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Sudan Tribune

Plural news and views on Sudan

Heavy fighting in southern Sudan between Nuer and Shilluk

KHARTOUM, July 23, 2004 (IRIN) — “Heavy fighting” broke out in the town of
Malakal on Thursday morning between Nuer and Shilluk ethnic groups,
according to local sources.

gril_holds_sign.jpgThe clashes started at 11:30 local time in the town near the main boat
station along the Nile river, sources told IRIN. Civilians said the
feuding became so widespread that the army and police intervened and
declared a state of emergency.

All shops in the town were closed down and people ordered to stay indoors,
while the army patrolled the roads surrounding the town. No fatalities
were reported.

The violence reportedly stemmed from an attack on Wednesday on a raft
carrying 25 Nuer civilians transporting 500 kg of wood and charcoal to
sell in the market. According to eyewitnesses and Oxfam UK, three people
were killed and the raft was set alight.

Residents of Malakal saw the burning raft floating towards them, sources
told IRIN. “The dead bodies were found floating down the river,” Otom
George, an attendant of the Shilluk king, Kwango, told IRIN.

Another three people are still reported missing, while 19 managed to
escape from the burning raft and are now in Malakal.

The survivors were unable to identify their assailants, but many Nuer have
accused Shilluk tribesmen of launching the attack in retaliation for the
militia violence that occurred in the surrounding Shilluk Kingdom in March
and April 2004.

According to the US-led Civilian Protection Monitoring Team,
government-allied militias of predominantly Nuer tribesmen (although some
Shilluk and Murle elements were also included) commenced a scorched earth
policy against villages surrounding Malakal town at the time.

Isaac Kenyi, the executive secretary of the Sudan Catholic Bishops’
Conference, undertook a fact-finding mission to the area and estimates
that as many as 625 civilians have been killed by the fighting this year
and 100,000 forcibly displaced.

Government-allied militia raids on Alek village, home of the revered
Shilluk king, Kwango, incited further inter-tribal animosity. The king’s
home was burnt to the ground and hundreds of his cattle were looted.

The king, or Reth, plays a central role in the Shilluk political and legal
administration.

One of the eight sacred Shilluk shrines of Nykango, the historical
spiritual leader who led the Shilluk tribe across Africa, was also left in
cinders. The sacred stool of Nykango is held in mystical veneration by the
Shilluk people. “They had no right to touch such an important symbol of
ours,” complained one Shilluk resident.

The Shilluk Kingdom became destabilised after 25 October 2003, when Lam
Akol, the leader of a government-allied militia, the Sudan People’s
Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A-U), re-defected from the government side
to the mainstream SPLM/A. Until then, the area had enjoyed the enviable
distinction of having stayed out of Sudan’s civil war.

As a result of a power vacuum created by Akol’s realignment, Khartoum
brought in militiamen to the area to support the SPLM/A-U rump faction,
now led by James Othow, and clear potential SPLM/A supporters.

Some of Akol’s Shilluk forces did not support his move back to the SPLM/A,
and were divided over whether or not to fight their former partners. For
the first time in many months, government forces reportedly became
embroiled in the conflict, while the militias razed an unknown number of
villages to the ground, looting and killing along the way.

The defection of Lam Akol and, perhaps more importantly, that of his first
commander Awad Jago, to the SPLM/A has severely diminished Khartoum’s
influence in this strategic location.

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