Rights body wants arms embargo imposed on South Sudan
December 10, 2017 (KAMPALA) – The Centre for Peace and Justice (CPJ) has called on the United Nations Security Council to impose a comprehensive arms embargo on the South Sudanese government.
“If arm embargo impose on South Sudan it will help the government to be able to control the arms they have in hands,” reads the statement.
The calls comes days after inter-communal violence in South Sudan’s Jonglei state left more than 40 people dead and dozens injured.
“Sudan needs an arm embargo immediately today not tomorrow, to stop inter communal fighting that killed hundreds in the last three months,” CPJ further stressed in the statement.
It added, “Politicians and tribal generals who are after their interest, are supplying guns to communities to protect their interests and threaten government in case they want them out of office”.
The rights body also wondered why the Juba government has no monitoring mechanism to control and restrict the use of arms.
In December last year, the UN Security Council failed on Friday to adopt a United States-drafted resolution to impose an arms embargo and further sanctions on South Sudan despite warnings by UN officials of a possible genocide in the war-torn East African nation. There were seven votes in favor and eight abstentions.
However, for any resolution to succeed at the Security Council, it needs nine votes in favor and no vetoes by the US, France, Russia, Britain or China for it to be adopted.
(ST)