By Olivia Le Poidevin
GENEVA (Reuters) – The United Nations rights chief urged on Friday for warring sides in South Sudan to pull back from the brink, warning that the human rights situation risks further deterioration as fighting intensifies.
“The escalating hostilities in South Sudan portend a real risk of further exacerbating the already dire human rights and humanitarian situation, and undermining the country’s fragile peace process,” said the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk.
“All parties must urgently pull back from the brink,” he added.
Since May 3 fighting has intensified, with OHCHR citing reports of indiscriminate aerial bombardments and river and ground offensives by the South Sudan People’s Defence Forces SSPDF on Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA-IO) positions in parts of Fangak in Jonglei State and in Tonga County in Upper Nile.
At least 75 civilians were killed and 78 others injured by the fighting, which displaced thousands from their homes between May 3-20, the agency said. Civilian-populated areas have been targeted, including a medical facility operated by Doctors Without Borders (MSF), it added.
(Reporting by Olivia Le Poidevin; editing by Matthias Williams and Toby Chopra)
