World’s newest nation plagued by violence

The country is only six months old but decades of war and ethnic tension have left it awash with weapons and rival militia

JUBA // Six months after the world’s youngest country euphorically declared its independence, South Sudan is riven by conflict, killings and ethnic tensions as it stumbles along the path of nation building.

Two decades of war with former enemies from the now rump state of North Sudan left the grossly underdeveloped south in ruins, awash with guns and rival militia forces, and split by bitter divisions between multiple tribes.

On Friday, a top official from the Jonglei region claimed that thousands of people were killed in a wave of tribal violence last week.

Joshua Konyi, the commissioner for Pibor county in Jonglei state, said 3,141 people had been killed. UN and South Sudanese army officials have not confirmed the death toll, which would be the worst outbreak of ethnic violence ever seen in the fledgling nation.

Aside from internal conflict, South Sudan faces tensions in oil-rich regions along the still-undefined border with the north, with each side accusing the other of backing rebels and analysts warning of the risk of all-out war.

In late December, Juba accused Khartoum of killing 17 civilians in two days of bombing raids on the South Sudan border state of West- ern Bahr Al Ghazal, a charge denied by Khartoum.

The most pressing issue for the new country, which is the size of Spain and Portugal combined but has few tarred roads outside the state capitals, “is without doubt that of security”, Giorgio Musso, a professor at the University of Genoa, said in an October paper.

Since independence, South Sudan’s ex-rebel army has succeeded in defeating several rebel leaders – killing some, while others negotiated surrender with their troops joining the bloated 100,000-strong military, itself divided along ethnic lines.

“Much of the internal instability recently experienced ... has to do with unsettled disputes within the SPLM/A [the ruling party and army] itself, embroiling the very elite which is supposed to settle them,” Mr Musso added.

Several of the remaining rebel forces have proffered nominal political agendas, many of them accusing the government of corruption, election rigging and of the domination of President Salva Kiir’s Dinka ethnic group over other tribes.

The south, which broke free on July 9, has repeatedly accused Khartoum of continuing civil war tactics of destabilising it by shipping arms to militia groups – claims denied by the north.

Historical enmities between rival groups were exacerbated by the war, while traditional societal structures were badly shaken by a youth brought up to rely on guns for survival.

Many armed youths, with expectations and ambitions raised high by South Sudan’s historic independence, see taking up arms as a solution to their crushing poverty, stealing cattle in bloody tit-for-tat raids.

“South Sudan has a traumatised population who are used to using violence as a method to solve their disputes, and it will be a long, slow process to change this attitude,” said Sudan expert John Ashworth.

One of the hardest hit regions is the troubled eastern state of Jonglei, where violence last week left thousands displaced and local officials warning of heavy loss of life in bloody massacres.

Mr Konyi – the commissioner for Pibor county – said a column of some 6,000 armed youths from the Lou Nuer tribe last week marched into Pibor, home to the rival Murle people, whom they blame for abductions and cattle raiding and have vowed to exterminate. When the Lou Nuer gunmen attacked at the weekend, they allegedly torched huts and looted a hospital, only withdrawing after government troops opened fire. More than 1,000 children are missing, feared abducted, while tens of thousands of cows were stolen, said Mr Konyi.