On Monday, the Associated Press revealed that South Sudanese troops went on a almost four-hour violent rampage, where they raped foreign aid workers and killed a local journalist near the country’s capital of Juba.
Advertisement
Several women were raped, men were beaten and a South Sudanese journalist was shot dead in cold blood. A report put together by the hotel’s owner and reviewed by the Associated Press alleges that at least five women were raped during the incident and details reports of torture and mock executions.
The failure of United Nations peacekeepers to act on their core mandate of guaranteeing non-combatants’ safety was corroborated in the HRW report, which said that the “peacekeepers did not venture out of the bases to protect civilians under imminent threat”.
The attack came just as people in Juba were thinking the worst was over.
A Ugandan employee of Terrain who witnessed the rampage reported that between 80 and 100 troops stormed the compound.
When it seemed imminent that the soldiers would gain access, Filipino aid worker Gian Libot hid under his bed, staying there for two hours.
In a statement released on 15 August, Power said: “We are deeply concerned that United Nations peacekeepers were apparently either incapable of or unwilling to respond to calls for help”.
During the attack on the Terrain, several survivors told the AP that soldiers specifically asked if they were American.
“They took the girls out of the bathroom one by one”, she said.
Citing witnesses and victims, the United Nations reported that besides being sexually assaulted, women and girls were also “robbed of their belongings, beaten up and verbally abused by SPLA soldiers and other security officers”. “Why, after two years of documenting these kind of incidents, would we be surprised that they would do it to Americans, to Westerners, to aid workers?” she says. Neither did embassies, including the U.S. Embassy. You’re helping the rebels.
“This horrific incident further underscores the need for an enhanced, assertive, and more robust global peacekeeping presence in Juba in order to better prevent crimes against civilians and the further deterioration of security in the capital”, United States Ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power, said in a statement.
The U.N. and USA embassies are accused of ignoring desperate pleas help, witnesses said.
South Sudanese security forces eventually rescued all but 16 people who were being held.
“Obviously, we regret the loss of life and the violence that the people who were in Hotel Terrain endured, and we take this incident very seriously”, said Farhan Haq, deputy spokesperson to the United Nations secretary-general. Gai’s visit comes days after the UN Security Council approved a US-drafted resolution backed by regional bloc IGAD to strengthen the 12,000-person peacekeeping mission, known as UNMISS, with 4,000 additional troops drawn from regional armies and equipped with a more aggressive mandate.
“We condemn these attacks”, State Department spokeswoman Elizabeth Trudeau said.
Advertisement
The war continues to pit South Sudan’s most prominent ethnic groups against one another: the SPLA and other members of the Dinka, the largest tribe in the country led by President Kiir, versus the rebel forces that include defected soldiers and militias from the Nuer, the second-largest group headed by Machar.
