“When Padeah was attacked on 16 February, I was taken from my village along with more than 20 other women and our children. [The attackers] forced us to carry food items and other goods they had looted from our village. They beat and lashed us with sticks until we reached Mirmir Payam where we were raped several times in front of our children. Most women gave-in to the rape because they were afraid that their [daughters would be] raped instead of them.”

This account from a rape survivor in Padeah, Unity State, South Sudan, is one of the numerous testimonies collected by UN Human Rights and United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) investigators following the violence against civilians that took place in the region from February to May 2022.

The findings of these investigations were documented in a report published in September. These include gross violations and abuses of international human rights law and serious violations of international humanitarian law in southern Unity State, namely killings and injuries, abductions and sexual violence, as well as forced displacement and attacks on humanitarian facilities and personnel. The report follows 32 verification missions conducted in three counties – Koch, Leer, and Mayendit – and neighbouring areas.

The report also reveals that these violations were committed during clashes between joint Government Forces and affiliated armed militias on one hand, and on the other, by elements of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army in Opposition (SPLM/A-IO (RM)) – loyal to former Vice-President Riek Machar.

Violations and abuses

At least 28 villages and settlements were affected during the clashes— with an estimated 173 civilians killed, 12 injured, and 37 women and children abducted. Many of the abductees were subjected to sexual violence, with a total of 131 cases of rape and gang rape documented, including girls as young as eight-years-old and a nine-year-old girl who was gang-raped to death. Approximately 44,000 civilians were displaced from at least 26 villages.

The southern part of Unity State has experienced repeated violent clashes involving military forces and armed militias since the onset, in December 2013, of the larger South Sudanese power struggle between President Salva Kiir Mayardit and then-Vice President Riek Machar. A first peace agreement, the Agreement on the Resolution of Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan was signed in August 2015. However, it was violated in July 2016 with clashes mainly concentrated on the capital, Juba, that also led to the distinct alignment of warring parties to the Government (SPLM-IG) and the opposing faction loyal to Riek Machar, the SPLM/A-IO.

Following the more recent Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan in September 2018, Unity State had returned to relative calm. That peace was short lived, however, due to tensions re-emerging between Government and opposition forces in February 2020. The report indicates that, according to some political analysts, the root causes of the violence in Unity State are political tensions and rivalries among different sections of the Nuer ethnic group.

Key recommendations

UN Human Rights and UNMISS have identified nine key individuals believed to bear the greatest responsibility for the violations committed between February and May 2022. They have urged the Government of South Sudan to address the lack of accountability for crimes under international and national law, stressing that this was critical for the resolution of the prolonged conflict in Unity State and lasting peace in South Sudan.

“Human rights violations were committed with impunity. The Government is duty-bound under international law to protect civilians, investigate allegations of human rights violations, and hold suspected perpetrators accountable in compliance with fair trial standards,” said the Special Representative of the Secretary-General and Head of UNMISS, Nicholas Haysom.

Both organizations also urged the Government of South Sudan to take adequate measures to protect civilians.

“The Government of South Sudan should also ensure that future investigations into allegations of human rights violations be conducted independently, impartially, promptly and thoroughly and that perpetrators be held accountable through fair trials” said Chief of the Africa Branch at UN Human Rights, Maarit Kohonen Sheriff.

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