South Sudanese government and rebel forces clashed in a few areas over the weekend in spite of a new ceasefire that went into effect on Sunday. However, there were no significant changes of territory or major battles reported.
Colonel Phillip Aguer, spokesperson of the SPLA-Juba forces, issued a series of statements on Saturday and again on Sunday, accusing rebel forces under Riek Machar of carrying out attacks on their positions in Malakal. The purpose of these attacks, according to Aguer, is for the rebels to gain more territories to use as assembly points when the peace deal is implemented.
He said the attacks in Malakal took place Saturday and Sunday. On the other hand, a rebel official blamed the government for instigating the violence, saying they had launched artillery shells across the Nile, but SPLA-IO did not respond.
SPLM/A-IO official Peter Adwok Nyaba, a native of Upper Nile State, said that government forces shelled Ditang, Bukieny, Obuwa and Lelo. “Our forces did not return fire respecting the orders of the [SPLA-IO] Commander in chief Dr. Riek Machar to cease fire,” said Nyaba.
He also claimed that government forces on Sunday shot at one of their speedboats that was traveling between Wau Shilluk and Watbajwok, wounding one passenger.
Separately, Dickson Gatluak Jock Nyuot, a journalist now working for SPLM/A-IO, said government forces traveling on three barges and seven gunboats mounted with heavy machine guns attacked their positions along the Nile. The military barge convoy heading from Leer to Malakal through SPLA-IO controlled areas randomly shelled along the Nile including at Fangak, targeting civilians, he claimed.
But the SPLA-Juba spokesman reportedly claimed that these barges were only for logistical purposes.
Separately, an SPLA-IO official has claimed that villages were attacked in Mayendit County over the weekend. John Riek, who coordinates relief activities in an opposition-held part of southern Unity state, told the AP news agency that government troops on Sunday attacked a village in the county following attacks on two other villages in the same area Saturday night.
He said government troops were burning houses and looting livestock on Sunday, and that he himself had to hide in a swamp to escape the violence. In its report, AP noted that there was no independent confirmation of John Riek’s claims.