Gunmen from President Salva Kiir’s Dinka tribe and the Shilluk militia, which is led by army defector, Major General Johnson Olony, and comprises members of an ethnic community of the same name, were involved in the violence.
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“People came to the… site looking for protection and this should be a sanctuary respected by all parties”. The bases, sheltered around 200,000 people, are protected by razor wire and no weapons are allowed in them.
South Sudan’s United Nations peacekeeping mission, UNMISS, initially said on Thursday that fighting between youths sheltering in the United Nations compound in Malakal on Wednesday night had killed five and wounded 30 after violence erupted between two ethnic groups.
MSF said an initial surge of violence lasted around three hours, forcing around 600 people, mostly women and children, to gather inside the organisation s hospital.
The site is one of eight United Nations bases in South Sudan providing a safe haven for displaced people since the civil war began in 2013.
“It was a brutal and sudden attack, where the attackers used machine guns and Kalashnikov rifles against helpless civilians”, he added.
The Mission said that UNMISS police in charge of maintaining order within the protection sites immediately intervened with tear gas to disperse the crowd.
UNMISS protects 47,791 civilians in Malakal, while 198,440 civilians are now protected at six UNMISS bases throughout South Sudan.
Simonovic said new theaters of violence have emerged in areas that had been little affected by direct hostilities, especially in the Equatoria states.
Dinka camp residents who fled into Malakal town have found shelter in churches and schools, UNHCR says, citing sources in the government, which controls Malakal.
Both the government and opposition rebels have been accused of carrying out massacres and more than 2.8 million people are in need of aid.
Kiir and Machar signed a peace deal in August 2015, but fighting has continued, even since Kiir named Machar to be his vice-president again on February 11.
Residents, rebels and aid sources told AFP that South Sudan government troops took part in the attack, which the UN Mission in South Sudan said may constitute a war crime.
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The camp that had housed almost 48,000 people has been heavily damaged.
