Sexual violence has reached “epic proportions” in the conflict in South Sudan, a team of UN experts said yesterday while calling for the establishment of a special committe to investigate violence against women.
“The scale of gang rape of civilian women as well as the horrendous nature of the rapes by armed men belonging to all groups is utterly repugnant and what’s worse is that there is no sense of outrage about this horror,” Yasmin Sooka, the chairperson of the UN independent Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan, said in a statement on Friday.
The team which concluded a ten-day visit to South Sudan where it met survivors said that the situation requires urgent attention of the world.
The experts pointed out that a UN survey found 70 percent of women in the capital Juba had suffered sexual assault since December 2013.
“There was justifiable uproar when international humanitarian workers were gang raped in July in the capital Juba but this is happening to South Sudanese women on a daily basis and the world is just averting its eyes,” reads part of the statement.
The UN exprts called on Kiir government and armed opposition groups to give UN investigators unfettered access to all areas in South Sudan.
“What concerns us is the pattern of sexual violence targeting women all over the country, the fact that rape is one of the tools being used for ethnic cleansing and the absolute impunity for these crimes,” said Sooka.
The experts stressed that all commanders at every level have an affirmative responsibility to prevent and punish rape and other sexual violence.
The Commission believes the only way to curb the “normalization” of rape is to conduct investigations leading to prosecution for those in command.