The new Chairperson of the African Union Commission (AUC) has expressed deep concerns over the detention of the Vice President of South Sudan, Riek Machar, as conflict threatens to engulf the world’s youngest nation barely seven years after the end of a brutal civil war.
Machar’s Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-in-Opposition (SPLM-IO) party said South Sudan’s defence minister and its chief of national security “forcefully entered” Machar’s residence in the capital, Juba, on Wednesday evening to deliver an arrest warrant. The VP was placed under house arrest.
Machar was being held with his wife at his home, accused of supporting the White Army militia, which clashed with the military in South Sudan’s Upper Nile State this month, according to SPLM-IO.
Machar’s party denies ongoing links with the White Army, which it fought alongside during the civil war.
In a statement on social media, the acting chair of the party’s foreign relations committee, Reath Muoch Tang, said the defence minister and chief of national security accompanied a convoy of more than 20 heavily armed vehicles, which had “forcefully entered” Machar’s residence. There his bodyguards were disarmed and an arrest warrant issued “under unclear charges”, he said.
The AU has called on parties involved to de-escalate tensions.
“The African Union urges all concerned parties to exercise maximum restraint, refrain from any actions that could exacerbate tensions, and engage in constructive dialogue to resolve any outstanding issues through peaceful and legal means. The well-being of the South Sudanese people must remain the foremost priority, and all efforts must be directed towards ensuring an environment conducive to lasting peace and development,” reads a statement issued by Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, AUC chair, this week.
The Chairperson called upon all parties to recommit to the principles of dialogue, and indicated he would deploy a panel of experienced diplomats to mediate.
The UN-led peacekeeping mission in South Sudan has also called for restraint and warned that the country stands on the brink of relapsing into widespread conflict.
South Sudan’s brutal civil war—fought between forces loyal to Machar and his rival, President Salva Kiir, often along ethnic lines—left hundreds of thousands of people dead before it ended with the formation of a united government in 2018.
SPLM-IO deputy chair Oyet Nathaniel Pierino said Machar’s detention meant the agreement had been “abrogated”, collapsing the peace deal that ended the five-year war.
