voted unanimously to send thousands more troops to protect civilians in the young nation convulsed by violence.
The council's vote could nearly double the size of the U.N.
peacekeeping force in the country, allowing for up to 12,500 military troops and 1,323 police to patrol there.
"Even with additional capabilities, we will not be able to protect every civilian in need in South Sudan," Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said after the unanimous Security Council vote that urged the clashing parties to seek a peaceful solution.
"There is no military solution to this conflict," Ban said, later adding that "in this season of peace, I urge the leaders of South Sudan to act for peace."
U.N. Assistant Secretary-General Toby Lanzer tweeted that more accounts were reaching him of human rights abuses amid the widening violence that has stoked fears of an all-out civil war in the world's newest country.
"Mass extrajudicial killings, the targeting of individuals on the basis of their ethnicity and arbitrary detentions have been documented in recent days," U.N. High Commissioner
for Human Rights Navi Pillay said in a statement.
Ban also cited reported rapes and mass graves, and warned that such atrocities could constitute war crimes.
One U.N. official saw 14 bodies at a mass grave in Bentiu and another 20 on a nearby riverbank, said Ravina
Shamdasani, a UNHCR spokeswoman for the commissioner.
"As for the other two reported graves in Juba, we are still working to verify but it is very difficult, and there are
reports that some bodies may have already been burned,"she said.
South Sudan's breathtaking descent into widespread conflict comes a little more than two years after the nation was ushered into existence with help from international powers after decades of civil war between separatists in the oil-rich
south and Sudan's northern government.
From BEN Latest News: www.benlatestnews.blogspot.com
0 comments:
Post a Comment