South Sudan: Tensions Between Juba and Khartoum After the Massacres of South Sudanese in Wad Madani

Juba — Yesterday, January 16, riots broke out in Juba, the capital of South Sudan, where demonstrators took to the streets to protest against the massacre of South Sudanese in neighboring Sudan.

Some criminals took advantage of the chaos to loot shops belonging to Sudanese citizens and attack the Sudanese embassy, where a diplomat was killed. The police fired into the air to disperse the crowd. The news of the massacre of civilians, including South Sudanese citizens, after the capture of Wad Madani by the Sudanese Armed Forces (FAS) has caused unrest. Wad Madani, the capital of Jazira State (Sudan’s main wheat producer), was recaptured by the SAF on 11 January from Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitaries who had taken it in December 2023. South Sudanese anger has been fuelled by videos circulating on the internet showing atrocities committed by SAF soldiers against South Sudanese and Sudanese from Western Sudan. The South Sudanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs had summoned the Sudanese ambassador to protest the “loss of lives of innocent citizens”.

The government in Khartoum has stated that it has set up a commission of inquiry into the massacres committed in Wad Madani. According to the Sudanese ambassador in Juba, the human rights violations were not committed by regular soldiers, but by a militia affiliated with the army. A SAF spokesman admits that there have been “violations committed by some individuals.” At the time of its capture by the SAF in December 2023, Wad Madani, located south of the capital Khartoum, was considered a relatively safe area, so thousands of people (including South Sudanese citizens) fleeing fighting in other parts of Sudan had found refuge there, and had thus been trapped in the city for more than a year.

Its recapture by the SAF marked a major step in the Sudanese conflict, marked by persistent human rights violations by all factions on the ground. The US government has imposed sanctions on both the head of the RSF, Mohammad Hamdan Dagalo Mousa, and the commander of the SAF, General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, for crimes committed against civilians. Ahmad Abdalla, a Sudanese-Ukrainian citizen and official of the Defence Industries System (DIS, the Sudanese military-industrial complex formerly known as the Military Industrial Corporation MIC), and of Portex Trade Limited, a Hong Kong-based company controlled by Abdalla, has also been sanctioned for violating the UN arms embargo on Sudanese factions.

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