South Sudan’s Riek Machar charged with murder and treason
South Sudan’s first Vice President Riek Machar has been charged with murder, treason and crimes against humanity.
Machar has been charged over his alleged involvement in attacks by a militia against federal forces in March, the justice minister announced on Thursday.
According to the South Sudan government the White Army, a loose band of armed youths, attacked a military base in Nasir, northeastern South Sudan, and killed more than 250 soldiers after they were given orders by the Machar.
The Vice President has been charged alongside Seven others, including the former minister of petroleum following investigations into a suspected rebellion plot.
“These crimes were marked by gross violations of the Geneva Conventions and international humanitarian law, including the desecration of corpses, persecution of civilians and attacks on humanitarian workers,” Justice Minister Joseph Geng Akech said as reported by the International Press.
Civil war erupted in South Sudan in 2013, less than two years after it gained independence from Sudan, when President Salva Kiir dismissed his then Vice President Riek Machar, accusing him of plotting a coup.
The conflict devastated the young nation, leaving an estimated 400,000 people dead through violence, hunger, and disease, while displacing around four million—about a third of the population.
A peace deal signed in 2018 brought the two rivals together in a fragile government of national unity, raising hopes for stability and recovery.
However, tensions have persisted, and the agreement has been plagued by mistrust, delays in implementing reforms, and frequent outbreaks of violence.
Those strains worsened earlier this year following renewed clashes in the northeastern Upper Nile state, where fighting escalated in late February.
In response, Kiir’s government arrested several senior figures from Machar’s faction, among them the petroleum minister and the deputy army chief, further straining the already shaky power-sharing arrangement.
