South Sudan’s human rights commissioner has raised the alarm on press situation and rights defenders in the country, saying the ongoing conflict undermines the efforts to hold the perpetuators accountable.
Beny Gideon Mabor, a human right commissioner at South Sudan Human Rights Commission, was speaking at an event marking the 62nd ordinary session of the African union commission on humans and people’s rights held at Nouakchott, Mauritania.
The annual gathering of human rights experts and officials from the continent and the world started on 25th and is expected to carry on until May 9th. South Sudan was represented by Beny Gideon Mabor, who expressed his concerns and called for support.
“On the freedom of assembly, association and situation of human rights defenders as a key challenge in the time of conflict, human rights defenders sometimes face attack by elements of the state authorities, ranging from closure of newspapers and shutdown of electronic media outlets such as sudantribune and Radio Tamazuj, detention, enforced disappearance and even killings,” said Beny through a statement seen by Radio Tamazuj.
The government official, however, denied that these actions are sanctioned by the government but committed in the name of the state by individuals.
“Unfortunately, majority of these incidences are not authorized by the state, but carried out by individuals in the name of the state. To the best of our investigation, there is no existing policy on reprisals of human rights defenders,” he explained.