Ceasefire ignored as South Sudan army rampaged: Amnesty

Bloomberg

Pro-government forces in South Sudan went on a weeks-long rampage of “staggering brutality” in opposition-controlled areas and killing civilians and destroying their food supplies even after warring sides agreed a cease-fire, Amnesty International said.
Soldiers and allied militias were given “free rein” to commit atrocities in the country’s north between mid-April and early July, the London-based group said on Wednesday. Its report, which cited about 100 testimonies, shows there’s been no respite for civilians after almost five years of civil war and casts doubt on whether a peace deal being brokered about the same time can end hostilities. Government forces shot some civilians dead, while others they set on fire, hung from trees or ran over with armored vehicles, Amnesty said. There was also a “deliberate attack on food sources” in Mayendit and Leer counties, just as residents began to recover from a famine declared there in early 2017. Army spokesman Lul Ruai Koang said by phone that he would comment once he had read Amnesty’s findings.
The report contains only the latest in a stream of alleged atrocities committed during a conflict that began in Africa’s youngest nation in December 2013 and has claimed tens of thousands of lives while fueling a regional refugee crisis.
President Salva Kiir and the main rebel leader, Riek Machar, who agreed a ceasefire at the end of June, signed a supposedly final deal to share power in a transitional government.