Gunmen loot relief in Jonglei’s Pibor County
By Philip Thon Aleu
March 2, 2010 (BOR) – Armed robbers looted an UN relief convoy in Pibor County on Monday, according to informed sources. The aid vehicles were heading to neighboring Pochala County. No human casualties have been reported but a land cruiser is missing.
Joseph Okello, Jonglei SPLM secretariat officer who hails from Pochala County, said the ambush occurred between Labarab and Pochala. He blamed Murle tribesmen inhabiting Pibor County, and predicted that this month’s election campaigns will be disrupted there.
Sudan Tribune can not independently confirm the attack.
Mr. Okello said the convoy fell into the possession of the raiders’ squad a few hours’ drive out of Labarab. The driver of the leading car escaped unhurt but left the car behind. He said all relief items, including food, are looted. Police uniforms carried by Pochala County car were also looted. A police unit providing escort from Labarab to Pochala never helped to stop robbers. All the cars but one returned to Labarab.
A disarmament exercise in the state extended to Pibor County in February 2010, but rear areas at the Ethiopia border are yet to be covered. Armed youths who are adamantly opposed to voluntary disarmament are allegedly seeking a haven in that mountainous location, which would pose a challenge to South Sudanese armed forces’ efforts to retrieve guns.
April polls for the first inclusive elections in the south since independence in 1956 are mandated in the comprehensive peace agreement (CPA) signed between the NCP and the former southern rebels, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) in 2005. The elections campaign season officially started in Bor town, the capital of Jonglei state and the expansion of campaign rallies to counties is another step observers say may prove difficult.
(ST)