South Sudan’s opposition and observers have warned that the prosecution of the country’s suspended vice president, Riek Machar, threatens to jeopardize a peace deal that ended a devastating civil war and plunge the country back into full-scale conflict.
On September 11, Machar was charged with murder, treason, crimes against humanity and other serious crimes in connection with a deadly attack by the White Army rebel group on a government army garrison in Nasir province in the country’s northeast. President Salva Kiir subsequently suspended him from office.
The prosecution is the culmination of a series of developments this year triggered by the Nasir ambush that has escalated a long-standing feud between Kiir and Machar and raised concerns about the country’s fragile peace.
In March, the White Army, a group of community militias that fought alongside Machar’s opposition forces during the civil war, captured a base in the province that belonged to the country’s military, the South Sudan People’s Defense Forces (SSPDF). The militia says it acted in self-defense.
A UN crew member and at least 27 SSPDF soldiers were killed in gunfire a few days later as a UN helicopter tried to evacuate troops from the province in Upper Nile State.
The government responded by conducting aerial bombardments of Nasir and adjacent areas, killing and injuring civilians. Human Rights Watch accused the military of it use of incendiary weapons.
Authorities too more than 22 arrested political and military personnel joined Machar’s party, the Sudan People’s Liberation Army-in-Opposition (SPLM-IO), and placed him and his wife, Angela Teny, under house arrest. He was accused of trying to foment the uprising.
Kiir also reshuffled his cabinet and security personnel in the transitional government established by the peace deal, including removing officials aligned with Machar.
In May, he promoted second vice president Benjamin Bol Mel, a US-sanctioned businessman who is part of his inner circle, to vice chairman of his party, raising fears among the opposition that Kiir was grooming him as his successor.
The latest attack on Machar has further fueled tensions.
“In a very short time, I think I will be in the bushes of South Sudan because the regime forced us to do this,” said Pal Mai Deng, SPLM-IO spokesperson and one of 20 people charged alongside Machar in self-exile. “Technically, the peace agreement is largely abrogated by the president and his tribal court. No one has any room left to say that the agreement is still in force.”
Daniel Akech, senior analyst for South Sudan at the International Crisis Group, described the persecution as “the latest spike in escalations.” “This is actually a major escalation in the dismantling of the agreement, but not only that: putting Machar behind bars in court creates emotional tension and divides the country,” he said.
Machar and Kiir were both members of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army guerrilla movement that fought for Sudan’s independence, which it gained in 2011, with Kiir becoming president and Machar first vice president.
South Sudan descended into a bloody civil war in 2013 after Kiir fired Machar and later accused him and others of plotting a coup. Machar founded a rebel faction, SPLM-IO, and both groups were involved in fighting that killed more than 400,000 people and displaced nearly half the country’s population. The conflict was marked by reports of ethnic cleansing, sexual violence and conscription of children.
It exposed ethnic tensions in the country and was fought largely along ethnic lines – with most of the fighting taking place between the Dinka community of Kiir and the Nuer of Machar, the second largest ethnic group in the country.
In 2018, Kiir and Machar signed a peace deal, brokered by Uganda and Sudan, ending the civil war; creating a unity government of the two parties; and returning Machar to the vice presidency. But implementation of the agreement has barely gotten off the ground as the two sides continually clash over power-sharing.
Selam De mission, a researcher at the Institute for Security Studies, said the risk of a return to civil war is “high”.
“In South Sudan, the 2018 peace agreement is the only document that holds the country together,” she said. “Anything done outside the agreement or the consent of these opposing parties could amount to a violation of this peace agreement.”
She said these steps also risk sending a message to other opposition parties – which have also joined militias – that they may also be threatened.
The Guardian has contacted the government spokesperson for comment.
Fighting between militias and government forces that began in the Upper Nile early this year has continued and has spread to five other states where fighting has occurred. Nearly 2,000 people have been killed.
About 300,000 South Sudanese have fled the country so far this year, largely due to an escalating conflict, the UN Commission on Human Rights said on Monday. “Armed clashes are taking place on a scale not seen since the signing of the cessation of hostilities in 2017, with civilians bearing the brunt of human rights violations and displacement,” the UN said in a statement.
The fighting has also hampered access to humanitarian aid. “The situation is alarming and there is a lot of suffering,” said John Garang Akot, head of program implementation at Plan International South Sudan. “We call on the warring parties to reach an agreement so that the affected communities can enjoy peace.”
Last month, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said warned the country was on the brink of a new war and urged the government to ensure due process and fair trial for Machar and his co-defendants.
Deng, who was dismissed as Minister of Water Resources and Irrigation in August called on regional and international communities to intervene “to save the country from renewed chaos and political disorder.”
“Everyone in the country is tired of war,” he said. “In the last years of the wars we have fought, none of us have benefited. None of us have won.”
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