South Sudan rebels slaughter ‘hundreds’ in ethnic massacres

JUBA: Rebel gunmen in South Sudan massacred ‘ hundreds’ of civilians because of their ethnicity when they captured a key oil town last week, the UN said Monday, calling for a probe into one of the worst reported atrocities in the war-torn nation.

In the main mosque alone, “more than 200 civilians were reportedly killed and over 400 wounded,” the UN mission in the country said. Civilians including children were also massacred at a church, hospital and an abandoned UN World Food Programme compound, it said.

Toby Lanzer, the top UN aid official in the country, told AFP after visiting the town of Bentiu he had witnessed the “most terrible sight”.

“There are piles of bodies lining the streets where they had been executed, in the market, outside and inside places of worship... the majority wearing civilian clothes,” he said.

Fighters took to the radio to urge men to rape women from the opposition ethnic group and said rival groups should be forced from the town, the UN said.

South Sudan’s army has been fighting rebels loyal to sacked vice president Riek Machar, who launched a renewed offensive this month targeting key oil fields.

The conf lict has an ethnic dimension, pitting President Salva Kiir’s Dinka tribe against militia forces from Machar’s Nuer people.

UN human rights investigators said that after rebels wrested Bentiu from government forces in heavy battles last Tuesday, the gunmen spent two days hunting down those who they believed opposed them.

The UN peacekeeping mission in South Sudan ( UNMISS) “strongly condemns these targeted killings,” UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in New York. — AFP