Africa-Press – South-Sudan. The 2018 revitalized peace agreement is at serious risk of collapse, and called for urgent regional intervention to salvage the faltering peace process, the UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan has warned.
In a press release set to Eye Radio this morning, the Commission said the escalating military offensives, political crackdowns, and foreign military presence are not only accelerating the breakdown of the agreement but also fueling deep fear, instability, and widespread trauma among the people of South Sudan.
“South Sudan’s peace agreement is in crisis, the renewed violence is pushing the Revitalized Peace Agreement to the brink of irrelevance, threatening a total collapse. Such a breakdown risks fragmenting the country even further,” said Yasmin Sooka, Chairperson of the commission.
She stressed the need for the African Union and IGAD to urgently increase their leverage and pressure on South Sudan’s leaders to return to meaningful dialogue.
“Regional partners – especially the African Union and IGAD – must urgently increase their leverage and pressure on South Sudan’s leaders to de-escalate tensions, return to meaningful dialogue, and fully implement the peace agreement.”
Earlier this week, the Commission held consultative dialogues with a range of stakeholders, including civil society representatives, to assess the deepening crisis and explore measures to avert a return to civil war.
Participants expressed widespread fear and anxiety among communities, who are increasingly traumatized by persistent violence, arbitrary arrests, and the erosion of civic space.
According to the commission, since March 2025, the SSPDF has launched sustained military operations, including airstrikes on civilian populated areas, causing significant casualties and mass displacement.
It added reports of Ugandan forces supporting the SSPDF, alongside the government’s move to recruit thousands of additional soldiers, seemingly outside the security sector reform commitments in the Revitalized Agreement and pointing towards protracted conflict, have further heightened public fear and concern over looming widespread violations.
A commissioner at the commission, Carlos Castresana Fernández said South Sudanese are living with extreme trauma. They are enduring targeted military attacks that have upended lives and instilled widespread fear.
“The ongoing recruitment drive by the SSPDF directly contradicts the Revitalized Agreement, which calls for the training and deployment of the Necessary Unified Forces,” he said.
“The country’s leaders – signatories of the Agreement – must abandon partisan agendas and act in the interest of the people. The world cannot remain a bystander while civilians are bombed, and opposition voices are silenced. The time for passive diplomacy is over – these senseless attacks must stop.”
The rights body further stated that political tensions in South Sudan have sharply escalated with the arbitrary detention of key opposition figures, including the First Vice President, Dr. Riek Machar, alongside expanded military operations by the SSPDF, including in populated civilian areas, and against armed opposition forces and groups.
It added that escalating armed violence has deepened South Sudan’s humanitarian and human rights crises.
The South Sudan government has yet to comment on the report.
Civilians in Upper Nile State have been particularly affected, as the region, already grappling with emergency-level food insecurity, has become a key transit corridor for refugees fleeing the conflict in Sudan.
Fears are growing that if this conflict trajectory is not averted, South Sudan’s conflict will entwine with the crisis of Sudan, with even more dire consequences.
The Commission reiterated its call for regional and international actors to intensify diplomatic pressure on South Sudan’s leaders to ensure immediate de-escalation and full implementation of the Revitalized Agreement.
In conclusion, the commission said it continues to monitor developments closely and is documenting human rights violations and abuses committed by all parties to the conflict, including those potentially amounting to war crimes.
The Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan is an independent body mandated by the United Nations Human Rights Council.
First established in March 2016, it has been renewed annually since.
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