Peace in South Sudan, a Nation U.S. Helped Build, Is Unraveling
Africa|‘Knives Are Out’ in South Sudan as Vice President Is Held in Detention
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/16/world/africa/south-sudan-tensions.html
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After years of gradual progress toward stability, a succession battle is pushing the country to the precipice of another full-blown civil war.
Riek Machar, the vice president of South Sudan, has been detained at his residence in an upscale neighborhood of the capital, Juba, since March. Armored personnel carriers block the gate of the sprawling compound and security officers wielding AK-47s patrol the perimeter.
Inside, Mr. Machar lives in isolation, his phones and laptop seized. His wife, a government minister, is staying separately in the compound. While she is allowed to cook for him, she is not allowed to deliver the meals herself.
South Sudan is the world’s youngest nation. Its population of 11 million people gained independence in 2011 with the help of the United States. Two years later, the country was in a bloody civil war fueled by ethnic violence, with Mr. Machar on one side and Salva Kiir, the president of South Sudan, on the other.
The two leaders agreed to form a unity government in 2020 that was meant to pave the way for future elections. Instead, South Sudan’s tenuous peace is on the verge of collapse, with Mr. Machar accused of inciting an antigovernment rebellion led by a militia known as the White Army. The group was linked to the downing of a United Nations helicopter in March.
With no succession plan in place and violence surging, fears are spreading that oil-rich South Sudan will once again explode into war, setting off a mass exodus of refugees that would spill into neighboring nations like Ethiopia and Sudan, both burdened by war and famine. The turmoil has already drawn in Uganda, which deployed troops in March to back Mr. Kiir’s government.
“South Sudan is at a critical and terrible juncture,” Puok Both Baluang, Mr. Machar’s acting press secretary, said in an interview. The vice president’s arrest, he said, “is a violation of the Constitution, his right to movement and his rights as a constitutional office holder with immunity.”