Clashes between rival ethnic groups in south Sudan have left more than 170 people dead, a district official said on Monday. Armed fighters from the Murle ethnic group in remote Akobo county in eastern Jonglei state attacked Lou Nuer villages over the weekend, county commissioner Doyak Chol said.
"We have found 177 bodies dead, and we are expecting many more, even as high as 300 in total," Chol told AFP by satellite telephone. "Many are unaccounted for, whole villages have been burnt to the ground. "The destruction is terrible." It was the second outbreak of deadly violence between the two ethnic groups in Jonglei in a month. In March, as many as 750 people were killed in clashes in Pibor county further south.
Chol said that the areas attacked had been left vulnerable after a government-backed disarmament campaign collected guns from one area, but not from other rival groups. "The Murle came with guns, but the people here had nothing to defend themselves with," he said. "I think that this was a revenge attack," he added.
Jonglei state was one of the areas hardest hit in Sudan's two-decade-long north-south civil war, which ended in 2005. But the state remains awash with small arms and there are frequent clashes between rival groups. Authorities struggle to maintain order in the sprawling state, which is the size of Austria and Switzerland combined. The limited dirt roads that cross the swampy region are often impassable for months at a time as a result of heavy rains.
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