Scores killed in clashes at disputed Sudan-South Sudan border

More than 50 people including women, children and two UN peacekeepers have been killed in attacks along South Sudan's border with Sudan, officials have said, the deadliest in a spate of incidents since 2021 related to a boundary dispute.

Abyei Administrative Area’s Information Minister Bulis Koch confirmed on Monday that 52 people were killed and 65 others wounded during clashes that began on Saturday with attacks by armed youth from neighbouring Warrap State of South Sudan.

“The authorities have imposed a curfew from 6 pm to 6 am (1600 GMT to 0400 GMT) to give security organs time to provide more protection to the civil population and identify those who might be carrying out more attacks,” Koch said.

"Twic armed youth in collaboration with the Nuer spiritual leader Gai Machiek attacked Nyinkuac market in Abyei town where 16 innocent civilians were killed and 35 others wounded," the official said.

Another 13 internally displaced people from Abyei were killed when armed Twic youth ambushed a vehicle transporting them from Biemnhom to the Rumamer area of Abyei in Kolngolnyang, he said.

Abyei is an oil-rich area that is jointly administered by South Sudan and Sudan, which have both staked claims to it.

A Ghanaian peacekeeper from a United Nations force based in Abyei was killed when its base in the town of Agok was attacked amid the violence, the UN Interim Security Force for Abyei (UNISFA) said on Sunday.

In further violence a day later, a second peacekeeper, from Pakistan, was killed and four of his colleagues and a civilian were wounded while transporting civilians from a UNISFA base to a hospital, UNISFA said on Monday. It gave no further details.

Koch said hundreds of displaced civilians had sought shelter at a UNISFA base.

Repeated clashes

William Wol, Warrap State's information minister, said his government would conduct an investigation jointly with the Abyei administration.

Separately, Twic County Commissioner Simon Aguek Chan denied in a statement that Twic youth were involved in the attack.

“The fighting erupted within Abyei town between Abyei armed youth and Nuer armed youth who are staying within Abyei and we don’t have people there, our youth cannot reach there, all those allegations levelled against Twic youth are not true,” Aguek said.

He claimed that the Abyei armed youth disagreed with the Nuer armed who had been staying with them in Abyei.

There have been repeated clashes in Abyei between rival factions of the Dinka ethnic group related to a dispute over the location of an administrative boundary where significant tax revenue is collected from cross-border trade.

Civil war in South Sudan, erupting soon after the country won independence from Sudan, and fought largely along ethnic lines between Dinkas and Nuers, caused hundreds of thousands of deaths between 2013 and 2018.

Since then, routine clashes among a patchwork of armed groups have continued to kill and displace large numbers of civilians. Fighting in Abyei in November killed at least 32 people.