Situation in South Sudan "dire"

(Vatican Radio) The African Union has threatened targeted sanctions against those inciting the violence in South Sudan, and the country’s neighbors have given the country’s warring faction until the end of Tuesday to lay down their arms and begin negotiations.

The current President of the UN Security Council, Ambassador Gérard Araud of France, said on Monday the situation in the country is “dire”.

“There are 70,000 idps [internally displaced persons] on 13 bases of the UNMISS and in all the country, there should be 180,000 idps,” he told reporters. “The situation of human rights is also pretty worrying. There are reports of torturing, killing disappearances and on ethnically targeted violence, so the human rights sector or component of the mission has been upgraded.”

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