Monday 31 / March / 2025
Juba: South Sudan's main opposition party said on Thursday that a 2018 peace deal that helped end the country's civil war had collapsed after party leader Riek Machar was arrested.
Machar's opposition SPLM-IO party said after his arrest that the five-year peace deal that had ended the country's civil war had "been abrogated."
It "effectively brings the agreement to a collapse, thus the prospect for peace and stability in South Sudan has now been put into serious jeopardy," a party representative said.
South Sudan's government has not yet commented on Machar's arrest nor his party's statement on the peace deal.
Inernational observers have sounded the alarm, fearing the return of civil war.
Head of UN mission calls for 'restraint'
Nicholas Haysom, the head of the UN mission in South Sudan on Thursday called on all parties to "exercise restraint and uphold the revitalised peace agreement."
"Tonight, the country's leaders stand on the brink of relapsing into widespread conflict or taking the country forward towards peace, recovery and democracy in the spirit of the consensus that was reached in 2018 when they signed and committed to implementing a Revitalized Peace Agreement," Haysom said in a statement on Wednesday night.
The UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan called a potential return to full-scale fighting "catastrophic," adding that it represented "a direct threat to millions of lives."
"The deliberate targeting of opposition leaders and civilians represents a reckless disregard for international law and the country's future," said Commission Chairwoman Yasmin Sooka.
"The Peace Agreement," added Sooka, "is not optional: it is binding. Its systematic undermining by political and military actors is not only unlawful but a betrayal of the South Sudanese people who have already endured years of devastating conflict."
Kenya's President William Ruto announced on social media that he had spoken to President Salva Kiir about Machar's arrest, adding that he would dispatch a special envoy to help defuse the situation.
The African Union (AU), too, voiced "deep concern" over the situation, urging all parties to "de-escalate."
In Washington, the US Bureau of African Affairs called on Kiir to release Machar and "demonstrate sincerity of stated commitments to peace."
