This archive report was first published on 7 May 2020.
South Sudan is on the brink of a new crisis as violence erupts in the country, threatening a fragile peace agreement between the government and rebel groups.
On Tuesday, reports emerged of clashes between the National Salvation Front, an armed opposition group led by former deputy army leader Thomas Cirilo, and forces under the South Sudan People's Defence Forces, as well as the Sudan People's Liberation Army-in Opposition.
The National Salvation Front accused the SPLA-IO and SSPDF of attacking its military bases in Katigiri and Wonduruba Payam of Yei River County, Central Equatoria State.
"Our forces fought back in self-defence and dispersed the attacking enemy force which lost four soldiers," the group said in a statement, referring to an incident on May 5.
"Again on May 6, 2020, at 5:00 am, the SSPDF and SPLA-IO forces supported by armoured personnel carriers and heavy weapon-mounted attack vehicles attacked our advance base in the outskirts of Loka. We responded to the attack and destroyed 1 Toyota land cruiser," the group added.
South Sudan's fragile peace agreement, known as the Revitalised Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (R-ARCSS), was signed in 2018 and implemented in February. However, several groups, including the National Salvation Front, have yet to sign on.
On May 6, 2020, prominent South Sudanese civil society activist Edmund Yakani warned that the Rome Declaration on cessation of hostilities may be ignored.
"The ongoing military confrontations between the forces being it to IO, SSPDF and NAS around areas of Yei, Lainya or Morobo are really a contradiction to the Rome Declaration," he told The EastAfrican.
Community leader Batali Oliver accused the SPLA-IO of forceful displacement of civil population who had just returned from refugee camps in Uganda.
"Forces loyal to Dr Riek Machar came to our Village of Wuji payam [in the former Kupera County], looking for Gen Thomas Cirilo's army. They didn't get them but they started beating the local people, including children and the elderly and looted," he said.
