Recent reports indicate that the South Sudanese minister of petroleum has been detained by military officials.
- South Sudan’s petroleum minister detained by military officials.
- Arrests linked to officials allied with the First Vice President, Riek Machar.
- Tensions rise as security forces deploy around Machar’s home after arrests.
Amid rising tensions in the oil-producing nation of South Sudan, the country’s security forces arrested the its petroleum minister, a day after apprehending several military officers.
According to a spokesperson, as seen on Reuters, the officials arrested have been allied with the First Vice President, Riek Machar, former rebel commander.
“As of now, there’s not any reason provided to us that led to the arrest or the detention of (these) officials,” Machar’s spokesperson, Puok Both Baluang, told Reuters.
The spokewoman also relayed that members of South Sudanese security officials had been deployed around Machar’s home.
The arrests came weeks after fierce fighting between national troops and the White Army militia, a loosely organized organization primarily made up of Machar’s ethnic group, the armed Nuer, in the strategically important northern town of Nasir.
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The White Army fought with Machar’s forces between 2013 and 2018 in the civil conflict, which pitted them against mostly ethnic Dinka troops loyal to President Salva Kiir.
Since splitting from neighboring Sudan in 2011, South Sudan has been troubled with instability.
The country has been having difficulty implementing the provisions of a peace agreement signed in 2018 to put an end to a civil war that broke out in 2013 and claimed almost 400,000 lives.
Elections that were originally planned for October have been rescheduled till 2026.
Just last wee, the African Union and the United Nations peacekeeping force in South Sudan issued a warning about the possibility of “widespread violence” and demanded a de-escalation in Nasir’s Upper Nile State.
Ter Manyang, the director of the Center for Peace and Advocacy in Juba, said the arrest could lead to war, barring the proper handling of the issue by the country’s top officials.
