Officials and villagers in Wanjok in Northern Bahr el Ghazal were surprised and suspicious that a UN-marked helicopter landed Tuesday in the town’s Freedom Square.Aweil East commissioner Awet Kiir Awet told Radio Tamazuj that the helicopter flew overhead Tuesday morning , then landed in the square, creating panic and fear among the civilians.
The commissioner said that he contacted UN officials to ask whether they had sent a helicopter to Wanyjok, but they denied. The UN told him that they did not have a plane of that size nor any planes that flew over Aweil on that day.
UN aircraft typically do not land in Wanyjok, which is the county seat of Aweil East, but rather in the nearby town of Malualkon.
Commissioner Awet Kiir Awet added that the skin color of the pilots ‘was not like khawajas (whites), it was like jellabas (Arabs)’.
The event has prompted authorities to investigate the source of the aircraft. They have given the United Nations until Thursday to explain the origin of the aircraft.