CIVILIAN DEVASTATION

Abuses by All Parties in the War in

Southern Sudan

Human Rights Watch/Africa

(formerly Africa Watch)

Human Rights Watch

New York $ Washington $ Los Angeles $ London
Copyright 8 June 1994 by Human Rights Watch
All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 94-75427

ISBN 1-56432-129-0

Human Rights Watch/Africa (formerly Africa Watch)

Human Rights Watch is a nongovernmental organization established in 1978 to
monitor and promote the observance of internationally recognized human rights in
Africa, the Americas, Asia, the Middle East and among the signatories of the
Helsinki accords. Kenneth Roth is the executive director; Cynthia Brown is the
program director; Holly J. Burkhalter is the advocacy director; Gara LaMarche is
the associate director: Juan E. Méndez is general counsel; and Susan Osnos is the
communications director. Robert L. Bernstein is the chair of the executive
committee and Adrian W. DeWind is vice chair. Its Africa division was established
in 1988 to monitor and promote the observance of internationally recognized human
rights in Africa. Abdullahi An-Na'im is the executive director; Janet Fleischman is
the Washington representative; Bronwen Manby, Karen Sorensen, Alex Vines and
Berhane Woldegabriel are research associates; Kimberly Mazyck and Urmi Shah
are associates; Alison L. Des Forges is a consultant. William Carmichael is the
chair of the advisory committee and Alice Brown is the vice chair.
 HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH

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Human Rights Watch began in 1978 with the founding of its Helsinki division. Today, it
includes five divisions covering Africa, the Americas, Asia, the Middle East, as well as the signatories of
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The staff includes Kenneth Roth, executive director; Cynthia Brown, program director; Holly
J. Burkhalter, advocacy director; Allyson Collins, research associate; Richard Dicker, associate counsel;
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 CONTENTS

PREFACEx

GLOSSARY xii

I. INTRODUCTION AND SUMMARY 1

II. BACKGROUND 19
ETHIOPIAN REFUGE 22
SPLA SPLIT IN 1991 25
FAMINE CREATION 26
HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF THE HUNGER TRIANGLE 29

III. VIOLATIONS OF THE RULES OF WAR BY GOVERNMENT

FORCES 35
GOVERNMENT ABUSES DURING THE 1992 DRY SEASON
OFFENSIVE 35
Government Offensive from Ethiopia into Eastern Upper Nile
in 1992 37
Government Offensive from Malakal South in March/April
1992 40
Government and SPLA-Nasir Attacks in Bahr El Ghazal in
1992 43
Indiscriminate Government Bombing and the Capture of
Kapoeta and Torit in 1992 45

GOVERNMENT ABUSES BEFORE AND DURING THE BATTLE

FOR JUBA, 1992 49
Abuses During the 1991-92 School Strike and Civic Struggle 50

GOVERNMENT ABUSES FOLLOWING JUNE-JULY 1992 SPLA-

TORIT ATTACKS ON JUBA 56
Summary Executions, Disappearances, Arrests, and Mass
Displacement 58
Government Execution and Disappearance of International
Aid Employees 60
Government Accountability for Killings and Disappearances 62
Detention and Deportation of Clergy 64
Forcible Displacement of Civilians into Inadequate
Conditions 65
Law on Forced Displacement 68

v
 Prohibition on Targeted, Land Mine Attacks on Civilians 69

GOVERNMENT ABUSES IN 1993 70

Scorched Earth Campaigns: Bahr El Ghazal 70
Attacks on Civilians: Bor 73
Indiscriminate Government Bombing in 1993 74
Government Offensive in Western Equatoria from July-
August 1993 76
Bombing in Late 1993 79

INDISCRIMINATE GOVERNMENT BOMBING IN THE 1994 DRY

SEASON CAMPAIGN 80

LEGAL STANDARDS APPLICABLE TO BOMBING AND

SHELLING 85

IV. SPLA VIOLATIONS OF THE RULES OF WAR 90

SPLA FACTION FIGHTING IN UPPER NILE PROVINCE FROM
1991-1992 91
Killings and Looting During September/October 1991 92
SPLA-Torit Attack on Adok, Upper Nile 96
SPLA-Nasir Second Raids into Kongor/Bor Area in 1991 96
Fighting Resumes After First Cease-Fire in 1991 99
SPLA-Nasir Accountability for the Bor Massacre 99
SPLA-Torit Accountability for the Counterattack106
SPLA-Nasir Attacks in Bahr El Ghazal in 1992 107
SPLA-Torit Counterattack on Nasir Territory in Early 1992108
Fighting in Upper Nile in mid-1992110

ABUSES IN EQUATORIA DURING 1992112

SPLA-Torit Abuses During and After its Two Attacks on
Juba from June-August 1992112
Shelling of Juba Airport112
Siege of Garrison Towns by the SPLA-Torit and the
Prohibition on Starvation of Civilians as a Method
of Combat121
Abuses Committed during William Nyuon's Defection from
SPLA-Torit and Associated Fighting in Equatoria
in late 1992127

VILLAGE BURNINGS IN EQUATORIA IN EARLY 1993136

SPLA in Lafon136
The Didinga of Chukudum141
FACTION FIGHTING IN 1993 IN THE UPPER NILE146

vi
 Pariang 1993, Kala Azar Epidemic Worsened by Nuer and
Government Raids 149
Kuac Deng Attacked by SPLA-Torit Twice in Early 1993151
Panyakur and Kongor, Occupied by SPLA-Nasir in Late
1992152
Duk Faiwil Attacked by SPLA-Nasir in February/March
1993155
SPLA-Nasir Occupation of Panyakur/Kongor in Early 1993155
Kongor Captured by SPLA-Torit on March 27, 1993156
Accountability of SPLA-Torit for Deaths and Injuries in
Kongor Attack158
Effects of Fighting in Kongor 159
SPLA-Nasir Abducts Women in Duk Faiwil in April 1993160
Kuac Deng Attacked by SPLA-Torit in April 1993160
Ayod Attacked by SPLA-Torit on April 2, 1993161
Yuai, Created by SPLA-Nasir, Attacked by SPLA-Torit on
April 16, 1993164
Pagau and Pathai Attacked by SPLA-Torit from April-May
1993167
Mogogh Area Attacked by SPLA-Torit in April 1993169
Gar and Surrounding Villages Attacked by SPLA-Torit in
April 1993169
Accountability for SPLA-Torit Attacks on Ayod and Yuai in
April 1993170
Cease-fire Agreement on May 28, 1993171
Pagau Attacked Again by SPLA-Torit in June 1993172
Second Attack on Yuai by SPLA-Torit on June 16, 1993172
Tip Village Attacked by SPLA-Torit in June 1993173
Kongor/Panyakur Attacked Again by SPLA-Nasir/United in
July 1993173

SPLA FOOD POLICIES ABUSIVE OF THE CIVILIAN

POPULATION 174
Background175
Stealing Food from Civilians177
Looting from Civilians Under Enemy Control178
Forced Farm Labor179
Ugandans Used for Farm Labor in Khor Shum (Pakok) 180
Taxation or Requisition of Food from Farmers181
Requisition of Food from Emergency Relief Recipients183
Diversion and Stealing of Relief Supplies184
Displacement of the Civilian Population for Reasons Related
to the Conflict: Yuai185

vii
 FORCED RECRUITMENT189
Forced Portering192
Historical Background193

UNACCOMPANIED MINORS AND RECRUITMENT OF CHILD

SOLDIERS195
SPLA-Torit Position on Recruitment of Minors197
Rationale for Segregation of Unaccompanied Minors198
Conditions in the Ethiopian Refugee Camps204
Emergency Evacuation of Unaccompanied Minors Along
With Sudanese Refugees from Ethiopia208
Conditions for Unaccompanied Minors Repatriated to Sudan
from Ethiopia209
Military Training and Forced Recruitment of Boys Inside
Sudan218
Conditions in Nasir and Status of Family Reunification
Program and Schooling219
Minority Minors222

SUMMARY EXECUTIONS, DISAPPEARANCES, AND TORTURE224

Summary Executions224
Disappearances224
Torture226
Prolonged Arbitrary Detention and Torture of Long-Term
Prisoners228
Prolonged Arbitrary Detention and Torture of Ugandan
Prisoners by SPLA-Torit235
Other Arbitrary Detention238

SPLA ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE239

Customary Southern Sudanese Law239
The SPLA Code242
Due Process Lacking in Procedure and Investigations243
No Independent Tribunal245
Capital Punishment247
Accountability250

V. RECOMMENDATIONS253
UNITED NATIONS253
UNITED STATES, UNITED KINGDOM, AND OTHER
CONCERNED COUNTRIES253
SUDAN GOVERNMENT254
SPLA-TORIT AND SPLA-NASIR/UNITED255

viii
APPENDIX A: APPLICATION OF THE RULES OF WAR TO THE
CONFLICT IN SUDAN257

MAPS

Sudaninside front cover

Upper Nile18
Western Equatoria & Bahr El-Ghazal34
Eastern Equatoria89

ix
x Civilian Devastation
Contents xi
xii Civilian Devastation
Contents xiii
 PREFACE

This report is based on a visit to southern Sudan and Sudanese refugee

camps in Kenya and Uganda from late June to late July 1993 by a delegation from
Human Rights Watch/Africa (HRW/Africa, formerly Africa Watch) consisting of
Jemera Rone, counsel to Human Rights Watch, and John Prendergast, a consultant
to HRW/Africa. The delegation visited the towns of Nasir, Ayod, Waat, Kongor,
Lafon, Nimule, Aswa, and Atepi in southern Sudan, and refugee camps in Uganda
and Kenya, and interviewed about 200 victims of the war and other witnesses to the
violence. Interviews were also conducted in London, Cairo, Nairobi and
Washington, D.C.
HRW/Africa sought to visit Khartoum and other locations in government-
controlled Sudan, but was denied permission--at the same time that the government
was announcing to the world that everyone was free to "come and see for
yourselves." The government initially granted Ms. Rone a visa and agreed on a date
for the visit in June 1993. At the last minute, the government asked to defer the visit
until July, and then cancelled that visit as well, also at the last minute, without any
mention of a future date. The Sudan Embassy in Washington, D.C. even announced
in its U.S. publication that HRW/Africa was about to visit. Since it cancelled the
July 1993 visit, the government has abstained from any contact with HRW/Africa.
In contrast, HRW/Africa encountered few problems entering the areas of
Sudan controlled by the two rebel factions. HRW/Africa met and discussed its
human rights concerns with several people in the leadership of SPLA-Nasir/United.
Such high-level meetings were not granted by SPLA-Torit, however.
This report is based primarily on the field work of Jemera Rone and John
Prendergast. It is based on eyewitness reports where possible, although the
eyewitnesses are generally not identified for safety reasons. Because of the
preference for first-hand accounts, this is not an exhaustive account of violations
during the war in 1991-93. For instance, the tragic situation in the Nuba mountains
in south Kordofan is not covered in this report, but was reported in our publication
"Sudan: Eradicating the Nuba" (September 9, 1992). The information in this report,
however, is fairly representative of the types of abuses that occur throughout the
south in the war.
The report was written by Jemera Rone with the help of John Prendergast
and edited by Karen Sorensen, research associate of HRW/Africa. HRW/Africa
would like to acknowledge with thanks the informed comments of Dr. Douglas H.
Johnson of St. Anthony's College, Oxford, England and Dr. Andrew N. M. Mawson
of Amnesty International, London, England, on the draft report. We are grateful for
the assistance of many others who have asked to remain anonymous.
 GLOSSARY

Anya-Nya the southern Sudanese rebel army of the first civil war,
1955-72

Anya-Nya II rebel south Sudanese forces who, together with former

members of the Sudanese army, formed the SPLA in
1983; also, some of those forces that defected from the
SPLA later in 1983 and became a militia force of Nuer
in Upper Nile province supported by the Sudanese
government; several Anya-Nya II groups over the years
were wooed back to the SPLA

EEC European Economic Community

Hunger Triangle A name adopted by relief organizations in 1993 for the area
defined by Kongor, Ayod, and Waat, in Upper Nile province,
where hunger was especially acute

ICRC International Committee of the Red Cross

Murahallin Arab tribal militias

NGO Nongovernmental Organization

NIF National Islamic Front, the militant Islamic political

party which came to power in 1989 after a military coup
overthrew the elected government

Nuba The African people living in south Kordofan's Nuba

Mountains; some are Muslims, some Christians, and
some practice traditional African religions

OFDA Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance, within U.S.

Agency for International Development

OLS Operation Lifeline Sudan, a joint United Nations/NGO

relief operation for internally displaced and famine and
xvi Civilian Devastation

war victims in Sudan which began operations in 1989.

It serves territory controlled by the government and by
the SPLA. Much of its work in southern Sudan is
through cross-border operations conducted by OLS'
Southern sector based in Nairobi.

PDF Popular Defence Force, a government-sponsored militia

RASS Relief Association of Southern Sudan, the relief wing of

SPLA-Nasir

Red Army SPLA military unit composed of minors

SPLA the Sudanese rebel army formed in 1983 headed by

Commander-in-Chief John Garang; in 1991 it split into
two factions

SPLA-Nasir the faction of the SPLA that broke away from John
Garang's leadership in August 1991, led by Riek
Machar and based in Nasir, Upper Nile

SPLA-Nasir/United same as SPLA/United, used here to refer to the rebel

movement led by Riek Machar after March 27, 1993

SPLA-United the name that SPLA-Nasir and other SPLA dissidents

adopted after they united on March 27, 1993

SPLA-Torit the faction of SPLA that, after the August 1991

division, remained under the leadership of John Garang,
based in Torit, Eastern Equatoria province, until that
town fell to the government in July 1992; also known as
SPLA-Mainstream

SPLM Sudan People's Liberation Movement, the political

organization of the Sudanese rebels formed in 1983, of
which John Garang is chairman

SRRA Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Association, relief

wing of the SPLA-Torit
Glossary xvii

Triple A camps displaced persons camps in Ame, Aswa and Atepi created in
1992 in Eastern Equatoria and evacuated in 1994 due to
government military advances

UNDP United Nations Development Program

UNHCR United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

UNICEF United Nations Children's Fund

White Army An informal local self-organized defense force of Nuer

in Upper Nile province, also called "Decbor"

WFP World Food Program

 I. INTRODUCTION AND SUMMARY

The civil war that has raged in southern Sudan since 1983 has claimed the
lives of some 1.3 million persons, southern civilians.1 The specific causes of death
vary--victims either have been targeted, or they have fallen in indiscriminate fire, or
they have been stripped of their assets and displaced, such that they have died of
starvation and disease. All the parties to the conflict are responsible for these
deaths, including the government and the rebels of the Sudan People's Liberation
Movement/Army (SPLM/A, hereafter SPLA), who in 1991 split into two factions,
SPLA-Torit and the breakaway SPLA-Nasir. All parties have waged war in total
disregard of the welfare of the civilian population and in violation of almost every
rule of war applicable in an internal armed conflict.2
Sudan is internationally recognized as an economic basket case.3 In the
underdeveloped south, war, flood, drought, disease, and mismanagement have
rendered useless ordinary survival strategies and made millions wholly or partially

1
Millard Burr, A Working Document: Quantifying Genocide in The Southern Sudan
1983-1993 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Committee for Refugees, October 1993), p. 2.

2
See Appendix A.

3
Sudan is in arrears to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in the amount of
approximately $1.62 billion, which represents 39 percent of all outstanding arrears to
that institution world-wide. In August, 1993, the IMF suspended Sudan's voting rights
and on February 14, 1994, voted to initiate compulsory withdrawal proceedings against
Sudan.
dependent on emergency food assistance provided by the United Nations (U.N.) and
foreign agencies--that is, when the government or rebels do not prevent the civilian
population from receiving this relief.
Sudan, with approximately twenty-five million people in nearly one
million square miles, occupies the largest land area of any country in Africa.4 The
southern third of Sudan, which occupies a larger land
area than many neighboring countries, such as Uganda, had a pre-war population of
some five to six million. The population of southern Sudan is now estimated at four
and a half million. The U.N. estimates that the population declined 1.9 percent in
the year of 1993, and that the excess mortality in that year alone was 220,000. This
report makes it clear, through one horrifying testimony after another, just how such
a large toll could have been reached.
Among the abuses committed by the government in the southern conflict,
documented in greater detail in prior HRW/Africa reports but also included here,
are:

$ indiscriminate aerial bombardment of southern population centers;

$ scorched earth tactics against villages around garrison towns, burning and
looting the villages and killing, displacing or capturing civilians;
$ use of torture, disappearance and summary execution, particularly against
residents of garrison towns in order to quash civic opposition to
government policies, such civic opposition in Juba to the mandatory use of
Arabic in what had been English-language schools, and forcible
conversion to Islam;
$ restriction of movement of the civilian residents of garrison towns--in
Juba, forbidding them from leaving even in times of food scarcity--and
placement of land mines and military patrols on the exit routes to enforce
the ban on movement;
$ killing civilians, pillage of civilian cattle and grain and burning of homes
by tribal militias armed by persons and political parties aligned with the
government to carry on its counterinsurgency war on the cheap and to
"drain the sea" of tribes deemed supportive of the SPLA;
$ cruel and inhuman prison conditions;
$ lack of due process;
$ abducting women and children; and

4
See Sudan map, inside front cover.
Introduction and Summary 3

$ severe restrictions on relief efforts by international and U.N. agencies, and

impunity given to army officers and others who profiteer on relief food.
4 Civilian Devastation

Among the abuses committed by the two SPLA factions are:

$ indiscriminate attacks on civilians living in the territory of the other SPLA

faction;
$ pillage of civilian cattle and grain and destruction and burning of homes in
the opposing faction's territory;
$ taking food from civilians, directly or indirectly, by force or fraud;
$ abducting civilians, principally women and children, from the territory of
the other faction;
$ siege of garrison towns by the SPLA-Torit, including on some occasions
using starvation of civilians as a method of combat;
$ torture, disappearance, and summary executions;
$ holding long-term political prisoners in prolonged arbitrary detention, by
SPLA-Torit;
$ cruel and inhuman prison conditions;
$ lack of due process;
$ forcible recruitment, primarily of Equatorians, by SPLA-Torit;
$ forced portering or carrying heavy military supplies by SPLA-Torit;
$ creation by the SPLA of tens of thousands of "unaccompanied minors"--
boys originally brought or lured to Ethiopian refugee camps for
educational opportunities, who were then segregated from their families
and trained and deployed as soldiers although some had not reached
fifteen years old (the minimum age under international law)--and similar
practices with boys inside Sudan, by SPLA-Torit; and
$ denying unaccompanied minors the opportunity to be voluntarily reunited
with their families.

The cumulative effect of the way the war is waged, in total disregard of the
rules of war, has had a drastic effect on the civilian population of the south. Their
hardship and starvation is the direct result of human rights abuses by all parties.
The year 1993 saw an expansion of international relief efforts in south
Sudan for political reasons; the need had existed before, but the government had
prevented access until shortly after Somalia was the subject of a U.N. peacekeeping
action in late 1992. Approved flight access in cross-border operations to southern
Sudan grew from seven to forty-five government and SPLA-held locations between
January and December 1993, and another forty isolated locations were serviced by
barge and rail convoys from the north. Operation Lifeline Sudan (Southern Sector)
Introduction and Summary 5

(OLS)5 coordinated from Nairobi, Kenya, provides the umbrella for relief activities
for the U.N. and over thirty international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs).6
About 150 international staff from U.N. agencies and NGOs were permanently
residing in twenty SPLA-held areas serviced from the south in early 1994.7
At the beginning of 1993, the OLS estimated that 1.5 million southerners
were in need of some form of assistance, with 800,000 requiring food assistance.
Seventy-five percent of the food-dependent were considered "specially vulnerable,"
or almost entirely reliant on food assistance, not including the Juba population,

5
Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS) is a joint U.N.-NGO relief operation for the needy
internally displaced and war victims in Sudan, under the U.N. umbrella. It began
operations in early 1989, working on both sides of the civil war, in government and non-
government areas, but only with consent of the parties. In 1991 OLS became a program
under the U.N. Department of Humanitarian Affairs. The OLS Nairobi-based southern
sector operations are coordinated by UNICEF.

6
OLS (Southern Sector) press release, "UNICEF and WFP Request Urgent Funding
for War-Torn Southern Sudan," Nairobi, Kenya, February 14, 1994.

7
OLS press release, "UNICEF Preparing for Renewed Emergency in Southern
Sudan," Nairobi, Kenya, January 31, 1994.
6 Civilian Devastation

which would bring that number to over one million people in southern Sudan who
required food assistance.8
The U.N./NGO efforts accomplished much in 1993: child malnutrition
rates were cut by 60 percent in the most seriously affected areas, and 95,000
children were vaccinated against measles, a major killer when combined with
malnutrition. Despite these and other successes, the U.N. found that excess
mortality was 220,000 in 1993, a decline of almost 2 percent, compared with a
typical growth rate of 3 percent in peaceful African country. About 600,000 people,
almost one-sixth of the estimated southern population, were still internally
displaced. About 23 percent of households were headed by women, another
indicator of impoverishment; in the most seriously affected areas, women
outnumber men by as much as three to two.9

8
Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance (OFDA), "Humanitarian Relief
Operations in Sudan: Trip Report, July 1993" (Washington, D.C.: U.S. AID), p. 14.

9
OLS press release, "UNICEF Preparing for Renewed Emergency in Southern
Sudan," Nairobi, Kenya, January 31, 1994.
Introduction and Summary 7

As for the year 1994, the Sudan government's military offensive again has
caused tremendous shifts of population. Food shortages and disease naturally follow
each one of these population upheavals; the direct and indirect death toll caused by
the fighting in 1994 promises to rival 1993. The needs of the civilian population
remain dramatic: the U.N. needs assessment for food and non-food items in 1994
for Sudan was $279 million, most of it destined for the south where more than two
million people are estimated to be extremely vulnerable because of the breakdown
caused by war, and recent crop failures.10
In Eastern Equatoria the Triple A camps, home until February to over
100,000 displaced persons, have been evacuated together with local villagers. These
civilians have fled south and east, many to locations that are more difficult to
access. The government reported it retook Pageri, which was an SPLA-Torit
headquarters, on May 24, 1994, and reached Aswa to the south by May 29. U.N.
and NGO staff were evacuated from Nimule south of Aswa on the Ugandan border,
since Nimule appeared likely to fall next. In Upper Nile province, clan fighting
lasting three months among the Nuer in Nasir caused most of the huts there to be
burned to the ground and its population of 30,000 to move to Malual, Maiwut and
Jikawo. About 10,000 of these people were said to be en route to Ethiopia where
they would become refugees. The unaccompanied minors who lived in Nasir were
scattered.11
None of these military changes mean that the war will come to a military
conclusion, since the SPLA still controls most of the hinterland. These substantial
government gains, however, mean that the numbers of vulnerable have risen and
delivery of assistance to them is made more difficult.

10
OLS (Southern Sector) press release, "UNICEF and WFP Request Urgent Funding
for War-Torn Southern Sudan," Nairobi, Kenya, February 14, 1994.

11
OLS (Southern Sector), "Weekly Update," Nairobi, Kenya, May 31, 1994.
8 Civilian Devastation

The basic principle of African relief operations has been to define, usually
according to nutritional status, the most vulnerable groups within a population and
to target them with the minimum necessary food, water and shelter to sustain life.
The problem in Sudan and other areas of Sub-Saharan Africa is that one is not
dealing with a temporary emergency involving a normally robust and self-sustaining
population which can eventually resume its former life. A process of sustained asset
transfer which has taken place, particularly in Sudan and other faminized countries,
is synonymous with the spread of mass impoverishment. Relief operations may, to
varying degrees, help keep people alive but, at best, this is all they do. The way
such programs are conceived and resourced means they are usually unable to tackle
the process of resource depletion (war and looting) which is equated with recurring
famine.12 These are human rights problems; the devastation of southern Sudan and
its peoples can only be halted if the rules of war are obeyed, or if the war itself
comes to an end.
Food and sustenance play an important role in internal conflict. They are
both weapons and goals. In this situation the donor/NGO system can exercise a
good deal of influence, some of it unintentional but nevertheless unavoidable. The
donor/NGO safety net has been drawn into the effective partitioning of Sudan,13 in
part because the Sudan government was actively hostile to and neglected the
welfare of those civilians it deemed to be aligned with its enemy. The U.N./NGO
cross-border relief operation into southern Sudan represents a means of slowing
population displacement from and deaths in SPLA territory, making it more difficult
or even impossible for the government to force a military conclusion. Similarly, the
provision of emergency relief to garrison towns under government control means
that the SPLA's ability to capture those towns through siege and starvation of the
civilian population is significantly reduced.
International relief food thus has become an important element in the
subsistence economy of southern Sudan. As a result, it is wrongly siezed upon as an
asset to be taxed, confiscated, expropriated, or otherwise taken for the war effort by
the government and the armed factions as well. The relief community is laboring
against enormous logistical, environmental, financial and military odds to deliver a

12
Mark Duffield, "NGOs, Disaster Relief and Asset Transfer in the Horn: Political
Survival in a Permanent Emergency," Development and Change 24 (1993): p. 145.

13
Mark Duffield, "The Emergence of Two-Tier Welfare in Africa: Marginalization
or an Opportunity for Reform?" Public Administration and Development 12 (1992): p.
151.
Introduction and Summary 9

fraction of what the devastated southern population requires. U.N. agencies and
NGOs involved in Sudan deserve praise for their active concern for civilian welfare,
especially so where the parties to the conflict seem not only to have neglected the
civilians but also to have targeted and stolen from them.
All parties to the conflict prey on the civilian population. They are
sophisticated enough, however, to realize that when it comes to international
assistance intended for starving civilians, the armed parties cannot confiscate the aid
outright. They devise schemes that are little more than theft.
Armies that steal food from civilians violate the rules of war. So do armies
that try to direct the movement of the starving civilian population to strategic
military locations, where the armies can be reap the benefit of food and other
assistance intended for civilians. While increased vigilance and tighter controls may
deter some combatants from some forms of stealing, such controls in and of
themselves will not cure the problem. The predatory practices of all parties must be
confronted by the international community and the practices deterred through
concerted international pressure.
The donor countries and the U.N. should warn the parties to the conflict
that their indiscriminate killing, food diversion, looting, burning of civilian
property, and other actions that weaken the capacity of the civilian population to
become self-sufficient, are violations of the rules of war and will not be tolerated.
These practices have already jeopardized the reception of the parties at the
international level.
The international community should insist that, if the parties are to fight,
they fight within the boundaries set by the rules of war and cease to prey on the
civilian population. The international community should not be satisfied until the
parties not only acknowledge that such practices are abuses and pledge to refrain
from them, but also take firm disciplinary action against troops and officers who
offend.
The current internal armed conflict, aside from its asset-transfer aspects, is
predominantly a regional war of the north against the south and other marginalized
areas such as the Nuba Mountains. The first civil war (1955-72) was also a regional
war; it was less destructive and ended with an autonomy agreement for the south
concluded in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Peace lasted only eleven years.
The role of Islam in Sudan, and Sudan's identification as an Arab or
African state, are questions that have been open since independence in 1956.
Elements of religion are present in this conflict because, since the military coup in
June 1989, the Sudan government has been an Islamic fundamentalist state, run
from behind the scenes by the National Islamic Front (NIF). Southerners are not, for
the most part, Muslims but practice traditional African religions; a minority of the
10 Civilian Devastation

southerners are Christians.14 Both the traditional African religionists and Christians
have resisted the attempts of the central government--whether the present one, the
prior democratic one (1986-89), or the 1983 attempt of the Nimeiri military
dictatorship (1969-85)--to apply Islamic law, or shar'ia, to the south.
Although a majority of the Sudanese population is Muslim, the NIF's view
of Islam is not shared even by a majority of the Muslim population of Sudan. The
fundamentalist NIF government won less than 20 percent of the vote in the last free
elections in 1986. The NIF differs considerably from the two main traditional
political parties that developed over the decades in Sudan, which were based on
Sunni Muslim religious and regional sects and families. These traditional parties
failed to resolve the north-south issues and related issue of the role of Islam in the
state and society.
To solidify control of government and enforce its vision of an Islamic
state, the NIF and its allies engaged in serious human rights violations, such as
torture, summary executions, and repression of all civil liberties, to stamp out the
substantial political parties and civic organizations that were accustomed to play a
role in Sudanese politics, even under dictatorships. Popular movements, engaging in
strikes and street demonstrations, almost without bloodshed overthrew two military
governments in 1969 and 1985. The NIF since 1989 has built up a police state,
dismantled the civil service, and dismissed professional soldiers, replacing them
with NIF party loyalists, making NIF overthrow by any popular movement much
more difficult.

14
The Encyclopedia Britannica, World Data Annual 1993, says that in 1980 73
percent of the Sudanese population was Sunni Muslim, 9.1 percent Christian, and 16.7
percent practiced traditional beliefs.
Introduction and Summary 11

These serious human rights problems led the U.N. Commission on Human
Rights to appointment a Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Sudan, Gáspár
Biró, on March 10, 1993. He visited Sudan twice in 1993 and published a final
report on February 1, 1994,15 in which he concluded, among other things, that two
provisions of the Sudan Penal Code are "radically opposed" to the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the
Child, both of which Sudan has ratified. The two provisions are hudud offenses16
and gisas, or the institution of retribution.17

15
U.N. Economic and Social Council, Commission on Human Rights, Fiftieth Session,
"Situation of human rights in the Sudan, Report of the Special Rapporteur, Mr. GHspHr
Biró," E/CN.4/1994/48 (Geneva: United Nations, February 1, 1994), pp. 15-16.

16
Hudud offenses are specific crimes for which the Koran provides specific
punishment. They include theft, highway robbery, fornication, drinking alcohol,
unproven accusation of fornication, and apostasy. For instance, highway robbery must
be punished by amputation or death by crucifixion. See Abdullahi An-Na'im, Toward an
Islamic Reformation (Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press, 1990), chapter 5.

17
Gisas is retribution for bodily injury including murder. The punishment is at the
discretion of the victim or the deceased's relatives, and may be forgiveness, monetary
compensation (diya) or retaliation in kind. Ibid.
12 Civilian Devastation

The Attorney General and Minister of Justice of Sudan attacked the

Special Rapporteur, calling the legal conclusions "blasphemous" and claiming that
Mr. Biró was a promotor of "satanic morality." The Attorney General told the U.N.
Commission on Human Rights that the report was an "attack on the fundamental
principles of Islamic penal law."18
Elements of race are also present in the conflict. Although a majority of
Sudanese are Muslims, Arabs are not the ethnic majority.19 Those who have fought

18
"Sudan criticises the author of a rights survey for blasphemy," The Guardian
(London), March 8, 1994. Khartoum's government-sponsored press denounced Biró as
"worse than Rushdie," and organized demonstrations in protest of the report. "Sudan
cites higher authority," The Economist (London), March 5, 1994.

19
The Encyclopedia Britannica, World Data Annual 1993, gives the ethnic
composition in 1983 as Sudanese Arab 49.1 percent. Of the southern groups, Dinka
were 11.5 percent of total Sudan population, Nuer 4.9 percent, Azande, 2.7 percent,
Bari 2.5 percent, Shilluk 1.7 percent, Latuko 1.5 percent. The Nuba were 8.1 percent
and the Fur 2.1 percent; these groups are located in the transition zone and west.
"Other" was 9.5 percent. The two most frequently-spoken languages are Arabic and
Introduction and Summary 13

the central government with the SPLA have included non-Arab Muslims, such as
the Nubans from the centrally located Nuba Mountains, not geographically part of
southern Sudan but part of the central or transition zone of Sudan. About half of the
Nubans are Muslims, but they too have been military targets of the government.
Their considerable suffering is not detailed in this report, in part because it has been
well covered in other reports by HRW/Africa and other human rights groups.20
The south is predominantly inhabited by African peoples, compared to the
rest of the country where the majority claim Arab descent. The majority of southern
peoples are Nilotes (Dinka, Nuer, Anuak, and Shilluk). The Dinka are the largest
single ethnic group in Sudan. The Nuer are the second-largest group in the south.
There are numerous non-Nilotic Equatorian tribes, related to others in Central
Africa, but their total numbers are smaller than the Nilotes.

Dinka, and Sudan has fourteen minor languages which are further divided into some
100 sub-languages. Of these languages nearly half are found in southern Sudan.

20
Africa Watch, "Sudan: Eradicating the Nuba," vol. 4, issue no. 10 (New York:
Human Rights Watch, September 9, 1992); Amnesty International, "Sudan: the
Ravages of war: political killings and humanitarian disaster," AI Index: AFR 54/29/93
(London: Amnesty International, September 29, 1993), and "Sudan, Patterns of
repression," AI Index: AFR 54/06/93 (London: Amnesty International, February 19,
1993); African Rights, "The Marginalized Peoples of Northern Sudan" (London:
African Rights, March 1993); Sudan Human Rights Organisation, Sudan Human
Rights Voice, vol. 2, issue 5 (London: Sudan Human Rights Organisation, May 1993).
14 Civilian Devastation

Many southerners have fled to the capital of Khartoum to escape the war,
only to meet severe racial discrimination, forcible displacement and crowding into
subhuman living quarters by the government,21 and state-supported attempts to
convert them to Islam.
The war has not affected all parts of the south with the same intensity at the
same time. In the late 1980s, northern Bahr El Ghazal was the area of greatest
suffering, inflicted by tribal Arab militias supported by elements within the
government. Their brutal raids on the Dinka of Bahr El Ghazal contributed to
famine conditions. After the split in the rebel movement in August 1991, the scene
of most intense battle shifted to Upper Nile province. The primary fighting was
conducted not against the government but by one SPLA faction against the other for
the next two years. Many observers believe that the strife between the two SPLA
factions claimed more civilian lives than did the government army.
The suffering was intensified by the government's disruption of the U.N.-
led relief effort and its yearly offensives launched to take advantage of the factional
fighting that seriously weakened the SPLA's effectiveness. The government
recaptured a string of SPLA-held towns in 1992, winning significant ground for the
first time in years. The factional fighting in Upper Nile nevertheless continued and
spread to Equatoria, claiming lives both directly, through indiscriminate fire and
deliberate killing, and indirectly, through war-caused hunger and disease.
Violations of the rules of war are largely to blame for the estimated 1.3
million deaths of southern Sudanese in the first ten years of the current civil war.
The lives of millions of civilians have been reduced to surviving by means of
international handouts because the manner of combat practiced by all parties not
only destroys their families but also robs them of the means of self-sufficiency and
rips apart the survival strategies they customarily employ during times of food
scarcity. Even before the war, subsistence in the flood-prone marshes periodically
subject to drought was never easy--pastoralism with some farming has been and
remains the most viable economy. Yet this economy has been crippled because
civilians' cattle and grain are looted, whole areas are displaced time and again, and

21
Africa Watch, "Sudan, Refugees in Their Own Country: The Forced Relocation of
Sqautters and Displaced People from Khartoum," vol. 4, issue no. 8 (New York: Human
Rights Watch, July 10, 1992).
Introduction and Summary 15

many civilians are unable to settle anywhere long enough to plant or replace their
herds.
In this report, we wish to bring attention to the abuses not only of the
government but also of the SPLA factions. We note that the government's abuses
and repression are not excused by anything the SPLA factions have done, and vice
versa. The government continues to commit gross violations not only of the rules of
war in the south, but also in the Nuba mountains, and to violate the basic human
rights of some twenty million Sudanese outside the war zones. Unfortunately, its
gross violations continue as amply documented before.
We note that the SPLA claims the widest jurisdiction over the reduced (4.1
million) population of the south; the government's reach in the south, despite
captures of towns and encouragement of tribal militias, is not long. Most of the
territory and people of the south are under the control of the SPLA factions, if they
are under the control of any authority, and they have been for several years.
Since our last major report on Sudan in 1990,22 the SPLA split into two
and sometimes more factions. Until the split, it was difficult to find rebel insiders or
witnesses willing to discuss SPLA abuses. The split itself generated more violations
of the rules of war as each SPLA faction turned its guns on the civilian base of the
opposing faction, and victimized civilians complained to us throughout the areas we
visited.
The leaders of the SPLA factions must address their own human rights
problems and correct their own abuses, or risk a continuation of the war on tribal or
political grounds in the future, even if they win autonomy or separation.23 As one
member of a small Equatorian tribe said to HRW/Africa with disgust after he had
fled village burnings, looting, and summary executions by the SPLA-Torit, "And
these are the ones who want to rule us in the future!"

22
Africa Watch, Sudan: Denying the Honor of Living: Sudan, a Human Rights
Disaster (New York: Human Rights Watch, March 1990).

23
For an assessment of the political possibilities, see Francis M. Deng, "The Sudan:
Stop the Carnage," The Brookings Review 12 (Washington, D.C.: Winter 1994): pp. 6-
11.
16 Civilian Devastation

Short of an end to the war, only the elevation of respect for human rights
and humanitarian law to the top of the agenda of all parties will prevent the
extinction of millions more southern Sudanese. The political leadership of the entire
Sudan--north, south, east, west, transition zone, and in exile--must immediately
assume responsibility for the survival of the southern peoples by exercising its
moral and other authority to stop the continuing victimization of civilians in this
war. Outsiders involved in the Sudan must insist on an end to human rights abuses
as a primary means of preventing the obliteration of southern Sudanese.
HRW/Africa therefore recommends that the U.N. Security Council, among
other things, institute an arms embargo on the warring parties in Sudan, with special
attention to bombs and airplanes used by the government to attack civilian
population centers. We also recommend that the Security Council authorize a
contingent of full-time U.N. human rights monitors to observe, investigate, bring to
the attention of the responsible authorities, and make public violations of
humanitarian and human rights laws. The monitors should have access to all parts of
Sudan. They should be based in southern Sudan because the conflict is at its most
extreme there.
Creating a contingent of human rights monitors to observe human rights
and humanitarian law abuses in the field in southern Sudan is an appropriate step
for the U.N. to take now as it expands and develops its protection to and assistance
of internally displaced persons. The twenty-four million displaced persons
worldwide now exceed the almost twenty million refugees.24 The internally
displaced are similar to refugees except that they have not crossed an international
border and therefore do not benefit from the same assistance or protections afforded
refugees. Therefore, they are in many respects more needy.
In 1991, the U.N. Commission on Human Rights drew attention to the
needs of internally displaced persons.25 A report on refugees, displaced persons and
returnees was submitted to the U.N. General Assembly, suggesting that the
Commission on Human Rights might consider creating machinery for addressing
the human rights aspects of internal displacement to enable it "to deal with existing
problems in this area with the necessary degree of urgency and in a concrete

24
James Rupert, "World's Welcome Strained By 20 Million Refugees," The
Washington Post, November 10, 1993, quoting Sadako Ogata, U.N. High Commissioner
for Refugees.

25
U.N. Commission on Human Rights, Resolution 1991/25 (Geneva: U.N. Economic
and Social Council, March 5, 1991).
Introduction and Summary 17

manner, bringing them to the attention of the international community and trying to
generate the cooperation of all interested and concerned Governments."26

26
U.N. General Assembly, "Report on Refugees, Displaced Persons and Returnees,
prepared by Mr. Jacques Cuenod," E/1990/109/Add.1 (New York: United Nations, June
27, 1991).
18 Civilian Devastation

The Human Rights Commission appointed a special rapporteur on

internally displaced persons, Francis Deng, a Sudanese born in southern Sudan. The
Commission on Human Rights has issued his preliminary report;27 his work and that
of others on this issue is continuing.28
One chief example of U.N. concern for the internally displaced is the
Operation Lifeline Sudan (Southern Sector), since 1989 in the forefront of U.N.
efforts for the displaced through cross-border operations directed from Nairobi,
Kenya. OLS serves the displaced inside southern Sudan and thus helps prevent their
mass starvation within Sudan and a larger flow of refugees to countries bordering
on Sudan. This operation does not address the rules of war abuses committed by the
parties, nor provide protection to the displaced.
The U.N.'s growing concern with the human rights problems of internally
displaced persons could be addressed more readily in southern Sudan than perhaps
anywhere else in the world. Human rights monitors could utilize an already-existing
OLS logistical system provided for the delivery of relief supplies, yet the monitors
could operate separately and would not burden those U.N. and NGO staff

27
U.N. Economic and Social Council, Commission on Human Rights, "Further
Promotion and Encouragement of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms,
including the Question of the Programme and Methods of Work of the Commission,
Alternative Approaches and Ways and Means within the United Nations System for
Improving the Effective Enjoyment of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms,
Analytical report of the Secretary-General on internally displaced persons,"
E/CN.4/1992/23 (Geneva: United Nations, February 14, 1992).

28
See Roberta Cohen, "Strengthening United Nations Human Rights Protection for
Internally Displaced Persons" (Washington, D.C.: Refugee Policy Group, February
1993), pp. 5-8.
Introduction and Summary 19

concerned with the emergency food operation. U.N. human rights monitors could be
incorporated into the same program for personal security already provided to the
rest of the OLS and NGO staff operating in southern Sudan.
Such monitors would be able to investigate abuses and report on them, thus
raising the profile of abuses in the conflict. Increased U.N. reporting would lead to
greater sensitivity on the part of the rebel forces, which would be an enormous
benefit to the millions of people living under rebel jurisdiction. More attention paid
to the government abuses would prevent the government from denying that such
atrocities, particularly indiscriminate fire and scorched earth campaigns, occur.
Coverage of abuses by all sides would illustrate to the parties that one is not being
singled out and that all must conform to human rights and humanitarian law, no
matter what their enemy's abuses.
The use of human rights monitors in this conflict could provide U.N.
decision-makers with a prototype for deploying monitors in other conflicts, without
committing the U.N. to equivalent action elsewhere.
There is already U.N. recognition of the severity of the human rights
problems in Sudan: a special rapporteur was appointed to review human rights
conditions in the country, and his reports indicate the need for more human rights
attention to the Sudan, including attention to abuses committed during the armed
conflict. Under the circumstances in Sudan, human rights concerns should not be
deferred until the end of the conflict. The war has been particularly long-standing,
lasting from 1955-72 and 1983 until the present, or twenty-eight of the last thirty-
nine years. Its solution is not imminent and active combat is the rule of the day,
subjecting the civilian population to new abuses of human rights and the rules of
war every year, as this report illustrates. Human rights monitors, by regularly
documenting and reporting on abuses in a manner that is beyond the capacity of
nongovernmental organizations, would focus the attention of the parties and the
world on the need for reform and respect for human rights.
Field human rights monitors could be hired specifically for Sudan to work
under the supervision of the special rapporteur for Sudan, under the supervision of
the High Commissioner for Human Rights, or under a separate and temporary
human rights structure created by the Secretariat as in El Salvador and Cambodia
pursuant to peacekeeping arrangements. The Centre for Human Rights has deployed
monitors recently in the former Yugoslavia, where the conflict continues, and has
opened a field office in Cambodia from which staff gathers human rights
information for the reports of the special representative of the U.N. Human Rights
Commission. Although there is not an armed opposition nor an internal armed
conflict in Haiti, U.N. human rights monitors are being deployed there.
20 Civilian Devastation

We recommend that the United States, the United Kingdom, and other
concerned countries fully support these recommendations, and, while continuing to
pressure the Sudan government to improve human rights and humanitarian access,
also pressure the SPLA factions to improve their human rights performance. The
government and the SPLA factions should be put on notice that the international
community considers improvements in the following areas to be top priority: 1) due
process, 2) political detention, torture and summary executions, 3) death penalty, 4)
attacks on civilians, 5) means of acquiring food, 6) recruitment, particularly of
minors, and 7) voluntary family reunification.
The Sudan government, because of its human rights performance, receives
little foreign aid. That should continue until substantive improvement has taken
place and until the human rights performance of the SPLA factions is significantly
improved, there should be no consideration given to any assistance to the SPLA
factions by any government.
Nongovernmental organizations play a vital role in the delivery of food
and non-food relief to the needy in south Sudan. They, too, should use their
influence to persuade the parties to conform their conduct to international standards
of humanitarian law and human rights.
The devastation of the civilian population in southern Sudan is the fault of
all the parties to the conflict. They have waged war in complete violation of the
most minimal rules of war. The international community, including neighboring
countries, donor nations and the U.N. should play a meaningful role in bringing
pressure to bear on the parties to cease their violations, in the interest of the survival
of the southern peoples.
22 Civilian Devastation

PLACE MAP #2 HERE

 II. BACKGROUND

During the period prior to independence in 1956, southern Sudan was

administered separately from the north by the British under the Anglo-Egyptian
condominium government1 which had ruled Sudan since the beginning of the
twentieth century. The language of instruction in southern schools was English,2 and
customary law was applied, with Christian missionary work encouraged and Islamic
missionaries banned. Some Europeans and Christians looked to this separate
administration to create a barrier to further Arab or Muslim penetration of Africa.
Armed conflict between north and south Sudan started in 1955, before
independence. The conflict was punctuated by an autonomy agreement in 1972 that
ended the first civil war between southern separatist forces and the central
government, then headed by President Jaafar Nimieri, a military dictator. Members

1
The Anglo-Egyptian Condominium government was a hybrid form of shared
sovereignty created to acknowledge former Egyptian claims on Sudan and to
accomodate British interests. Egypt itself was under British protection at the time.
Egypt and Great Britain acted together to reconquer the Sudan from the Mahdist
independent nationalist government (1885-98). While the bulk of the reconquest army
was Egyptian, it was led by British officers. P.M. Holt & M.W. Daly, A History of the
Sudan, 4th ed. (London: Longman Group UK Ltd, 1988), pp. 117-18.

2
It was not until the Arab-Israeli war of 1967 that the language of instruction in
northern Sudan was changed from English to Arabic.

23
of Anya-Nya, the guerrilla army of southern Sudanese, were to be integrated into
the national army, the local police, the prison service, and the wildlife service.3
By 1983, when the second civil war began, the autonomy agreement had
been broken numerous times by the government. One such violation involved
dividing the south into three regions, enabling the central government to deal
separately with each and to play them off against each other on a tribal basis. The
government also asserted control over the two most valuable natural resources of
the south and all

3
Douglas H. Johnson and Gerard Prunier, "The Foundation and expansion of the
Sudan People's Liberation Army," in Civil War in the Sudan, ed. M.W. Daly and
Ahmad Alawad Sikainga (London: British Academic Press, 1993), p. 119.

24
Background 25

SudanCthe waters of the Nile and oilCwhile failing to live up to promises to

develop and educate the south.4
The second civil war was built on the shoulders of the first. The SPLM/A
was formed in 1983 in Ethiopia from Anya-Nya II groups and Sudan army
mutineers from the 105 Battalion stationed in Bor, Upper Nile, who escaped to
Ethiopia, where they were joined by others.5
The SPLA experienced political divisions almost immediately. John
Garang, a former Anya-Nya I guerrilla who became a Sudan army officer and
received an American education, emerged as a leader. He advocated a united
secular Sudan. Many Anya-Nya II leaders sought the Anya-Nya I objective of
secession or self-determination; they were attacked in Ethiopia by Garang's
supporters and his Ethiopian government army allies. Ethiopia was then governed
by dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam. There were shootouts and even military clashes
between contending Sudanese factions, and John Garang de Mabior emerged as the

4
The Jonglei canal through Upper Nile was planned to channel the waters of the Nile
ultimately to populous Egypt. It was not finished because of the war. The main oil field
was near Bentiu, Upper Nile. The two major oil fields in southern Sudan are said to
have proven reserves of about 250 million barrels, none of which has been drilled yet
due to the war. U.S. Department of Commerce, International Trade Administration,
"Foreign Economic Trends and Their Implications for the United States," FET 92-36
(Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Commerce, August 1992).

5
The Sudan army traditionally had recruited heavily from among impoverished
southerners. In previous centuries slave soldiers were common in East Africa. See
Douglas H. Johnson, "The Structure of a Legacy: Military Slavery in Northeast
Africa," Ethnohistory 36 (Winter 1989): p. 72.
26 Civilian Devastation

chairman and commander-in-chief of the SPLA. The dissidents who did not escape
to Sudan were either killed or detained in SPLA prisons in Ethiopia and Sudan.
The Sudan governments and political parties aligned with the governments
tried to tribalize the first and second civil wars by using local rebels to fight
guerrillas in neighboring territories. In the mid-1980s the remaining Anya-Nya II
dissident officers and troops, mostly Nuers, formed a government militia also called
Anya-Nya II. It rallied Nuers in its native Upper Nile province against the Dinka as
represented by Garang's SPLA. Many Nuers, however, remained with the SPLA
despite government efforts to portray the war as a tribal clash of the Dinka against
everyone else.6
The Anya-Nya II attacked SPLA recruits as they were being marched from
west to east, from Bahr El Ghazal to Ethiopia for military training in SPLA bases

6
Johnson and Prunier, "Foundation and Expansion," pp. 125-29. Garang was a Bor
Dinka and many of the old Anya-Nya recruited into the SPLA were Equatorians
resentful of what they saw as Bor Dinka dominance, even of the 1972-83 autonomous
southern regional government. Among the pastoralists of Upper Nile, the Bor Dinka had
the advantage of having a Christian Missionary Society (CMS) school located in Bor,
one of the few schools in the province. The Bor Dinka took advantage of this educational
opportunity to escape from the poor economic possibilities offered by the Bor
environment.
Background 27

there. Anya-Nya II also prevented the SPLA from returning to Bahr El Ghazal in
any large numbers.7 According to one authority, "The Anya-Nya II was, between
1984 and 1987, one of the most serious military obstacles to the supremacy of the
SPLA."8 While a government militia, Anya-Nya II committed abuses against
civilians believed to be aligned with the SPLA. The Sudan governments made no
effort to curtail or punish these abuses.9
The SPLA undertook a policy of trying to win over Anya-Nya II, with
some success. Commander Gordon Kong Cuol of Anya-Nya II led his men into an
alliance with the SPLA in late 1987, and other Anya-Nya II forces followed suit,
leaving a few Anya-Nya II with the government.10

7
Johnson and Prunier, "Foundation and Expansion," p. 128.

8
Alex de Waal, "Some comments on militias in the contemporary Sudan," in Civil
War in the Sudan, ed. M.W. Daly and Ahmad Alawad Sikainga (London: British
Academic Press; 1993), p. 150.

9
Africa Watch, Denying the Honor of Living, pp. 78-80.

10
Johnson and Prunier, "Foundations and Expansion," p. 130.
28 Civilian Devastation

ETHIOPIAN REFUGE

Regional politics gave the southern rebels the opportunity to build up a

large professional army. Mengistu, then dictator of Ethiopia and a client of the
U.S.S.R., backed the creation of the SPLA and provided not only for refuge for
hundreds of thousands of Sudanese refugees who streamed into Ethiopia, but also
for military bases where the SPLA could train its recruits on hardware coming from
the Soviet bloc. The rebels' political movement, the Sudan People's Liberation
Movement, adopted the Marxist rhetoric of the day, but the SPLA dominated the
politics, which were focused not on socialism but on Sudanese north-south issues
and especially on the military goal of capturing territory from the Sudan army.
Sudan and Ethiopia have had a long history of funding and facilitating each
other's dissidents for purposes of mutual retaliation and attempted deterrence.11
Rebel Eritreans fighting for the separation of Eritrea from Ethiopia were aided by
the Sudanese government. Southern Sudanese rebels were assisted by an Ethiopian
monarch (deposed in 1974) and then by Ethiopian Marxist military officers.12 Both
governments not only lost or delegated control of large parts of their territory to the
rebels they sponsored, but confronted drought, famine, and massive refugee flows
over periods of years.
There was also an overlay of Cold War allegiances. The Sudanese
government was until the early 1970s aligned with the Soviet Union. In 1971, an
attempted coup by the Sudanese Communist Party pushed Sudan President Nimieri
into a closer alliance with the West.

11
Lemmu Baissa, "Ethiopian-Sudanese Relations, 1956-91: Mutual Deterrence
through Mutual Blackmail?" Horn of Africa, III-V (Washington, D.C.: October 1990-
June 1991): pp. 1-25.

12
Sudan permitted Eritrean, Tigrean, Amhara, and Oromo rebels to open offices and
operate from its territory and Ethiopia permitted the SPLA the same. Cross-border
attacks between Sudan and Ethiopia were not uncommon.
Background 29

Ethiopia was aligned with the West until the overthrow of Emperor Haile
Selasse in 1974 eventually brought a group of junior Marxist officers into power in
1977. The Ogaden War (1977) was the excuse for the Soviet Union to switch its
patronage from Somalia to the more populous Ethiopia, which had much better
developed facilities for communications and naval access. The Soviets backed the
Mengistu regime until it was overthrown in 1991.
From 1989 until the fall of the Mengistu regime in Ethiopia in May 1991,
the SPLA made major advances throughout the south, taking the towns on the
Ethiopian border and numerous towns in Upper Nile (Nasir, Akobo, Waat, Bor),
Bahr El Ghazal, and Equatoria (Torit, Kapoeta, Nimule, Kajo-Kaji, Kaya, Yambio).
By mid-1991, the momentum was solidly with the SPLA, which controlled most of
the south with the exception of major garrisons such as Wau (Bahr El Ghazal),
Malakal (Upper Nile), and Juba and Yei (Eastern Equatoria). The SPLA's border
access to Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, and Zaire was enhanced and OLS erratically
supplied food and other humanitarian supplies to areas under government and SPLA
control from 1989.
The SPLA's momentum came to a halt after the May 1991 overthrow of
the Mengistu regime, when an eight-year patron-client relationship between
Mengistu and the SPLA was destroyed overnight. The SPLA lost its military bases,
principal supply lines, and main supplier of military goods.
The SPLA evacuated its bases and refugee camps in Ethiopia within a
matter of days or weeks after the fall of Mengistu, and escorted hundreds of
thousands of Sudanese refugees back into Sudan, where little provision had been
made for them.
Once inside Sudan, the refugees' fortunes rapidly changed. The relief they
had become accustomed to receiving in Ethiopia was not provided; what came to
them was little and late, since the relief community had to negotiate often
unsuccessfully with the hostile Sudan government over security and permissions.
In mid-1991, before the 271,000 Sudanese refugees in Ethiopia made their
hasty repatriation to Sudan, the U.N. had warning that a disaster was impending. A
later study criticized the U.N., concluding that "the OLS did not prepare adequately
for the inevitable suffering that such a move would entail."13 By mid-1991, 130,000

13
Alastair Scott-Villiers, Patta Scott-Villiers and Cole P. Dodge, "Repatriation of
150,000 Sudanese Refugees from Ethiopia: The Manipulation of Civilians in a Situation
of Civil Conflict," Disasters 17 (1993): p. 206. This study concludes that the returning
refugees were pawns in Sudan's civil war, manipulated by governments, military forces
and the media, and that the international community failed to deal effectively with their
plight.
30 Civilian Devastation

repatriates had been registered in Nasir, 100,000 in Pochala, and 10,000 in Pakok,
all just inside the Sudan border.14 In July 1991, just before the August Nasir-based
rebellion within the SPLA, about 90,000 refugees from the Itang SPLA camp in
Ethiopia were in the Nasir and Sobat basin areas of Upper Nile.15 The OLS
response was late and inadequate. Food relief did not reach Nasir until five weeks
after the returning refugees started arriving in Nasir.16
At the same time, the exodus from Ethiopia disrupted the fragile
subsistence economy of the Sobat basin and Ethiopian border in southern Sudan,
which limped from battle to famine to flood and worse. Itang had served as a
commercial substitute for the Arab traders in the Sobat basin; these traders, before
1983, had been the sinews of the southern Sudanese commercial economy. The
Itang trading network, with surplus goods flowing from the refugee camps to the
Upper Nile border and Sobat valley areas, collapsed overnight, and nothing took its
place. The sudden appearance of hundreds of thousands of repatriated refugees with
little international support put an additional strain on the SPLA and tribal relations.
The Uduk, a small Sudanese tribe who fled with the rest of the Sudanese
refugees from Itang to Nasir, encountered such harsh conditions in Sudan in mid-
1991 that they returned to Ethiopia as refugees in 1992, making this their fourth or
fifth mass migration in the short period of three or four years, their numbers
diminishing with each move, placing them at the top of the list of Sudanese groups
most likely to disappear.17

14
Scott-Villiers, "Repatriation of Sudanese Refugees," pp. 207-210.

15
Ibid., p. 210.

16
Ibid., p. 211.

17
In 1989 the SPLA attacked and overran an Oromo (Ethiopian) refugee camp in the
Yabus valley of Sudan. The Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) in turn in January 1990
attacked and destroyed the Sudanese refugee camp at Tsore, near Assosa, Ethiopia. This
camp housed 42,000 refugees, of whom 28,000 were Uduk who were driven from Blue
Nile province in 1987 after the Rufaa Arab militia targeted them as suspected SPLA
supporters. The Uduk refugees fled Tsore and several were shot dead by the OLF on the
way; crossing into the
Sudan at Yabus Bridge, the Uduk refugees together with some SPLA troops were
bombed by the Sudanese air force. When the refugees retreated into the hills they were
shelled. Over the next few months they straggled into the Itang refugee camp in
Ethiopia, where they were marginalized and many died. They fled Itang with the rest of
the Sudanese refugees in May 1991 when Mengistu fell, and were kept in Nasir by
Background 31

SPLA-Nasir, which refused them permission to leave despite the serious food shortages
in Nasir until mid-1992, when they then numbered 11,500. They moved to a nearby area
of Upper Nile but were subjected to such banditry that they returned in July 1992 to
Itang refugee camp in Ethiopia, a difficult journey during which more died. When Itang
was attacked by hungry Nuer, the Uduk fled to Gambela, with more dying on the trek.
There were then about 10,000 Uduk refugees. Wendy James, "Uduk Asylum Seekers in
Gambela, 1992: Community Report and Options for Resettlement," prepared for
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (Geneva and Nairobi: UNHCR, 1992),
pp. 16-22.
32 Civilian Devastation

SPLA SPLIT IN 1991

The SPLA until 1991 had quelled several internal efforts at dissent with
the help of Mengistu's army and internal security apparatus. With Mengistu's fall,
the SPLA leadership became instantly vulnerable to more division. By the end of
1990, two senior commanders in the Upper Nile operational area, Lam Akol and
Riek Machar, had been raising questions about the democratization of the SPLA
command council, and by March 1991 their relations with Garang deteriorated.18
Garang had concentrated SPLA forces in Equatoria for a major wet season assault
on Juba, leaving Machar's forces in Upper Nile lightly protected and vulnerable to
government forces from either Malakal to the west or from Ethiopia to the east.
Complicating matters were the huge numbers of refugee returnees streaming into the
Sobat basin and eastern Upper Nile towns. They faced an aerial bombing campaign
and continuous interruptions in the supply of international humanitarian aid to the
area by the Khartoum regime.
On August 28, 1991, scarcely three months after Mengistu's fall, the three
commanders of northern Upper Nile, based at Nasir--Riek and Gordon Kong Cuol,
both Nuers, and Lam Akol, a Shilluk--called for the overthrow of Garang and broke
with the main body of the movement.19 Joining them were the Upper Nile SPLA
barracks at Ayod, Waat, Abwong, Adok, Ler, and Akobo.20 The stated goals of the
breakaway group, known as the Nasir faction after the town where their main
garrison was based, were of democratizing the SPLA, stopping human rights
abuses, and reorienting the SPLA's objective from a united secular Sudan to
independence for the south.

18
Douglas H. Johnson, The Southern Sudan: The Root Causes of a Recurring Civil
War (Oxford: manuscript pending publication, August 1992), p. 67.

19
Johnson and Prunier, "Foundation and Expansion," p. 139.

20
See Upper Nile map, facing Chapter IV.
Background 33

Many commanders remained loyal to Garang, who was not overthrown.

The SPLA remained split, roughly along tribal lines, especially after the Nasir
forces (mostly Nuer) massacred many Dinka civilians in an effort to capture
Garang's home territory of Bor. The massacre touched off one of the most violent
periods of inter-factional and inter-tribal fighting in southern Sudan's history. It
exacerbated a desperate situation for the civilian population and led directly to the
creation of the "Hunger Triangle," a pocket of famine from Ayod to Kongor to
Waat, so named in 1993 when the U.N. and other relief operations were finally
permitted access to the needy in this area of intense factional fighting.

FAMINE CREATION

Armed conflict and deliberate government strategies have largely been

responsible for the long history of famines in Sudan; famine can be regarded as an
outcome of a political process of impoverishment resulting from the transfer of
assets from the weak to the politically strong.21 Four specific groups are chiefly
responsible for the famines that have taken so many Sudanese lives during the
second civil war; three of these groups have been vehicles for state policies and
have been utilized as proxies by the government to attack the SPLA and its
supporters at a relatively low cost to the government and without putting too much
military recruitment pressure on the north.22

21
Duffield, "NGOs, Disaster Relief and Asset Transfer."

22
Alex de Waal, "Starving Out the South, 1984-9," in Civil War in the Sudan, ed.
M.W. Daly and Ahmad Alawad Sikainga (London: British Academic Press; 1993), pp.
165-72.
34 Civilian Devastation

First of the groups were the government-aligned militias of Anya-Nya II,

the murahallin23 and others. Their task was to attack and plunder other civilians and
take their reward in the form of looted cattle. They also harassed and looted famine
migrants. While the Anya-Nya II had a political agenda of building a separate state
independent from the north, and had sharp political differences from their fellow
tribesmen in SPLA, the murahalin never had a political agenda.
Second was the army, which supported militias, isolated some garrison
towns from the surrounding areas by forcibly preventing civilians from fleeing
besieged towns, created and maintained artificial scarcities of food in these towns,
and actively obstructed relief efforts.

23
Arab tribal militias called murahallin were formed by tribes in the Baggara
federation of cattle-keeping nomad tribes in northern Sudan close to the border of south
Sudan.
Background 35

The third group contributing to famine was traders connected with the
military. Because the army had sole control over the movement of commodities in
garrison towns, some officers used this control as an opportunity to extract
maximum profits in times of scarcities they helped to create. One egregious
example was in Wau in 1987.24
Fourth was the SPLA. Three elements in its military policy were
responsible for creating famine conditions: the siege of government-held towns,
including obstruction of relief; the raiding, destruction and looting of villages; and
the forced requisitioning of food from rural people. The SPLA policy began to
change in early 1988, toward greater encouragement of relief efforts, probably
because the SPLA realized that it would be unable to operate effectively in areas
that had been depopulated and, as the SPLA controlled larger and larger territories,
it realized the benefits of allowing relief to reach both sides. As detailed below,
however, the SPLA has not abandoned its famine-creating practices and has in some
respects intensified them.
The manner in which the government waged war through its three groups
was instrumental in creating famine out of the war. Their actions were made
possible by a central government policy which openly or tacitly encouraged them,25
and which, in turn, was made possible by the attitudes of the Sudan's donors and
creditors, who were largely uninterested in the threat or reality of famine in the
south. The attitude of the donors, however, began to change since 1988, with the
creation of the OLS, with more attention paid to the desperate plight of southerners.

24
De Waal, "Starving out the South," p. 171.

25
At the same time as famine occurred, the Sudan government did its best to invoke
sovereignty and use bureaucratic obstructions to keep relief food from starving
southerners. The government, although heavily indebted and internationally ostracized,
nevertheless "skillfully maniputed donor countries to keep control over humanitarian
programmes." Francois Jean, ed., Life, Death and Aid, the Medecins Sans Frontiers
Report on World Crisis Intervention (New York: Routledge, 1994), 18.
36 Civilian Devastation

The raiding, displacement, and asset destruction did not affect all parts of
southern Sudan simultaneously but created a situation of extreme instability at times
in which ordinary economic activities and survival strategies became impossible.
Even peaceful areas had their fragile economic and environmental balance
destroyed after experiencing deluges of displaced relatives and others looking for
food.
Although raiding occurred long before the civil wars, and often was settled
by negotiations between tribal leaders and payment of compensation where agreed,
the practice changed in the second civil war when the raids became part of a larger
political game in which negotiations for local compensation were not relevant. The
objective became to take without compensating, to win war booty, and to
impoverish the other side. The result was extraordinary impoverishment of the
civilian population, resulting in periodic famines and large numbers of civilian
deaths.
In 1989, an agreement with the Misseriya Arab militia and the SPLA put a
stop to most of the government-funded Misseriya raiding that had occurred from
1984-88 and caused the famine of 1987-88 and the large-scale migration from
northern Bahr el Ghazal.26 The negotiations were successful because in 1988, SPLA
units established a cordon sanitaire along the Bahr el Arab (Kir River), the border
between northern and southern Sudan, ensuring that without negotiations the cattle-
owning Baggara tribes (including the Misseriya) could not have access to dry lands
for their cattle.27 After this agreement, trade between the Dinka of Bahr El Ghazal
and the Baggara was reestablished, with the Baggara having access to dry season
pasture in the Dinka areas and the Dinka having relative freedom of movement in
and out of southern Kordofan and southern Darfur.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF THE HUNGER TRIANGLE

The outside world was given a closer look at the mechanics of famine
creation in 1993 when the government finally allowed relief agencies access to
areas of the Upper Nile where the faction fighting had been fiercest. The fighting
continued even as the relief agencies were attempting to bring assistance to the
remaining civilians, whose resources were severely depleted.

26
Ibid.

27
Johnson and Prunier, "Foundation and Expansion," p. 132.
Background 37

As many of the testimonies of abuses in this report come from survivors of

fighting in the Hunger Triangle (Ayod-Kongor-Waat) in Upper Nile, a closer look
at this particular area is merited.28 The plight of civilians in the region shows just
how destructive to civilian life violations of the rules of war can be, far beyond the
killings, which were not inconsiderable.

28
See Upper Nile map, facing Chapter IV.
38 Civilian Devastation

For centuries, the harsh clay plains environment of the Upper Nile region
in the Sudan has forced its Dinka and Nuer inhabitants to survive through mixed
cultivation and herding. Agriculture alone was unreliable, due to the combination of
erratic flooding, unreliable rainfall and clay soil. A millennium ago this led to the
development of a mainly pastoral economy, in which the pastoralists move their
cattle following the water as it dries up, until they come to rest on the toic.29
The economies of the various ethnic and political Upper Nile groups are
linked together and form a wider regional system that enables each group to survive
the limitations of its specific geographical area. The groups use a variety of
networks of exchange, some based on kinship obligations, some on direct trade.
Through these networks, the peoples of the region have enjoyed regular access to

29
Toic is the river-flooded grassland along the rivers, which in the dry season
becomes pasture. In Upper Nile there are four main vegetation areas: permanent
swamp, river-flooded grasslands or toic, rain-flooded grasslands, and relatively flood-
free land where the villages are built and cultivation undertaken. In the wet
season, or during a flood, the rivers rise, the rains fall, and the toic is flooded. The
months of April-November are the wet season in Upper Nile. Two or three crops of
sorghum are sown during the rains. During the dry season cattle are moved away from
the villages in stages, following the water as it dries up and exposes new pastures, until
they come to rest on the toic. Douglas H. Johnson, "Political Ecology in the Upper Nile:
The Twentieth Century Expansion of the Pastoral 'Common Economy,'" Journal of
African History 30 (1989): p. 465.
Background 39

distant resources, crossing political and ethnic boundaries.30 As the historian

Douglas H. Johnson has written:

We should recognize that people go where the food is, that in this
region lines of kinship frequently follow and strengthen lines of
feeding. Social ties . . . were, and still are, the main way in which
the Nilotic people survive and recover from the natural
catastrophes which are endemic to their region.31

30
Ibid., p. 463.

31
Ibid., p. 484.
40 Civilian Devastation

In times of shortage, they drew on each other's reserves, even if there was only a
surplus in relative terms.32 One tactic they employed was to raid both cattle and
grain, especially during the nineteenth century, when raiding was more common
than in the current century. Trade in cattle and ivory was yet another link between
the Dinka and Nuer. Intermarriage was another: by the time of the great floods of
1916, the southern Dinka were used to marrying their daughters to the Nuer in times
of need, in spite of intermittent periods of conflict, and there were already a number
of Dinka women living among the Nuer in marriages mutually recognized by both
peoples.33
The SPLA split of 1991, while not tribally motivated, drove a military and
political divide between these groups in Upper Nile. In addition, the places of
greatest SPLA factional fighting of 1991-93 were in the Duk Ridge and Kongor,34

32
Ibid.

33
Ibid., p. 480. The Gaawar Nuer were approached by southern Dinka in times of
need by the end of the first decade of the twentieth century. For a time they refused
grain and insisted that the Dinka bring girls for marriage if they wanted cattle. The
Gaawar Nuer paid a lower rate to the Dinka than was customary among the Nuer but
higher than most Dinka could afford among themselves, so there was an economic
incentive for intermarriage on both sides. Ibid.

34
The Duk Ridge -- a series of sandy knolls now occupied by the Gaawar Nuer from
Background 41

which in the past produced food surpluses but because of the fighting could no
longer be a bridge in the hunger gap.
One of the main problems coinciding with the war in the 1980s was
environmental: rainfall declined, followed by floods in 1988 and later in Upper
Nile. For instance, the area of Waat (Lou Nuer) suffered particularly from drought
during the planting seasons of the late 1980s. The area around Duk Faiwil and Pok
Tap (Nyareweng Dinka) was relatively flood- and drought-free. The Lou Nuer
therefore came in large numbers of family groups in 1988-90 to the Nyareweng
Dinka, many of them seeking out the same Dinka individuals to whom the Lou Nuer
had provided shelter during the floods of the 1960s.
In 1991, when Lou crops were destroyed by floods and Lou herds
devastated by disease, they would have again turned to the Nyareweng for
assistance, but for the SPLA faction fighting. By then the SPLA-Nasir and Anya-
Nya II of Ayod had attacked the Duks and Kongor and wrecked the area, forcing
many Nyareweng Dinka to flee with nothing. The Lou Nuer therefore were not able
to seek refuge with their Nyareweng Dinka contacts because Nyareweng Dinka
were destitute and simultaneously seeking assistance for themselves.
Thus the brutal conflict in the Hunger Triangle tore open the customary
safety nets and exposed hundreds of thousands to hunger, disease and death.

Mogogh to south of Ayod, the Ghol Dinka at Duk Fadiat, and the Nyareweng Dinka at
Duk Faiwil -- was frequently productive throughout the first half of the century. By far
the most productive land south of the Duk Ridge was in the area of Kongor, which has
dark soil, but lies in a depression, subject to much flooding. The area of permanent
habitations and cultivation is protected by banks round all the villages, offering some
security from the seasonal floods. Johnson, "Political Ecology in the Upper Nile," pp.
469-70.
PLACE MAP #3 HERE
 III. VIOLATIONS OF THE RULES OF WAR
BY GOVERNMENT FORCES

The Sudan government has engaged in widespread violations of the rules

of war during the period of 1992 to early 1994, indiscriminately killing southern
civilians, burning their villages, and indiscriminately bombing and shelling their
population centers. Its forces also tortured and killed detainees in southern garrison
towns. In Juba alone those disappeared after government arrest in 1992 number
over 100; they are all presumed dead.

GOVERNMENT ABUSES
DURING THE 1992 DRY SEASON OFFENSIVE

The 1992 government dry season offensive was characterized by serious

violations of the rules of war that usually accompanied government military
campaigns: killing civilians, burning villages, and indiscriminate aerial
bombardments and shelling.
The Khartoum regime's offensives on several fronts in 1992 dealt the
SPLA its heaviest military losses in years. The SPLA-Torit lost many population
centers it had controlled in Equatoria and Upper Nile provinces, including Torit,
Kapoeta, Pochalla, Pibor Post, Yirol, and Bor. The government's gains were made
possible because in August 1991 the SPLA had split into two factions--known as
SPLA-Torit and SPLA-Nasir--and engaged in faction fighting (see Chapter IV).
Following the split, the government did not attack areas controlled by the
SPLA-Nasir faction, nor did the SPLA-Nasir faction undertake any offensives
against the government, with the possible exception of the attack on Malakal in
October 1992.1

1
The SPLA-Nasir took credit for this attack, which appeared later to have been
largely the initiative of a Nuer prophet.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 45

In summary, there were four prongs to the 1992 government offensive.2

The first crossed from Ethiopia to the Sudanese border town of Pochalla, captured it
on March 9, 1992, and went on to take Pibor Post on April 23. The second was an
advance south from Malakal to capture Bor on the White Nile on April 4. The third
prong started in Wau, Bahr El Ghazal, in the direction of Tonj, and captured Yirol
on April 11 and Shambe on April 14;3 Tali Post was captured by the government-
supported Mandari militia in May. Another column from Wau proceeded north to
open the rail routes closed between Wau and Aweil since 1986. A fourth
government contingent came out of Juba, the regional capital of several hundred
thousand people, heading south to relieve the besieged garrison of Yei, one of the
only garrison towns in Equatoria in government hands.4 These troops, instead of
going to Yei, crossed the Nile in an effort to take Torit, and were bogged down in
fighting at Ngangala. They took that outpost in mid-April and Lirya in mid-May,
Kapoeta on May 28 and Torit, until then the headquarters of the SPLA-Torit, on
July 13.5

2
See Sudan map, inside front cover; Upper Nile map, facing Chapter II; Western
Equatoria and Bahr El Ghazal map, facing Chapter III; and Eastern Equatoria map,
facing Chapter IV.

3
Millard Burr, Sudan 1990-1992: Food Aid, Famine, and Failure (Washington, D.C.:
U.S. Committee for Refugees, May 1993), p. 26.

4
Ibid.

5
Ibid., p. 26-27. Torit had been heavily defended for months but the SPLA-Torit
evacuated the town in June 1992 before it fell to the government in order to concentrate
SPLA forces on capturing the larger town of Juba.
46 Civilian Devastation

The SPLA-Torit kept Juba under heavy siege and made two serious
incursions into Juba proper in June and July 1992, although it did not succeed in
taking Juba. In the course of defending against the SPLA-Torit, the government
forces committed many abuses, including torture, summary executions, and forced
displacement of the civilian population of Juba.
As part of its strategy, the government frequently denied access to U.N.
and international relief agencies seeking to alleviate the hardship caused by the
conflict. Starting in March 1992, the government ordered relief personnel to leave
many southern locations, refused permission to airlift supplies to starving civilians,
staged attacks by Toposa militia on relief convoys around Kapoeta, and for months
denied permission to truck food and non-food items into most of the south.
In March 1992, the government expelled the International Committee of
the Red Cross (ICRC), which had sustained about 100,000 recent repatriatees6 in
Pochalla. Beginning in April 1992, coinciding with its dry season offensive, the
government also revoked permission for OLS relief flights to areas under SPLA-
Torit control. After a delay, permission was given on April 21, 1992, to the OLS to
deliver food to Akobo, Waat, and Nasir, all towns under SPLA-Nasir's control.7 On
May 19, 1992, the government announced that all relief flights to all destinations in
the south could be resumed, ending a six-week ban on flights to the war zone.
Despite what the government said about resumption of relief flights,
however, the OLS remained frustrated in its attempts to deliver food to all the needy
populations. The OLS was cut off again, then permitted to resume flights to Nasir
and Waat in August 1992, but not to any other locations because either the SPLA or
the government of Sudan did not approve these other locations as flight
destinations.

Government Offensive from Ethiopia into Eastern Upper Nile in 1992

The Sudan government took Pochalla on March 9, 1992, after several
unsuccessful attempts which included indiscriminately bombing a camp for

6
Repatriatees are refugees who have returned or repatriated to their country of
origin.

7
United Nations, OLS, SEPHA Bi-Monthly Report no. 16 on OLS Emergency
Operations in Southern Sector for the Period 19 April to 5 May 1992, Nairobi, Kenya,
p. 1. These areas had not been attacked by the government, but those displaced from the
government attack on Pochalla were flooding into Akobo, and tens of thousands of
repatriated refugees in Nasir continued to remain in precarious condition.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 47

repatriatees. After moving from Pochalla to Pibor Post, the government troops
killed civilians, burned huts, and looted cattle in outlying villages.
The SPLA had held Pochalla, in Anuak territory, since 1986.8 Within a
few weeks after the fall of Mengistu, Pochalla had grown from a small border town
to the overnight home of about 100,000 Sudanese who fled their Ethiopian refugee
camps. Most of this population fled from Fugnido. The SPLA moved its military
base from Ethiopia to Pochalla, locating it one and a half hours east of the
repatriatees' camp, on the road that led from the border. The repatriatees were
assisted by the ICRC.9 When they had been there several months, early one morning
the Sudan government and Ethiopian forces started shelling from the direction of
Ethiopia. A woman repatriatee told HRW/Africa she believed that the shells were
aimed at the repatriatees' camp, over the heads of the SPLA. The SPLA shelled
back. At the first shelling, the civilians scattered to the bush. The shelling lasted
until noon, and then the Sudan government and Ethiopian forces pulled back.
The second attack, which occurred about a month later, started with an
artillery barrage, with shells landing in the center of the repatriatees' camp. At 10
A.M., a plane dropped bombs, appearing to be targeting the smoke from burning
cattle dung near the camp. Six bombs killed people and cattle. Others were
wounded. The civilians stayed outside Pochalla until midnight. After a week, a
plane returned to bomb again, prompting the civilians to begin to leave the area
entirely.
Many repatriatees walked to Kapoeta with an SPLA escort. They stayed
together in large groups, afraid of being killed if they traveled alone. The journey
was terribly long and difficult; the road was flooded and there were attacks by
Toposa militia. Many repatriatees went hungry and others drowned or were killed
by animals. A woman repatriatee told HRW/Africa that it took months for her group
of about 12,000 former refugees to reach Kapoeta, which they accomplished in
about January 1992.
By the time of the successful government attack on Pochalla in March
1992, the 100,000 repatriatees from 1991 had been reduced in number by several

8
Johnson and Prunier, "Foundation and Expansion," p. 130.

9
ICRC Annual Report 1992 (Geneva: ICRC), p. 50.
48 Civilian Devastation

such evacuations, some well publicized. When it expelled the ICRC in March 1992,
the government accused it of helping to recruit children into the SPLA and of giving
logistical support to the rebels. The accusation, which was not true, arose from the
humanitarian assistance given by the ICRC to repatriatees fleeing Pochalla. Among
them were several thousand unaccompanied minors, at whom, some believed, the
government attacks were especially aimed. (See Chapter IV.)
Advancing from Pochalla, government forces on April 23, 1992 captured
Pibor Post, held by the SPLA since March 1987. A Murle man in his early twenties
was in his home village of Kondago outside of Pibor Post when government forces
entered the village after the capture of Pibor Post.10 He was planting in his garden,
away from the house, when the army entered at 4 P.M., shooting "indiscriminately."
He and others fled two hours into the forest as soon as they heard the shooting. The
next day, they sneaked back, but returned to the forest when they saw the army was
still there. They returned the next day to find that the army had left, after burning
down the huts and killing many villagers. Among the dead were thirty-two children
who were burned inside a hut, apparently gathered there by the army in order to

10
This man said that earlier some Murle residents in Pibor Post were sent by the
government to the village to meet with the chief (sultan). The Murle of Pibor Post, who
allegedly were given money by the government representatives, came three times to
meet with the chief and ask him to call a meeting of the people and tell them they had to
"learn the Koran." The chief refused.
A month after this refusal, the chief, Nam Korok, and two helpers were taken
away by the army to Pibor Post. One helper, who escaped and ran back to the village,
told the people that they had been taken to the army compound where the other two
were killed. After that everyone was afraid to go to town.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 49

burn them along with the hut. Four of this man's children, ages five, six, seven, and
eight, and his brother's children were killed.11 Other villagers were shot.
The army looted most of the cattle, either looting or shooting one hundred
of the witness's 113 cows. "Everything but the trees was burned," he said, including
a large African Inland church, also used as the school, and a Catholic church.
Because the army burned and looted all their food, this man and others left the
village that same day and walked west into SPLA-controlled territory.

11
He had three other children of whom one died en route to the displaced persons
camp; of seven, only two survive.
50 Civilian Devastation

Government Offensive from Malakal South in March/April 1992

In a separate prong of the government offensive on SPLA population
centers, motorized army troops advanced south from Malakal and passed through
Duk Fadiat in Upper Nile, wreaking havoc on Dinka (but not Nuer) villages as they
proceeded.12 Tens of thousands of southern civilians were displaced between March
and May 1992 during this offensive.
A Dinka religious leader who lived in the Duk Fadiat area said that a
government convoy passed through that outpost in March 1992. The army burned
the houses on the road but did not sweep beyond the road. The civilians fled to the
toic, the river-flooded grassland. The army did not search out cattle, but they took
the cattle they found and kept advancing south. The witness went to the toic because
there he could find food, fish and roots, to eat. "There was no food in Duk because
of the fighting in 1991," he said. They all eventually went to Ayod.
By March 1992, Kongor had been nearly deserted for several months, but
the government in March 1992 nevertheless destroyed the few civilian structures
left standing after the devastating SPLA-Nasir raids of a few months earlier.
According to a Dinka chief from Kongor, a government army truck convoy from
Malakal to Bor passed alongside the Jonglei canal, made a short detour through
Kongor, stayed in Kongor only a few hours, then returned back to the canal. During
that time the government troops destroyed the cement buildings, including a
dispensary, schools, the rural council office, and others. There were only a few
people living in Kongor at the time. "Here was a no-man's land, only hunger," the
chief said. A married couple, Dau Deng and his second wife, Achol Ajak, were
killed by an army tank during this incursion into Kongor: the tank pursued them
between Kongor and Panyakur.
Bor, which is strategically located on the White Nile, frequently was
subjected to government aerial bombardment. It was captured by the government on
April 4, 1992. A twenty-eight-year-old Bor civilian man who was wounded in the
attack on Bor said that the day before Bor fell, at about noon, a government

12
See Upper Nile map, facing Chapter II.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 51

Antonov plane circled and bombed.13 He and many others ran to the bank of the
White Nile for shelter. Some people were bleeding, he said.
The next morning, at about 11 A.M., an artillery attack on Bor commenced
from the Malakal road. The residents of Bor "were surprised the enemy was so
close," he said. As he was running away from the artillery, out of Bor to the south,
he heard the sounds of fighting between the SPLA and the government. The SPLA
had apparently advanced into Bor from its base outside Bor to engage the
government troops.
On his way out of Bor, the witness was hit by government artillery fire.
There were no SPLA troops in the vicinity. The shell that wounded him killed his
older sister, his six-year-old brother, and another man. Three other women were
wounded as well by the same shell. The fifty cows he had managed to save from the
1991 SPLA-Nasir attack were looted by the army.

13
An Antonov is a Soviet-made plane. After an attempted coup by the Sudan
Communist Party in 1971, the Sudan government switched its allegiance to the West
and received no further from The U.S.S.R. military supplies.
52 Civilian Devastation

A combined relief operation directed by the U.N. delivered substantial

food relief within the first six weeks following the SPLA-Nasir 1991 raids on Bor
and Kongor, but the situation degenerated quickly, with feeding centers reported to
be "not coping at all" with the 58 percent of children said to be severely
malnourished. International relief staff left Bor on March 18, 1992, following the
advice of the Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Association (SRRA)14 in view of the
impending government attack; the feeding program for 6,000 children was
abandoned. Other international staffers similarly left Malek on March 31 and
arrived in Jemeiza, seventy-five kilometers south of Bor, where they reestablished a
supplementary feeding program for 5,000 malnourished children in three centers
and 7,000 others in villages in the area and started distributing dry rations to the
displaced.15
After the government occupied Bor, it burned the villages of Baidit,
Mathiang, Moreng, Molek, and Anyidi in April and May 1992; the villagers fled the
government.
The further battering of Dinka civilians pushed tens of thousands of them
west to neighboring Dinka tribes in Bahr El Ghazal. In July 1992 groups of Bor and
Twic (Kongor) Dinka were arriving daily in Aguran, after a 150-kilometer journey
of ten to twenty days; many reported the death of infants en route.16

14
The SRRA is the SPLA-Torit relief wing.

15
SEPHA Bi-Monthly Report No. 14 on OLS Emergency and Relief Operations in
the Southern Sector for the Period 21 March to 5 April 1992, p. 1.

16
Fighting subjected the civilians to continual displacement. Two Dinka chiefs from
Wernyol north of Kongor in Dinka territory first fled the SPLA-Nasir raids in
September 1991, wandering twenty days with their followers south to Jemeiza,
bypassing Bor. They ate wild leaves and fruits until, fifteen days later, the U.N. arrived
with relief food.
"The U.N. then was not like now. It was very good, they brought food without
stopping, in good quantities and useful items. This U.N. now [July 1993] is very
irregular here," a chief told HRW/Africa.
The two chiefs did not plant in Jemeiza because it was still the dry season.
"When the rains were near," or in April 1992, the government took Bor. This group of
displaced left Jemeiza, because 1)it was on the main road and could be reached easily by
the government from Bor, and 2) when the rains started, the road to Jemeiza and Bor
would become impassable for U.N. vehicles. They waited fifteen days and no U.N. trucks
came. They ate wild fruits and leaves. It started to rain. These displaced took the seeds
the U.N. gave them and began to walk back home.
They were right to fend for themselves by moving; they did not know it but the
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 53

international staff who had set up a feeding camp in Jemeiza were evacuated on April 8,
1992, and after that the U.N. could not reach the displaced anywhere in this area.
SEPHA Bi-Monthly Report No. 15 on OLS Emergency and Relief Operations in the
Southern Sector for the period 3 April to 21 April 1992, p. 1.
This group walked for twenty days to reach the area of Panyakur near
Kongor, then went back north to Wernyol during the wet season of 1992, and planted
the U.N. seeds. They were in Wernyol during the second SPLA-Nasir attack in July
1992.
54 Civilian Devastation

An assessment of the Bor area in late 1992 revealed that it was almost
deserted although it had once been heavily populated. Many civilians from
surrounding areas arrived daily in Bor in late 1992 seeking food and other
assistance. The Sudan government, in control of the town, permitted their free
movement. However, no agreement could be reached between the government and
rebels to permit relief agencies to cross the lines around Bor to deliver food to the
needy where they lived.17

Government and SPLA-Nasir Attacks in Bahr El Ghazal in 1992

17
OLS (Southern Sector), "1992/93 Situation Assessment," February 1993, Nairobi,
Kenya, p. 13-14.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 55

Bahr El Ghazal was formerly the most densely populated area of all
southern Sudan, with the population of the floodplain area of Aweil and Gogrial in
1976 estimated at 1.5 million.18 The area was, however, suffering from widespread
destruction of crops by flooding in 1992 and a poor harvest in 1991, also due to
flooding. Flight permission to the area was suspended by the government of Sudan
in early 1990 and was only reinstated in December 1992, leaving the area, far from
international borders, also far from international purview.
Government abuses during an offensive in Bahr El Ghazal in 1992
included burning villages, looting, and killing civilians. During the campaign, the
government won back control of several strategic towns from the SPLA-Torit and
disrupted the relative calm that had prevailed in Bahr El Ghazal for a few years.
Government troops and Popular Defence Force (PDF) militia proceeded
from the government garrison town of Wau in March 1992, and destroyed a string
of villages across Bahr El Ghazal province, reaching Rumbek garrison in early
April.19 The SPLA-Torit engaged government troops at the Na'am River Bridge on
the Rumbek-Yirol road and at Allau cattle camp. The government forces withdrew
to the north, burning many more Dinka villages, including Luel, Paloc, Pandit, Kap,
Mageir, Markur, Yali, Mangar and Aromniel. The government finally captured
Yirol on April 11 after bombing it. Shambe, a Nile port for southern Bahr El Ghazal
and an important crossroads for the SPLA's supply system, fell on April 14, also
after bombing.20

18
Ibid, p. 20. Others note that the 1983 census for Aweil area council was 691,309 and
for Gogrial area council 322,734, totalling 1,214,043. This census was disrupted,
however, and its figures are often rejected by southerners.

19
See Western Equatoria and Bahr El Ghazal map, facing Chapter III. The attacked
villages included Abiem Nayar, Nyangakoc, Manyiel, Citgok, Makuac, and Pagor.

20
Burr, Food Aid, p. 26.
56 Civilian Devastation

A thirty-year-old Dinka woman then living in Yirol town said that

government forces bombed Yirol one week before they attacked. When they entered
the town in the early hours of the morning, she was in her hut, or tukl. She heard
firing and ran outside, where she saw random shooting. "Anyone was shot--men,
women, children," she said. "Some of the soldiers burned houses with people in
them." The soldiers captured many people; some were taken away, others were
executed.
Three of this witness's daughters and two sons were killed in the attack.
Two of her children survived, but a young daughter later died when running from
another attack near Mundri in Western Equatoria. Her family's cattle were all raided
from a nearby cattle camp.
From Yirol, the Sudan Army set out, with tanks and troop carriers, to
round up cattle and set fire to villages in a radius of twenty kilometers from Yirol. A
relief worker noted that previously government troops had not systematically set fire
to villages in this area. This time, however, the destruction was systematic. At least
fifteen villages were affected.21
The Dinka woman and her relatives escaped Yirol to hide in the forest
around Aguran. They saw smoke from the burning villages, from which people
escaped and joined her group in the forest.
U.N. and NGO presence in Bahr El Ghazal and thus information on these
attacks was quite limited because of the flight ban on destinations in that region and
its inaccessibility by road during the rainy season. What began to emerge, however,
was that the government's scorched earth campaign was again producing vast
numbers of displaced.
The 1992 dry season campaign occurred at a time when many civilians had
returned to the villages from the grazing grounds to prepare the land for cultivation.
Although part of the motivation for the scorched earth campaign may have been to
prevent the SPLA-Torit from having any cover under which to sneak up on Yirol,
the extent of the burning greatly exceeded that need. It also drastically weakened the
capacity of the civilian population to survive, forcing many of them to move south.
About 90,000 Dinka who lived north and northeast of Rumbek were
displaced by tribal clashes, and about 50,000 living in Yirol were displaced by the
intensive fighting preceding the government's recapture of the town on April 12.
Many were gathering around Aluakluak between Rumbek and Yirol, as were others

21
These villages included Abiem, Panabier, Lualthiep, Alakec, Banylom, Nyang,
Manyang, Tit Agau, Nyatiba, Goltoin, Geng Geng, Wunapoth, Arwau, and Pakeu.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 57

displaced from the Bor/Kongor area. At that time, relief agencies estimated that
Aluakluak had a population of 150,000.22

Indiscriminate Government Bombing and the Capture of Kapoeta and Torit in

1992
Prior to the capture of Kapoeta and Torit in Eastern Equatoria, the
government engaged in indiscriminate bombardment of the two towns. In the course
of the government capture of Kapoeta and afterwards, the army and militia killed
civilians; many were targeted deliberately because they were Dinka.

22
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report no. 20, June 21-July 3, 1992,
Nairobi, Kenya, p. 8.
58 Civilian Devastation

Kapoeta, captured by the SPLA on February 25, 1988, was retaken by the
government on May 28, 1992, in a surprise attack in which the Toposa militia
played a key role because of their knowledge of the terrain. The government had
provided guns and ammunition to the Toposa so they could fight the SPLA and the
Lotuko tribe, a longstanding Toposa rival. The SPLA then armed the Boya against
the Toposa.23 In early 1991, the SPLA reached an agreement with local Toposa, but
the move was not entirely successful.24 A witness told HRW/Africa that the Toposa
militia in 1992 "frequently raided the town, taking goats and cattle. They would kill
to get livestock."

Indiscriminate Bombing of Kapoeta

The government indiscriminately bombed Kapoeta on March 13, 1992,
killing several civilians. The fact that Kapoeta was a seat of local administration for
the SPLA-Torit did not convert the entire town into a legitimate military target. Nor
was the relief warehouse, described below, a legitimate military target.25

A man who witnessed the bombing said the attackers used an Antonov
plane. He was working in a hut next to a relief food warehouse by the river at 11:30
A.M. when he heard the plane approaching. People scattered, and several were
killed. He saw the body of a thirty-year-old man and later attended his burial.

23
Johnson and Prunier, "Foundation and Expansion," p. 135.

24
Ibid., p. 140.

25
To be a legitimate target, such a warehouse would have had to be dedicated to
military use, and this warehouse held civilian relief supplies. See Appendix A.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 59

Twelve shells were dropped near the relief warehouse, which he thinks was
deliberately targeted. The twelve craters left by the bombs were deep enough for
him, a Dinka man about six feet six inches tall, to stand in; the craters were "in a
line" outside the warehouse, a large brick building with a zinc roof, which was
damaged. Also damaged was a nearby one-story hotel.
The same plane circled around and made a second run on Kapoeta. It
dropped bombs on the airstrip and wounded three people, one a driver whom he
knew personally.26
An elderly woman in Kapoeta also saw two bombing runs that day; in one,
three bombs fell in one place killing five women, and in the other, three men, forty
cows, and twenty goats were killed. The dead were Toposa civilians. She saw the
bodies--one of the women had her head blown off, and one of the men was cut
almost in two at the waist.
The government bombed irregularly. There would be two or three months
or one week off, then it would start again. There was no pattern. "They would let
people forget then bomb randomly," she said.

Targeted Killings of Dinkas

Because the May 28 attack on Kapoeta surprised the SPLA-Torit, it could
not properly organize an evacuation. In the hasty flight, some of those left behind
when the government and militia entered were tortured and killed.

26
The airstrip would be a legitimate military target if it were used for military
purposes by the SPLA-Torit. This airstrip was used predominantly if not entirely for
the civilian relief effort.
60 Civilian Devastation

Government soldiers differentiated in their treatment of various tribes: the

Toposa-speaking civilians were kept alive, as were the Nuer and those from
Equatorian tribes, such as the Boya, Lotuko, and Acholi. The Dinka were singled
out for punishment.27 Many were captured, tied, shot, and thrown inside houses
which were set on fire. The aunt and uncle of a nineteen-year-old Dinka boy were
killed this way, as well as their four children.
Elijah Dau, a Dinka and financial comptroller of Kapoeta for the SPLA,
had remained behind with two of his four wives. He was killed, allegedly shot by
the Toposa militia at about 4 or 5 P.M. on May 28 while trying to surrender. Kir
Monychol, a graduate of the University of Cairo, was killed with his wife Chuti
Deng, chair of the Kapoeta Women's Affairs Committee, and three others who were
intercepted by the Toposa militia outside of Kapoeta, according to one who
survived this attack.
The nineteen-year-old Dinka above, who did not flee fast enough, was
hidden by his Toposa schoolmate friends. The attack on Kapoeta seemed to him to
last about five hours. After the government shelling stopped, from hiding he saw the
Toposa militia entering, followed by the army in military vehicles and tanks. The
Toposa shot people "indiscriminately," he said, and the army shot mainly at men.
Both government troops and militia looted. Only the houses at the outskirts of town
were burned, leaving the houses in town standing for Toposa militia use. This boy
remained in hiding ten days, then escaped.
The government raided villages around Kapoeta after seizing the town,
including Bunao village, the Norwegian Church Aid (NCA) mission, two hours
from Kapoeta, and Khor Mashi village, a displaced center one and a half hours from
Kapoeta where many took refuge after Kapoeta fell. Inhabitants of both villages
were accused of harboring the SPLA, and government soldiers reportedly killed
civilians in both places, and burned all the houses in Khor Mashi and Bunao.
People fled Kapoeta in two directions: on the road south to Kenya, or west
to Torit. A woman witness told HRW/Africa that she and her children fled at 4 A.M.
and arrived three hours later in Khor Mashi, then traveled farther. Her strength

27
Many Dinka came to Kapoeta after it was taken by the SPLA in 1988; some
participated in the administration and were among the top military officers, which
caused resentment among the locals. The Dinka were not native to this area.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 61

began to give out, however; her feet were badly blistered and she fell down as she
escaped, wounding her left upper arm, where she bears an ugly scar. She was hot
and exhausted. She said that her skin peeled off, "on my arms, buttocks; my tongue
split, too." She saw many lying on the ground, dead, because they had no water and
they had to pass through a desert area outside Kapoeta, where there was "no river
and no water, just small trees without leaves." A car picked her up and took her and
her children to Torit Hospital. She was there for two days and then was evacuated to
Aswa Hospital, where her recuperation took two and a half months.

Indiscriminate Bombing of Fleeing Civilians

Even after Kapoeta was retaken, the government air force chased the
fleeing civilians, bombing them on the road south to Kenya. Although most of the
Kapoeta evacuees reached Narus to the south on May 28, the SPLA advised them
not to stay because they feared the government troops would reach Narus. The
civilians and SPLA evacuated Narus about 7 P.M. The next day, May 29, the
column of refugees started reaching Lokichokio, Kenya at 9 A.M. It was so long that
its end was not visible from Lokichokio. The end of the column was bombed that
day at a Toposa village where some of the slower people were resting; reportedly
one was killed and three injured. Between 20,000 and 22,000 Sudanese left Narus
to seek refuge in Kenya, including 12,500 unaccompanied minors.
To the west of Kapoeta, Torit, which was captured by the SPLA on
February 27, 198928 and became its capital thereafter, was recaptured by the
government on July 13, 1992. The SPLA did not put up any resistance to the
recapture because at the time the SPLA-Torit was concentrating all its military
efforts on the larger city of Juba, which it entered on June 7 and July 6, 1992.

28
Johnson and Prunier, "Foundation and Expansion," p. 137.
62 Civilian Devastation

En route to Torit, the government first recaptured the town of Lirya on the
road from Juba to Torit on May 12; by that date, the SPLA had begun the
evacuation of Torit.29
Not all the civilians left that month. According to a Pari civilian still there
at the time, a week or more before they took Torit government troops shelled the
town from a distance of several miles while repairing a bridge. The shelling went on
every day that week, usually for two hours at a time, he said. When those left in
Torit heard the shelling begin, everyone "hit the ground" to avoid shrapnel.
During one incident, three boys and their two fathers, relatives of this Pari
man, died when they were hit by a shell that landed five meters away from him.

GOVERNMENT ABUSES
BEFORE AND DURING THE BATTLE FOR JUBA, 1992

29
SEPHA Bi-Monthly Report no. 17 on OLS Emergency Operations in Southern
Sector for the period May 5-20, 1992, Nairobi, Kenya, p. 1. The last three
nongovernmental organizations, Health Unlimited, New Sudan Council of Churches,
and Norwegian Church Aid, evacuated their staffs on May 15. By that time, the general
population largely had evacuated the town and so had SPLA/SRRA non-essential
personnel. Ibid. All U.N./NGO buildings appeared to have been looted by departing
civilians and SPLA military personnel before the
government forces entered Torit.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 63

Juba, the former capital of and largest city (estimated population

287,000)30 in the southern region, has been under siege by the SPLA-Torit since
1986.31 Located in Eastern Equatoria on the West Bank of the White Nile, its
population, which before the second civil war in 1983 was about 150,000, has since
been augmented mostly by displaced Equatorians from outside Juba who fled to
Juba when their resistance to the SPLA-Torit failed.32

30
Census, 1991, cited in internal report of a relief agency working in Juba, dated
August 25, 1992.

31
Africa Watch, Denying The Honor of Living, p. 70.

32
Ibid.
64 Civilian Devastation

This section focuses on abuses committed by the government in Juba in

1991-92. The information is supplemental to the considerably detailed work already
done by Amnesty International on the government's repression of the population of
Juba and on the population's civic resistance.33 Abuses committed by the SPLA-
Torit before, during, and after the battle for Juba are included in Chapter IV, below.

Abuses During the 1991-92 School Strike and Civic Struggle

In the course of suppressing civic resistance to its policies of forced
Arabization and Islamization, the government arrested and brutally treated student
demonstrators and leaders.
The struggle began in May 1991, when the government announced
proposed new laws to change the language of instruction in the south from English
to Arabic and to make compulsory the study of Islam.34 The students in Juba
organized themselves and held workshops and seminars in protest. The Young
Christian Student Movement passed resolutions against the change in language of
instruction, which, they protested, would have an adverse effect on their academic
careers.
In August 1991, the laws were passed, and on September 9, 1991, a school
boycott of primary, intermediate, and secondary schools took effect in Juba. A
peaceful student march to the office of the minister of education in Juba was
stopped by the police, who ordered the students to disperse. The students tried to

33
Amnesty International, "Sudan: Deaths and detentions: the destruction of Juba,"
AI Index: AFR 54/26/92 (London: Amnesty International, September 23, 1992);
Amnesty International, "Ravages of war."

34
According to Amnesty International,
The issue of Arabic as the language for teaching in secondary and higher
education is politically sensitive in Sudan. Historically, English is the language
of government in southern Sudan and is the medium of instruction in most
southern educational institutions. Tuition in English is regarded by many
southern Sudanese intellectuals as protecting their cultural identity in relation
to Muslim northern Sudan. Steps to Arabicize the educational system started
in 1991 when the government announced that all school-leavers seeking
university places would be required to pass an examination in Arabic. Since
1972 southerners had been exempted from this requirement. Southerners
argue that the requirement discriminates against southern students gaining
university places.
Amnesty International, "Urgent Action, Sudan," AI Index: AFR 54/25/92, London,
July 31, 1992.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 65

negotiate with the police, who after an hour started to use tear gas and electric prods
to disperse the crowd. Some students were arrested. The next day the students
attacked the office of Dawa Islamia, the Islamic missionary organization supporting
the curriculum changes. Arrests of students continued.
Five days later, a new state governor was appointed who ordered the
release of the students; they were videotaped before release. He issued an order
establishing a governing student body as an alternative means of registering student
complaints.
On September 22, 1992, while the school boycott continued, the secondary
school students assembled at Juba Commercial Secondary School and elected
representatives, who drew up a list of demands and made an appointment to meet
the governor and the Council of Ministers the next morning. At the meeting, the
students presented their demands and the governor responded that he would make
the changes that fell within his jurisdiction but that other matters would have to be
referred to the central government, including stationing armed Popular Defence
Forces in schools35 and on Juba university grounds.36
The main student demands related to a regional curriculum, the language
of instruction, and the teaching of religion. The students objected that textbooks
contained information about the north that was not "practical or useful to the south."
They thought it highly unfair that mid-year exams would be held in Arabic, not in
English as before.

35
To the complaint about armed Pakistanis in the Popular Defence Force, the
minister of education said that the Pakistanis were there on a religious mission. The
students replied that in such a case uniforms and guns were not indicated.

36
University classes had been transferred to Khartoum in 1990, but the majority of
the student body did not make the transfer.
66 Civilian Devastation

The students called off the boycott, with the ultimatum that it would be
resumed on October 10 if matters were not resolved.37 On October 14, a committee
of three persons appointed by the governor to resolve the crisis in Khartoum
informed the student representatives that their complaints had been accepted and
that there was no further need to boycott classes. The students asked for the
commitments in writing. When they received nothing, the boycott resumed.

Students Arrested and Beaten

At the end of October 1991, as the boycott held fast, the minister of
education announced the dissolution of the governing student body. At midnight,
three student leaders were arrested; they were interrogated by security authorities
and released three days later. Other arrests followed.
At least one student was arrested at home during this period with an arrest
warrant issued by the governor; his house was searched, although the authorities had
no search warrant. They took him to state security headquarters, made him take off
his shirt, and beat him on the back with a leather whip, to make him "give in." He
was beaten during interrogation and also in his cell, where he was held in isolation.
After two days of interrogation concerning church and political leaders allegedly
behind the movement, he was released; he was kept under close surveillance.
From time to time during November 1991, security authorities would force
some students to announce on the radio that they had dropped their complaints and
were ordering the other students to go back to classes.

Escaping Students Tortured by Military Intelligence

37
The secondary school academic year is April to March.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 67

In November 1991, the government announced that the schools in southern

Sudan were to use Arabic rather than English as the language of instruction.38 By
the end of that month, seeing the intransigence of both sides, some students started
to leave the country on foot. Those who were intercepted by the army were taken to
military intelligence headquarters and tortured.
A BBC broadcast on December 25, 1991 of interviews with students who
had fled Juba and reached Uganda on foot inspired more to try to escape, including
a group of about twenty-eight students who left for Uganda on January 8, 1992.
They found a guide to assist them in traveling through the military posts and the
land mines outside Juba. He recommended that they break into two groups; one
group, waiting in the bush eight kilometers south of Juba near an army headquarters,
was left behind in the confusion.
Because some in the group had already attempted three or four
unsuccessful escapes, they proceeded without a guide. After moving five more
kilometers, they were surrounded by the army and ordered to stop. Although they
were unarmed and complied with the order, the army shot at them, and they fell
down, most escaping injuries. A boy and a girl in the group, however, disappeared
at that point and have not been seen since. The other twelve were captured; three
were young women. All were taken to the military intelligence headquarters in Juba.
The nine boys were packed into one room with twenty-one male students arrested
earlier, four of whom, unbeknownst to the others, were informers.
The next morning the male captives were ordered by the soldiers to get in
the "Hindi" position, which involved putting one's head on the floor with straight
legs and lifting the hands, arms locked, behind and over the back. From this position
they were kicked in their hands and neck by the soldiers, who referred to this as
their "breakfast."

38
Amnesty International, "Urgent Action: Sudan," AI Index: AFR 54/14/92, London,
April 6, 1992.
68 Civilian Devastation

Three boys were called to the office and told to bring their documents. All
were beaten and had their documents taken. One was questioned about why he
wanted to go to Uganda and why he did not use legal means. He explained that he
had secured a visa but that transport from Juba was difficult.39 He had applied to fly
on a relief plane to Nairobi, but while waiting for that permission, his visa expired
and the authorities would not renew it.
During questioning, an interrogator lashed this student and banged his head
against the wall, asking him about the role of the U.N. in helping the students flee to
Uganda. The interrogator claimed that the U.N. kept vehicles near Kajo Kaji to take
the students to Roman Catholic Bishop Taban, who would take them to Uganda.
The student detainee denied this. The interrogators made him lie on the floor on his
back, already wounded from lashing, and lashed him several minutes more.
The next day, everyone in the cell received minor beatings from the
various soldiers who passed by. The numbers of male detainees in the cell increased
gradually to sixty-five. On the following day, Sunday, twenty students were
removed from the overcrowded cell and put in a makeshift cell, a trench with logs
covering the top. Since it was Sunday, the students asked for and received
permission to pray. The guards gave them back one of the Bibles they had
confiscated and allowed a Mexican nun to enter the army base to pray with them.
Priests brought food for the students and the soldiers.
On Monday, a second lieutenant, Ibrahim Salam, became annoyed when he
heard a student detainee singing a hymn. According to this twenty-three-year-old
student, this lieutenant called him into an office, alone. The lieutenant took out a
display of torture tools (pin, pliers, whip, cocked pistol, red peppers in a bag) and
placed them on a table, and told the student to remove his jacket, saying, "We're in
a state of emergency. If I kill you now like a dog, no one will question me. Which of
all these things do you want me to use?" The student refused to select any torture
instruments. The officer, in an effort to force the detainee to admit that he was a
student leader and SPLA-Torit agent and that the U.N. was behind the student
movement to Uganda, made the detainee lie on his face on the floor, and beat him.

39
Visas or travel permits are required by the government to enter or leave the
besieged city of Juba; they are hard to secure for those without government
connections.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 69

He also tightly tied each of the boy's fingers and punctured his fingertips with the
needle, making blood spurt out. He also made him stand an arm's length from the
wall, leaning against the wall; and he beat the detainee's outstretched arms and head.
The student passed out. When he opened his eyes he saw by a wall clock
that he had been unconscious for three hours. He was ordered to leave the office but
was unable to move. Then he was told to put on his jacket, but he could not. The
officer nevertheless forced the jacket on him; it became bloody.
The student crawled to the veranda, sat down, and moved slowly down the
steps to the trench. He lay face down without talking to the other prisoners. It was
hard for him to eat and when the guards came to count the prisoners at 6 P.M. he
could not stand up. He asked for permission to sleep outside the trench, and a
soldier agreed and gave him two blankets and a pillow.
The next day, his jacket was stuck to his wounds. The same officer who
had tortured him tore the jacket off his back, reopening the wounds. A nurse at the
base took pity on the victim and surreptitiously gave him antibiotics. An informer
saw him take a pill and informed that the prisoner intended to commit suicide. The
wounded student was again interrogated, although he was in a weak state, and
forced to turn over the medicine.
One night, he was taken in a car to the bank of the White Nile. His hands
were tied behind him and he was ordered to get out of the car and kneel facing the
river. The soldiers cocked a gun behind his ear and told him "This is the last
moment you have. Do you want to change your statement?" He had already decided
they were going to kill him so he did not change anything. They kicked and
threatened him some more but did not shoot him.
On the night of January 19, 1992, the student was driven to the White
House, a notorious torture center and death row. The captors showed him around
the building with a flashlight. "Have you seen the fate of the others? You will face
the same thing if you stick to your statement," they said. They tied his legs and arms
behind him with a rope around his chest. They attached a metal hook to the rope in
front of his body and pulled him up to hang from the ceiling. His head was thrown
back. For two minutes, "things became very difficult," he said, then they lowered
him down and finally took him back to the base.
The next day he was shown an "order of execution" for himself. He was
taken to kneel on an outcropping of rock over a valley with a small stream. "Say
your last prayers," the soldiers told him and hit him with a rifle butt. Three soldiers
cocked their rifles. "All will open up with their rifles. That is how we kill people.
Have you finished your prayers?" After a little more of this, they took him back to
his cell.
70 Civilian Devastation

The church put pressure on the army because of the reports of torture that
were leaking out of the base. Military intelligence then ordered the beatings to stop,
about fourteen days after the arrest of the student whose torture is described above.
The student overheard a military intelligence officer tell the torturer, "The
investigation is finished and I do not want to see any unnecessary beatings." The
interrogation of all but a few had already been completed by then.
Thereafter, they were not beaten. The student group, by then six girls and
fifty-nine boys, was transferred to police jurisdiction on January 22, 1992, where
they had "fine treatment, no harassment." The boys were kept in two big dormitories
and even given games to play. All the students were released on February 6, 1992,
on condition that a relative be a guarantor. The relative was to be photographed, and
if the student "went missing," the relative would be responsible. The student was
told by security authorities upon his release that they could not allow him to leave
Juba because he was "dangerous." The authorities also tried to recruit him after he
returned home.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 71

Arrest of Priests Followed by Police Shooting at Demonstrators,

Killing One
Following these events, the government targeted for arrest Catholic clergy.
When demonstrations were held to protest the arrests, the police used excessive
force in countering the demonstration, shooting into the crowd and killing one
student.
In March 1992, the head of the Catholic schools and another priest were
summoned by the police to explain why the Catholic schools had not been
reopened; the student school boycott of government schools was still in effect. Two
priests, Father Constantino Pitia and Father Nicholas Abdallah, were arrested on
March 10 and flown, without any notification to church authorities, to Khartoum on
March 15.40
Juba civilians demonstrated on March 15, 16, and 17, to protest the arrests
of the priests. On March 17, teargas was used to disperse the crowds. A fourteen-
year-old boy, Francis, who was at the head of the crowd, died when the soldiers shot
into the crowd. His body was carried to the church by the demonstrators. For his
funeral the next day, the funeral route, seven kilometers from the church to the
school, was lined with tanks and heavily armed soldiers. The government also
deployed prison warders, wildlife police, intelligence agents, and police. Marchers
were ordered to disperse in ones and twos; they were warned that larger groups
would be shot at. The priests who were present agreed to obey the order, and the
crowd dispersed.
The two detained priests were released in April 1992 after twenty-six days
in custody. They returned from Khartoum to Juba in early May and were met by a
large group of supporters at the Juba airport.41

GOVERNMENT ABUSES FOLLOWING JUNE-JULY 1992

40
Amnesty International, "Urgent Action: Sudan," April 6, 1992.

41
"Juba Welcomes Freed Priests," Sudan Update, vol. 3, no. 18 (London: May 20,
1992), p. 4.
72 Civilian Devastation

SPLA-TORIT ATTACKS ON JUBA

During the summer of 1992, SPLA-Torit made two military incursions into
Juba, on June 7 and then again on July 6, and nearly captured the city. Each
incursion was followed by a wave of retaliatory killings, disappearances, and arrests
of civilians, soldiers, police, army, wildlife, and prison forces, according to a
wildlife warden and others.
The SPLA-Torit, calling its incursion "Operation Jungle Storm," entered
Juba from the south at 5 A.M. on June 7. It claimed to have occupied the
headquarters of the Southern Military Command for three hours and captured the
BN116 Artillery Unit before it withdrew the same day.42
There was heavy shelling by both sides and attacks on residential areas.
The fighting produced at least 198 war wounded, who were taken over the border
by land to the ICRC hospital in Lokichokio, Kenya. In Juba, local ICRC staff and
the Sudanese Red Crescent assisted the victims and transported hundreds of
wounded to hospital and distributed medical supplies sent in by the ICRC.43
During those days, the Juba government could not tightly control the
movement of the civilian population, and it was estimated that some 50,000 people
left Juba for the safety of Mundri, Kaya, Kajo Kaji, and Aluakluak.44
The SPLA-Torit launched a second surprise attack on July 6, 1992, re-
entering Juba using the streams and inlets of the White Nile and remaining a few
days, according to a wildlife warden who was there. The SPLA-Torit occupied key
military areas and was forced to withdraw only after ten days of heavy fighting.
The government claimed that the attack followed an infiltration by SPLA-
Torit elements in civilian clothes. A government source said the infiltrators killed a
large number of government troops and innocent civilians, but that eventually the
garrison regained the initiative and drove out the infiltrators.45 Relief agencies

42
SPLM/A, County (Nairobi, Kenya), June 8-9, 1992 (publication of SPLA-Torit).

43
ICRC Annual Report 1992, p. 51.

44
SEPHA Bi-Monthly Report no. 19 on OLS Emergency Operations in Southern
Sector for the period June 7-22, 1992, p. 2.

45
Statement by H.E. Mr. Abdel Aziz Shido, Minister of Justice and Attorney
General, Republic of the Sudan, on agenda item no. 114 (c) at the 48th Session of the
General Assembly of the United States, New York, dated November 24, 1993, pp. 6-7.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 73

received reports of about 500 civilian casualties from the July 1992 fighting, which
were largely the result of shortages of food and medicine.46

Summary Executions, Disappearances, Arrests, and Mass Displacement

These two thwarted SPLA-Torit attacks were followed by crackdowns by
Juba government forces, including killings, disappearances, and arrests.

46
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report no. 21, June 21-July 3, 1992,
p. 2.
74 Civilian Devastation

According to Amnesty International, the day after the June SPLA-Torit

assault, forty soldiers providing air defense at Juba Airport were extrajudicially
executed by the government.47 In the next days, security authorities reportedly
arrested over eighty southern Sudanese soldiers, policemen, prison guards, and
paramilitary guards in the Department of Wildlife, suspected of being SPLA-Torit
collaborators or sympathizers.48 It was reported that, following the attacks, security
authorities also arrested people in responsible positions, such as customs officials,
technicians, church workers, youth leaders--in short "anyone who may be suspected
of being sympathetic to the SPLA-Torit or opposed to the Islamic government."49
The highest level arrest was that of Retired Maj. Gen. Peter Cirillo, former
governor of Equatoria, taken from his house in Juba at gunpoint to Khartoum
because his younger brother, Maj. Thomas Cirillo, defected to the SPLA-Torit
during the attack with some of his troops.50 Maj. Gen. Cirillo was released in
Khartoum several months later, in February 1993.

47
Amnesty International, "Ravages of war," p. 19.

48
Amnesty International, "Destruction of Juba," p. 1. It appeared that some southern
Sudanese members of the army, prison guard, police, and wildlife forces had helped the
SPLA-Torit plan the raid from within Juba, and defected or fought alongside the
SPLA-Torit.

49
Africa Faith and Justice Network, "Maryknoll Sisters' Report on War-Torn
Juba," Nairobi, Kenya, September 5, 1992.

50
Amnesty International, "Destruction of Juba," p. 1.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 75

On the night of June 23, 1992, seven southern Sudanese soldiers reportedly
were extrajudicially executed.51

51
Ibid, p. 2.
76 Civilian Devastation

The SPLA-Torit entered Juba for a second attack on July 6, 1992, through
the suburbs, including Lalogo. Over the next ten days, heavy fighting took place in
and around the suburbs of Lalogo, Kator, and Rejaf West. The army regained
control, although the SPLA-Torit continued to shell targets inside the city.52 The
army ordered the evacuation of Lalogo and Kator on July 11 and the next day
burned down these and other areas, leaving 100,000 civilians squatting without
shelter in the old center of Juba, at the height of the rainy season.
On July 16, a group of forty southern Sudanese soldiers serving in the
government army reportedly were extrajudicially executed, accused of collaborating
with the SPLA.53
In the course of regaining control, the army made a large sweep through
the town. Soldiers forced their way into private homes, searching for SPLA-Torit
combatants. During the searches, many civilians were beaten and many possessions
looted. An unknown number were arrested, including some who were later released.
Amnesty International was informed that at least 200 civilians were killing during
these operations.54 After the army sweep, relatives were too frightened to remove
the bodies and "many were left unburied for several days."55

52
Ibid.

53
Ibid., p. 3.

54
Ibid., p. 2.

55
Ibid.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 77

Amnesty International documented 230 men arrested by the government in

Juba between June and August 1992 but never accounted for; many of them were
prominent Juba civilians.56 In April, 1993, Amnesty International confirmed the
death of Camillo Odongi Loyuk, a retired southern Sudanese army officer who was
arrested in Khartoum in June in retaliation for the attack on Juba. He was tied
spread-eagled to the window bars of a room, where a rope with a sliding noose was
tied around his testicles and tightened if he moved. He was beaten to death. The
government denied responsibility and maintained that Loyuk was free.57

Government Execution and Disappearance of International Aid Employees

56
Amnesty International, "Patterns of repression," p. 8.

57
Amnesty International, "Urgent Action Report: Sudan," AI Index: AFR 54/14/93,
London, April 30, 1993.
78 Civilian Devastation

Among the many who were executed and disappeared by the government
in the aftermath of the SPLA-Torit July 1992 attack were several relief workers.
U.S. AID employees Andrew Tombe and Baudoin Tally were arrested and later
executed. Two other U.S. AlD employees, Dominic Morris and Chaplain Lako,
were arrested in August 1992 and have disappeared.58 Two U.N. employees, one
Michael Muto Alia, the highest-ranking United Nations Development Program
(UNDP) representative in Juba, were arrested and disappeared. One European
Economic Community (EEC) employee, Mark Laboke Jenner, admittedly was tried
and executed.
After the June attack, U.S.AID handed over the care of its Juba compound
to Tombe and Tally, two U.S.AID southern Sudanese employees. During the attack
the following month, government forces entered the compound and commandeered
all the vehicles. When Tombe and Tally tried to stop them, they were arrested. The
U.S. Embassy inquired about the arrests and was first told that the Khartoum
government had no information. The U.S. request to travel to Juba to investigate
was stalled on security grounds.
The Sudan government later claimed that Tally had disappeared and that
Tombe had been arrested and he confessed. It said the case had been investigated
and that Tombe was tried on August 15, 1992,59 "by a competent court of law which
convicted and sentenced him to death. It was proved that he used the
communication equipment available to him to direct the artillery of the SPLA-Torit
in bombarding the city and was justly punished for his treachery."60 The government

58
U.S. Department of State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 1992
(Washington, D.C.: GPO 1993), p. 256.

59
"Embassy Khartoum honors 2 Foreign Service nationals who were executed," State
magazine (Washington D.C.: U.S. Department of State, February 1994), p. 3.

60
Shido to General Assembly, November 24, 1993, p. 7.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 79

claimed that the defendant's actions had led to hundreds of casualties and that his
execution was unjustly characterized as an extra-judicial killing "ignoring the fact
that there is a constitutional government authority in a city which was then under
siege by an enemy, and an act of treachery can only be dealt with by court martial,
and in accordance with the rule of law."61

61
Ibid.
80 Civilian Devastation

The government has never established, however, what rule of law it

applied and whether any trial was held, much less one that comported with
elementary notions of due process. The record of this trial has never been produced.
The government referred to unspecified evidence from unnamed witnesses and a
confession that was never released. It failed to specify the venue of the trial, the
participants, or the judicial procedures applied.62
The Sudan government orally informed the U.S. that Tally was also
executed, but did not provide any further information. No oral or written
information whatsoever has been provided to the U.S. government regarding its two
other disappeared employees, Lako and Morris, last seen in Sudan army custody in
Juba.63 Sudan, responding to U.S. diplomatic protests, "ordered a judicial enquiry
into that incident. The commission of inquiry is headed by a judge of the High
Court who is yet to submit his report," wrote the Sudan government in November
1993, a year and three months after the event. "Delay is due to the continuous
requests for information of persons alleged to have disappeared after the incident.
That report would be distributed to interested governments and organizations on
completion."64
HRW/Africa awaits the report, but we must assume after such a lengthy
delay that it will never be produced. It appears to us that it was never the intention

62
"Embassy Khartoum honors 2 who were executed," State magazine.

63
Ibid.

64
Shido to General Assembly, November 24, 1993, p. 7.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 81

of the government to produce such a report, but simply to engage in delaying

tactics.65
Two Sudanese employees of the UNDP were arrested in Juba during the
period after the July 1992 attack and disappeared. It is suspected that they also were
executed. Despite repeated requests, the government did not provide any
information about them until November 1992, when the Juba authorities told the
U.N. that one of the men, Michael Muto Atia, was arrested on July 31, 1992, and
was awaiting trial in Khartoum. The authorities in Khartoum, however, said he had
"disappeared."66 The fate of the other man, an unnamed driver, is unknown.

65
Meanwhile, the government, apparently oblivious to the irony, criticized the U.N.
special rapporteur's interim report because his investigations were not completed within
a few months, ignoring the fact that the government's investigation into one incident has
lingered over a year.

66
Amnesty International, "Ravages of war," p. 18.
82 Civilian Devastation

Mark Laboke Jenner, a Sudanese employee of the EEC in Juba, was

executed in mid-August 1992. Sudanese officials say that he was sentenced to death
by a military court for treason, but there has been no independent confirmation that
he had received any trial, let alone a fair one.67

Government Accountability for Killings and Disappearances

Following the two SPLA-Torit attacks, the government received so many
complaints of summary executions that it bowed to pressure and established a
committee in November 1992 to "investigate the incidents in Juba town in June and
July."68 This committee has proved useless.
When the U.N. special rapporteur inquired about the results, the committee
revealed that it had not visited Juba until April 1993, ten months after the events in
question, and only for four days. The committee felt another visit was required,
which would not take place "soon" due to a "shortage of fuel for air transport." The
committee did not have any answer regarding the sentences pronounced by the
special military courts reportedly set up in Juba after June 1992.69

67
Amnesty International, Annual Report 1993 (London: Amnesty International,
1994), p. 271.

68
Amnesty International, "Ravages of war," p. 19.

69
U.N. General Assembly Forty-eighth Session, Agenda item 11K (c). "Human Rights
Questions: Human Rights Situations and Reports of Special Rapporteurs and
Representatives, Situation of human rights in the Sudan, Interim report on the situation
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 83

The U.N. special rapporteur in September 1993 asked for an accounting of

230 persons allegedly arrested in Juba between June and August 1992.70 In its
November 1993 written reply to the special rapporteur, the government repeated
that it had arrested and tried "some" infiltrators, did not mention the fate of the 230
persons, and referred only to the trial and execution of one person, Tombe who had
been an employee of U.S.AID.71

of human rights in the Sudan," prepared by Mr. GHspHr Biró, Special Rapporteur of the
Commission on Human Rights, A/48/601 (New York: United Nations, November 18,
1993), p. 10.

70
Ibid.

71
Shido to General Assembly, November 24, 1993.
84 Civilian Devastation

The government continues to ignore requests for an accounting of the

arrests and disappearances of persons last seen in custody following the battle for
Juba. In the vast majority of the 230 cases of disappeared following arrests in Juba
in this period compiled by Amnesty International, the authorities have failed to
provide any information at all. The disappeared remain missing72 and are presumed
dead.

72
Amnesty International, "Ravages of war," p. 19, and later information.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 85

Detention and Deportation of Clergy

On July 31, 1992, the Catholic archbishop of Juba, Paolino Lukudu, and
Fathers Immanuel Jada, James Oyet, and David Tombe were summoned to a
meeting with Mohammed al-Mahdi, chief of security, for the purpose of
interrogating Father David Tombe. On August 2, Father Tombe was taken to the
main barracks, where he was mistreated, then to Khartoum, where he was held
incommunicado until February 1993.73
On August 16, 1992, an order was given to all Catholic and Protestant
expatriate missionaries to leave Juba for Khartoum within twenty-four hours, later
extended to fifteen days. The archbishop met with security authorities to avoid the
deportation but had no success. On September 4, four Protestant missionaries left
for Nairobi.74 Five Comboni sisters and six Comboni fathers were escorted to the

73
Amnesty International, "Ravages of war," p. 17. The government did not provide
answers to inquiries about Father Tombe for several months, and it was presumed he
was dead.

74
Comboni Mission News, Rome, September 5, 1992, quoted in "Foreign
86 Civilian Devastation

airport by security authorities and flown to Khartoum following a written order that
they be removed for their own protection.75 All remaining foreign missionaries were
deported from Juba on September 5, 1992. Expulsion of foreign missionaries hit
hard because there were never enough Sudanese priests and nuns to minister to the
Catholic population of Juba, and because of the role they played in relief and in
reporting on government abuses.76

Missionaries Expelled," Sudan Update, vol. 3, no. 25 (London: September 9, 1992), p. 1.

75
Ibid.

76
A communique from two Catholic bishops of New Sudan Council of Churches,
Bishop Paride Taban of Torit and Bishop Joseph Gasi Abangite of Tombura/Yamibo,
noted:
The departure of the missionaries is going to deprive the helpless
civilians of Juba town of very much needed help and at least moral
support . . . . It is our belief that the missionaries are being
evacuated in order to remove any undesirable witnesses to the
atrocities being committed against the innocent
civilian population of Juba town at the hands of government troops . . . . It is true that a
few missionaries had asked to be evacuated from Juba because of poor health and the
shock of the atrocities they had witnessed. The majority of the missionaries, however,
freely decided to remain in Juba town.
Ibid.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 87

Forcible Displacement of Civilians into Inadequate Conditions

After the July 1992 attack, the Juba government forcibly displaced over
100,000 civilians living there,77 herding them from their homes to the city center
and crowding them into unsanitary and inadequate locations, or leaving them
exposed to the elements in open spaces. It also burned the homes and crops left
behind by the civilians, all in violation of the rules of war. Furthermore, it refused to
allow the civilians, who were in desperate conditions and entirely dependent on
erratic international relief, to leave Juba.78

77
Some relief agencies estimated that some three-quarters of the population of Juba
were displaced (which might be as many as 200,000 people), and that the rest of the
population was confined to their houses.

78
Refusing to let starving civilians leave Juba is not a new government tactic. When
fighting started between SPLA and government forces in October 1989, the government
stopped relief aid flights to Juba. The army consistently denied the displaced the right
to return to their villages after that, even though the arrival of relief supplies was very
insufficient and erratic and dependent on government whim. Burr, Genocide, p.40.
88 Civilian Devastation

On July 11, the army ordered the evacuation of Lalogo (the displaced
persons camp and the village) and Kator neighborhoods and burned them and other
areas the next day, forcing their inhabitants to squat without shelter in the city
center.79 Most displaced from Kator, Lalogo, Jebel Kujui, and Tong piny camps lost
their shacks.80

79
Amnesty International, "Destruction of Juba," p. 2. One observer noted that
during the fighting, some of those in the displaced camps on the outskirts of Juba fled
their homes for the relative safety of buildings in the city center to escape rebel
bombardment. Didrikke Schanche, "Food Stocks Exhausted for 350,000 in Beseiged
[sic] Juba," Reuters, Nairobi, Kenya, August 7, 1992.

80
The U.S. Committee for Refugees said that this forcible displacement started "well
in advance of the SPLA attacks; displaced camps and neighborhoods were destroyed
and the population packed into an area one-quarter its previous size." Burr, Food Aid,
p. 27.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 89

The destruction of housing appeared to be in retaliation for alleged support

for the SPLA-Torit in those areas (which the rebels had passed through) as well as
an effort on the part of the army to create "free fire" zones in which to attack SPLA-
Torit guerrillas attempting to enter Juba. Crops were also destroyed. A witness
noted that "the maize crop, at a milky stage, and the dura [sorghum], at the
flowering stage, were all cut down by the army on July 14 and the fields were
mined."81
This massive displacement of up to three-quarters of the Juba population82
occurred while the army prevented civilians from leaving Juba. "Afterward there
was no freedom of movement in Juba. People would be killed if they tried to move,"
one civilian said. The army reportedly mined routes out of Juba to prevent people
from leaving.
The displaced were forced to live in completely inadequate conditions as
squatters in and around the concrete buildings comprising the old commercial and
administrative center of the city.83 They were squeezed into an area of about twenty-
five square kilometers, about one-quarter of the whole urban area.84 Conditions
were reportedly sub-human: hunger, thirst, disease, lack of shelter, and fear were
daily battles, according to the foreign missionaries who witnessed this before their
expulsion:

81
Quoted in "Crops 'Destroyed,'" Sudan Update, vol. 4, no. 1 (London, September
22, 1992), p. 2.

82
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 22, July 21-August 5,
1992, p. 2.

83
Amnesty International, "Destruction of Juba," p. 1.

84
Burr, Food Aid, p. 27.
90 Civilian Devastation

[T]housands of people are living as squatters under makeshift

plastic coverings, each family in a space no bigger than 8 x 5
feet. Thousands of others have fled to the banks of the Nile River
or sought some protection behind walls of buildings. Others are
jammed into one- or two-room houses of relatives. Every church
and school compound and other public properties are crowded
with these squatters. Water and sanitation facilities, even in the
best of times, have never been adequate in the town, and under
these circumstances became an unimaginable horrible situation . .
. the people, plagued by mosquitos, have been living in these
sub-human conditions for almost two months. They are unable to
return to their own homes because in many cases these have been
burned and demolished by the army for what the army claims to
be military, strategic reasons. Even where the houses are still
standing, the people are afraid of harassment, brutality, and arrest
by government soldiers, especially at night.85

Other reports confirmed these descriptions, adding that the majority of displaced
persons were exposed to the torrential rain of the season and afflicted with the cold
and humidity of the night. Most slept on a mat or blanket, but some lay on the bare
ground.86
Since stores were closed, people had to rely exclusively on relief, and
many thousands were reported to be fleeing to Yei, Mundri, and Kajo Kaji areas,87
despite the double ring of land mines around Juba and other hurdles such as army
and SPLA patrols. Indeed, one agency reported that in only twenty-four hours on
July 14-15, about 1,000 people displaced by the Juba fighting arrived in Kajo Kaji
seeking relief and saying that more people were following behind them.88

85
Africa Faith and Justice Network, "Maryknoll Sisters' Report on War-Torn
Juba."

86
Nils Carstensen, "Southern Sudan - Report on a Forgotten Crisis," Danchurchaid
(Copenhagen, Denmark), September 16, 1992, p. 4.

87
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No.21, July 4-20, 1992, p. 2.

88
Ibid., p. 9.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 91

By late August 1992, families from Malakia, Atlabara, Nimeera, and Buluk
neighborhoods started to return to their homes, and people from Kator, Kassava,
Mayo, and Nyakura were waiting to move back.89

Law on Forced Displacement

Forced displacement of the civilian population for reasons connected with
the conflict is prohibited under article 17, Protocol II,90 which makes only two
exceptions: the immediate safety of the civilians and imperative military reasons.91
The term "imperative military reasons" usually refers to evacuation
because of imminent military operations. The provisional measure of evacuation is
appropriate if an area is in danger as a result of military operations or is liable to be
subjected to intense bombing. It may also be permitted when the presence of
protected persons in an area hampers military operations. The prompt return of the
evacuees to their homes is required as soon as hostilities in the area have ceased.
The Sudan government bears the burden of proving that its forcible relocation
conforms to these conditions. It appears that its displacement of civilians went far

89
Report of relief agency working in Juba, dated August 25, 1992.

90
Protocol II of 1977 Additional to the 1949 Geneva Conventions. See Appendix A.

91
Protocol II, Article 17 --
The displacement of the civilian population shall not be ordered for reasons
related to the conflict unless the security of the civilians involved or
imperative military reasons so demand. Should such displacements have to be
carried out, all possible measures shall be taken in order that the civilian
population may be received under satisfactory conditions of shelter, hygiene,
health, safety and nutrition.
92 Civilian Devastation

beyond what was necessary for military operations, and was accompanied by
extensive property destruction.
Even if the government were to show that the displacement and destruction
were necessary, it still has the independent obligation to take "all possible
measures" to receive the civilian population "under satisfactory conditions of
shelter, hygiene, health, safety, and nutrition." All available evidence points to the
conclusion that the government completely failed to take any measures to provide
for civilians. Indeed, the government destroyed civilian housing and crops without
any apparent military necessity, in punishment for alleged collaboration with the
SPLA-Torit.
If the government will not provide for the civilians it dislocates, in the
alternative either it must have recourse to international relief actions92 or it should
let the population engage in self-help and depart for safer areas outside the besieged
city. If it can or will do none of the above, then it is under an obligation to adopt
another military strategy--not one that displaces over 100,000 civilians and
provokes mass destitution, disease, and death.

Prohibition on Targeted, Land Mine Attacks on Civilians

The land mines ringing Juba directed at the civilian population constitute a
violation of the rules of war. Making civilians the targets of land mines or any other
weapon is forbidden in customary international law.

92
See Protocol II, article 18 (2):
If the civilian population is suffering undue hardship owing to a lack of the
supplies essential for its survival, such as foodstuffs and medical supplies,
relief actions for the civilian population which are of an exclusively
humanitarian and impartial nature and which are conducted without any
adverse distinction shall be undertaken subject to the consent of the High
Contracting Party concerned.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 93

Following the SPLA November 1988 call on residents to abandon Juba,

the army embarked upon an extensive campaign of planting land mines around the
town and gave general warnings that they would not permit civilians to leave.93
Other efforts to contain civilians in Juba included capturing and returning persons
attempting to leave and punishing them, including with torture.
Civilians are not legitimate military targets, even if they are attempting to
leave a city. The would-be escapees are not taking part in the hostilities at the time
of their escape; indeed, most of those in flight very much want to be far from the
hostilities.
While some of the government land mines may be directed at SPLA
attackers, it is clear that they serve the forbidden other purpose as well: containing
civilians. Indeed, if the civilians were permitted freely to leave Juba by road or air,
they would not be faced with the danger of encountering government land mines on
small paths.

GOVERNMENT ABUSES IN 1993

Scorched Earth Campaigns: Bahr El Ghazal

In late 1992 and 1993, the government continued to launch attacks on the
main population centers of Bahr El Ghazal, including the Yirol, Rumbek, Gogrial,
and Aweil areas, inflicting civilian casualties, and burning and looting civilian
property.
In mid-January 1993, government forces from the Wau garrison attacked
Karic village in Rumbek County early in the morning, according to an elderly Dinka
resident. They surrounded one side of the village and began shooting wildly. The
soldiers looted the houses and the grain storage buildings, using vehicles to load the
groundnuts, sorghum, and sesame, and then burned the buildings.

93
Africa Watch, Denying the Honor of Living, pp. 76-77. The government gave no
specific warning about which areas had been mined. These land mines were in a
different location from the SPLA ring of mines, and were well within the "security
cordon" of Juba, the area under army control.
94 Civilian Devastation

The army stole all fifty-eight head of cattle that belonged to one witness.
Most of the villagers similarly lost their cattle. Government soldiers also took this
witness' three daughters (ages seven, nine, and eleven) and three sons (ages eight,
fourteen, and fifteen). He still did not know what had happened to them months
later. Numerous people were burned alive in their huts during the attack, many of
them still asleep at the time.
When the army left, the witness returned to Karic to find nothing left. Even
the wells were destroyed. He, his two wives, and seven remaining children then had
to eat leaves and roots to survive, he told HRW/Africa.
The government destroyed a well in the area of Aliam Toc I, east of
Rumbek, that had been one of the few functioning wells left in the area, according
to a medical worker.
Prior to 1992, leprosy had been under control for ten years due to the work
of the Comboni sisters who ran three leprosy centers in Bahr El Ghazal: Pagarau
near Yirol, Kuel Kuac, and Aqile. Pagarau was overrun by the government in 1992;
the patients were killed and the healthy relatives who lived with them were
kidnapped. Kuel Kuac and Aqile were not taken by the government, but there are no
more services at any of the three centers. The lepers from the three centers were
dispersed, and now do not receive aid or medical attention. A medical professional
who used to work with the lepers estimated that there were in mid-1993 between
1,000 and 2,000 lepers in the Lakes Province of Bahr El Ghazal, including in Yirol,
Rumbek, and Tonj; he believed this constituted a leprosy epidemic.
A U.S. State Department cable describes operations by the government in
northern Bahr El Ghazal in late 1992 and in February-March 1993. According to
this source, two military trains, each with about 3,000 troops mostly from former
Arab tribal militias incorporated into the PDF, traveled from Babanusa in Southern
Kordofan to Wau in Bahr El Ghazal. The first train was preceded by foot soldiers
who allegedly killed or captured civilians in their path, burned houses, fields, and
granaries, and stole thousands of cattle. The second train left in March 1993
carrying horses for the soldiers, who in five days allegedly killed a large number of
civilians between Manwal Station and Aweil and captured several hundred women
and children. The soldiers burned granaries and fields and looted cattle, causing
many to starve to death later. When the soldiers reached Meiram, they were said to
have raped scores of displaced southern women.94

94
U.S. Embassy, Khartoum, Sudan, cable released May 12, 1994, in Washington,
D.C..
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 95

Some villages in Bahr El Ghazal have been attacked in retaliation when

government vehicles run over SPLA mines, according to this cable. Troops usually
burn the first village they find in such cases and kill its inhabitants for their
supposed collaboration with the mine-layers.95

95
Ibid.
96 Civilian Devastation

Government forces, especially the PDF, were alleged to routinely steal

women and children in Bahr El Ghazal. Some women and girls were said to be kept
as wives,96 others were believed to be shipped north for forced labor on Kordofan
farms, and still others were alleged to be "exported," mostly to Libya, where their
fate is not known. The cable noted that there are instances of government
authorities in Wau and Aweil freeing kidnapped women and children.97
Since the government recaptured Yirol on April 11, 1992, that town has
been used as a staging base for raids on adjacent civilian areas controlled by the
SPLA-Torit, causing tremendous displacement in Lakes Province in Bahr El
Ghazal. A villager reported that his family was forcibly displaced from Panliet
village by one of the army's 1993 forays from Yirol town.
Church officials alleged that government forces inside Gogrial town
frequently raided and burned peripheral villages eight to ten miles around the town
to form a "no-man's land" between the government and SPLA-Torit territory.
Church sources calculated that several government expeditions destroyed 200
villages along the main roads. Most of their inhabitants either rebuilt or moved to
remote areas to protect themselves from further incursions. Livestock was looted by
the army and militias, and little was left for the civilians. Schools and bush markets
were frequently hit by army ground forces and air bombardments.98

96
In this practice, which is not new, the kidnapped woman becomes part of the
family, with second-class status. Among some southern Sudan peoples, the girl children
are valuable because at marriage a dowry is paid to their fathers, usually in cattle. Girl
children thus can enrich a family. Similarly, kidnapping women for wives relieves the
kidnapper of paying the dowry price and these women can bear girl children.

97
Ibid.

98
Reports compiled by the New Sudan Council of Churches (NSCC) and the Diocese
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 97

of Rumbek, Nairobi, Kenya, May 1993, pp. 3-8.

98 Civilian Devastation

Church sources also reported that a government offensive was launched in

northern Aweil district on March 18, 1993, killing hundreds of civilians and razing
several villages to the ground.99 Government soldiers were said to consider the
villagers of Aweil district to be SPLA sympathizers or combatants and often
targeted them, regardless of sex or age. In March, 1993, villagers went into Aweil,
seeking food that they believed had arrived on a train from Babanusa. Government
troops captured thirty-two villagers inside Aweil and tortured them, cutting their
testicles with scissors and cutting off their ears; ten escaped, including one who was
severely injured, and twenty-two were killed, according to church sources. Two of
those killed were Deng Mojok Kuol and Garang Ateng Akuei, both from Gaal
village, fourteen miles from Aweil town.100
In the government garrison town of Wau, thirty-seven people suspected of
collaborating with the SPLA were summarily executed by government forces in
March 1993, including Ugok Ukello Muodic and Bol Theme Akec, according to a
former resident.
Government-supported militia used Wau as a base for raids and burnings
of nearby villages. In 1992-1993, government troops burned villages along the
railway line.101 It is estimated that many civilians were killed during the attacks.
The surviving residents were displaced to the Akon area. Troops also looted many
cattle, sheep, and goats as well as sesame, groundnuts, and cereals; they burned
grain storage buildings, according to the same former resident.

Attacks on Civilians: Bor

In late January 1993, government-supported Mundari militia between
Jemeiza and Mongalla in Eastern Equatoria attacked civilians fleeing Bor, making
their way south to the displaced persons camps near Nimule. Reportedly three
people were killed. In February 1993, the government attacked the village of
Kolnyang near Bor and robbed cattle from civilians displaced from Jonglei. In early
1993, the New Sudan Council of Churches charged that the government imprisoned,
tortured, and buried alive four members of the Episcopal Church of Sudan in the

99
Ibid., p. 8.

100
Reports compiled by NSCC and the Diocese of Rumbek, May 1993, p. 8.

101
These included Wunlit, Aulwic, Lol Akuei, Gaal, Wargeng, Ametnyang, Kajik,
Alel Thonj, and Wuonkuel.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 99

Bor area: Rev. Peter Lual, evangelists Matthew Duol and Paul Kon, and layman
Joseph But.102

Indiscriminate Government Bombing in 1993

102
New Sudan Council of Churches letter to Pope John Paul II, Nairobi, Kenya,
February 15, 1993, p. 1.
100 Civilian Devastation

A frequent government weapon is aerial bombardment of SPLA

strongholds which the government cannot hope to reach overland. "The wide open
spaces of southern Sudan, with scanty cover, make air superiority the key to
controlling the ground," noted one reporter.103
The planes and bombs used in these air raids are notoriously inaccurate.
Apparently, in many raids little effort is made to actually hit military targets and
bombs land several kilometers away from possible targets. Frequently the bombs hit
civilian population centers, either accidentally, in which case the bombing is
indiscriminate, or deliberately. On at least one occasion in 1993 and another in
1994, aerial campaigns hit displaced persons camps housing tens of thousands,
caused civilian dead and wounded, and so terrorized the people that they deserted
the camps.
Mundri, in Western Equatoria, half of whose estimated population of
30,000 was displaced Bor Dinka, was bombed twice by government planes in late
November 1992, and repeatedly in February 1993. One such bombing occurred on
or about February 4, 1993, at 10 A.M. A Catholic priest in Kaya, 383 kilometers
away, received a radio message about the bombing at 5 P.M. that day. He arrived in
Mundri two days later. Two men and two women were killed; they were already
buried by the time he arrived. He was told that twelve bombs had been dropped
which hit Mundri, Lowei and Amadi.
Mundri was being rebuilt when it was bombed again on February 24, when
the priest was present. Twelve consecutive bombs were dropped at 12:30 P.M.,
killing three women and two men. One of the men was killed when a bomb fell on a
mango tree ten meters from where he was sitting in a doorway. Two women were
killed by another bomb, which landed one meter away from a shallow shelter where
one of the women was hiding. A third woman and a second man were killed when
another bomb fell on their hut. Five were injured, and houses were set on fire.

103
Mwambu Wanendeya, "Sudan air terror sets off exodus of refugees," The Sunday
Times of London, February 20, 1994.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 101

On February 6, 1993, the government bombed the market of the Eastern

Equatorian outpost of Kajo-Kaji.104 The market was the most populated civilian
area in town. Seventeen civilians were killed, including six children, four women,
and one teenage girl. Ten were seriously wounded. A witness to the incident, a
thirty-three-year-old man from a nearby village, said that twenty-four were injured.
He remembered that the government had bombed Kajo-Kaji four times from 1991
to 1993.
U.S. member of Congress Frank R. Wolf, on his third trip to Sudan, visited
Kajo Kaji shortly after the February 6 bombing. He made the following statement
about the extent of the destruction he found:

I saw first hand recent damage in the town of Kajo Keji on the
western bank of the Nile where the Khartoum government
bombed the crowded town market square, killing and injuring
many. The Khartoum government conducted high altitude
bombing on this village when there was no military presence. I
saw bomb craters where they hit huts and destroyed the market
place. I visited what was termed a hospital but what was in reality
a filthy, rat-infested place where the injured were gathered. One
woman, injured in the air-raid, had shrapnel still in her head. She

104
Kajo Kaji in Eastern Equatoria is 216 kilometers from Kaya, although the good
road between the two runs through government-controlled Yei. (Yei is a government
garrison almost entirely deserted by civilians today.) Kajo Kaji is on the West Bank of
the Nile across from the Ugandan border town of Moyo. The 1983 census for Yei area
council was 340,599, which included Yei town (27,214) and Kajo Kaji rural council
(96,063). Many small Equatorian tribes inhabit the area: Kakua, Pojulus, Mundri,
Arocaya, Lovaro, Kalico, Makaraka, Kuku, Bari, and others.
102 Civilian Devastation

had no hope and little chance for tomorrow. When it seemed

conditions were as bad as they could be, they got worse.105

On February 24, the Kajo Kaji market was bombed again several times.
Also in February, a bombing run on Amadi, north of Yei, killed cattle. The
bombings, even when they do not kill civilians, are frightening, and they prevent
people from remaining and cultivating in areas where bombing occurs. SPLA
commanders have ordered bomb shelters to be built, but civilians say there are not
enough of them to protect the population.

105
Statement by U.S. Rep. Frank R. Wolf, Congressional Delegation to the Horn of
Africa, February 5-February 12, 1993 (Washington, D.C.: undated).
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 103

In February, March, and April 1993, government planes bombed in the

mountainous area of the Didinga tribe in Eastern Equatoria, south of Kapoeta and
Torit along the Ugandan border. In the February bombing, which occurred at about
10:30 A.M. near Lotukei, witnesses said that two planes were aiming at the SPLA
base in Lotukei, five miles away, and "in the course of the attack, some bombs fell
on homes." The ten-year-old niece of a witness was killed in the play area outside
her hut. The bomb left a crater larger than a hut (about ten by fifteen feet) and
blasted out all the trees in the surrounding area. Others who were wounded at the
same time were taken to Kenya for medical treatment.106 The planes made two runs,
one in the morning and another in the afternoon. Twelve bombs were dropped in
each.
The second bombing took place on March 17, 1993, at about 3 P.M., also
in Lotukei. Twelve bombs were dropped on an old well used by both SPLA soldiers
and civilians. Some thirty people were injured in the bombing; some were SPLA
and others were civilians, although the witness who saw the event did not know the
number in each category. About twenty houses near the well were set on fire by the
bomb.
The third bombing was in April, 1993, in Chukudum. A man on the nearby
mountain saw and heard the bombing from his position of safety. He said that the
bomb did not hit the large SPLA base in Chukudum, but fell on the tukls about two
kilometers away. When the plane left, the witness and others inspected the damage
and were told of injuries.

Government Offensive in Western Equatoria from July-August 1993

Beginning July 26, 1993, the government launched its largest offensive
since the dry season campaign of March 1992. It was a two-pronged offensive, with
aerial bombing in the areas between Yei and Morobo in Eastern Equatoria, as well
as in Kaya on the Ugandan border. The bombing intensified on August 3.107 The

106
The ICRC runs a hospital for the war wounded in Lokichokio, Kenya, on the
Sudan border.

107
New Sudan Council of Churches, Press Release, Nairobi, Kenya, August 9, 1993.
104 Civilian Devastation

government had not launched a dry season (November to April) campaign in the
1992-93 period, apparently preferring to watch U.N. developments in Somalia and
the intense fighting in Upper Nile between the SPLA factions.
The first prong of the offensive was unsuccessful. In mid-July, 1993, some
5,000 government troops in armored vehicles from the garrison town of Juba moved
towards Nimule, an SPLA-Torit-controlled town close to the Ugandan border. The
government troops were repulsed.
The second prong started on July 24, opening a second front with
movement of troops from the garrison town of Yei towards rebel-held Kaya. An
aerial campaign was part of this renewed offensive against the SPLA-Torit,
ultimately aimed at cutting off the rebel road and supply line from Uganda.108 By
mid-August, the government had retaken Morobo, a strategic crossroads town on
the Juba, Yei, and Kaya roads, and cut the supply lines for relief efforts as well as
for the SPLA from Uganda to Bahr El Ghazal and Western Equatoria.
The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) appealed to the
government on humanitarian grounds to suspend all military activities in the area, to
no avail. The relief organization Africa Action in Need (AAIN) was daily sending
food to 70,000 displaced people in towns in Western Equatoria, and non-food
supplies to many more. The offensive made it impossible for AAIN to bring in food
and supplies and it estimated that the offensive would put a total population of
about 750,000 at great risk of starvation.109

108
Julie Flint, "Anti-Rebel Offensive Creates Sudanese Refugee Crisis," The
Guardian (London), August 10, 1993, p.1.

109
Sam Kiley, "Famine fear in Sudan as army attacks the rebels," The Times of
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 105

The immediate result of the July, 1993, bombing was that approximately
75,000 people were internally displaced, 27,000 fled across the border to Uganda,
and 1,000 went to Zaire,110 according to the UNHCR. An outbreak of measles in a
refugee transit center in Uganda killed fifty-seven refugees, thirty-eight of them
children, almost immediately.111 Some 20,000 of the internally displaced, mostly
Dinkas, went north and east to Dinka areas and were reported to be arriving in
Akot.112

London, August 12, 1993, p. 1.

110
Mark Huband, "Thousands Flee new Fighting in Famine-Racked Southern
Sudan," The Washington Post, August 18, 1993, p. A27.

111
UNHCR press release, "Over 100,000 Sudanese Refugees Flee to Uganda,"
Nairobi, Kenya, August 25, 1993.

112
OFDA, "Sudan Civil Strife/Displaced Persons, Situation Report no. 6," September
10, 1993, p. 6.
106 Civilian Devastation

During the second week of August, 1993, after the government took the
town of Morobo, government planes bombed the surrounding areas to break an
SPLA siege of Morobo. Government planes bombed the outskirts of Kaya on
August 7; those fleeing reported that the government had bombed and shelled the
displaced camp.113 Thereafter the SPLA-Torit began to urge civilian populations to
move east to Kajo-Kaji.114
Relief workers who toured Kaya a few days later observed that the town
and the U.N.-run camp nearby at Yondu were deserted and had been looted.115
Yondu had been established in 1992 for the mostly Dinka displaced people who
were streaming in from the Bor and Yirol areas. They crossed the Nile around
Jemeiza and continued westward past Aluakluak and Mundri to the Kaya area.
Because there was not enough room for them in Kaya, they were resettled at Yondu,
a former Ugandan refugee camp about fifteen kilometers north of Kaya. Since
access for relief overland from Uganda was relatively easy, the area became a
magnet also for the displaced from Mundri and Aguran.116 A November 1992 U.N.
World Food Program (WFP) assessment reported the presence of 10,000 displaced
at Yondu.117
Seven months later, they were displaced again and Yondu was deserted.

Bombing in Late 1993

Thiet, in Bahr El Ghazal, attracted thousands of displaced persons in
search of food who were fleeing what they called Nuer militia in early 1993.

113
Robin Denselow, "Boy soldiers fail to shift rebels in weary Sudan," The Guardian
(London), November 2, 1993, p. 1.

114
Mark Huband, "Thousands Flee new Fighting in Famine-Racked Southern
Sudan," The Washington Post, August 18, 1993, p. A27.

115
Julie Flint, "Anti-rebel offensive creates Sudanese refugee crisis," The Guardian
(London), August 9, 1993, p. 1. Later information indicated that SPLA-Torit troops
under the command of Commander Pitia were responsible for the looting.

116
OLS (Southern Sector) UNICEF/WFP Bi-Monthly Situation Report no. 29,
November 6-21, 1992, p. 2.

117
OLS (Southern Sector) UNICEF/WFP Bi-Monthly Situation Report no. 30,
November 22-December 6, 1992, p. 4.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 107

There were tens of thousands of displaced who depended on this relief

program and airstrip. A journalist visiting the area in June 1993 reported that many
were displaced from the Lon Arik area, where Nuer tribesmen had killed over
ninety and displaced thousands.

Most of the survivors trekked on foot to Thiet, believing that they

would find food, shelter and medical care. A few found little.
The majority found none....

What was billed as "the last convoy" to beat the rains left Kaya at
Uganda/Sudan border in March. After avoiding Sudan
government controlled towns and land mines on the roads, only
nine out of the original 23 trucks managed to reach Thiet on 2
May. Thirteen got stuck in the mud or broken down in various
parts of the route. One got blown up by a land mine, killing the
driver.

Thiet district's normal population of 150,000 is now well over

200,000 and increasing daily, due to expectations that the World
Food Programme will either fly supplies into Thiet town or carry
out aerial drops.118

On November 12, 1993, a government squad of MIGs buzzed the town, and then an
Antonov airplane dropped fourteen bombs next to the airstrip of Thiet, where a
large group of civilians had gathered at a feeding center. Three civilians were
wounded119 and the relief team then working there was evacuated.

118
Jacob Akol, "Agony continues," New African (July 1993), p. 20.

119
U.N. Commission on Human Rights, "Situation of human rights in the Sudan,
Report of the Special Rapporteur, Mr. GHspHr Biró," p. 9.
108 Civilian Devastation

The cumulative impact of government scorched earth campaigns and

bombing in 1993, plus poor harvest, plummetted areas of Bahr El Ghazal to near
disaster by 1994. An epidemiological survey in Akon in April 1994 revealed that an
alarming 45.5 percent of the under fives were malnourished.120

120
Medecins Sans Frontiers press release, "Medical aid group says the stage is set for
a new humanitarian disaster in Sudan," New York, May 24, 1994.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 109

In Loa in Eastern Equatoria, on November 23, 1993, three persons were

reportedly killed, including two children, and at least fifteen injured when
government planes dropped two bombs on the marketplace. Two other bombs
exploded close to a Christian mission.121 The government also bombed the area of
Chukudum again, on December 20, 1993.

INDISCRIMINATE GOVERNMENT BOMBING

IN THE 1994 DRY SEASON CAMPAIGN

The result of the government's 1994 dry season campaign and

indiscriminate aerial bombardment in Equatoria was to kill and injure civilians and
to so terrorize the surviving inhabitants of three large displaced persons camps,
Ame, Atepi, and Mundri, that they deserted the camps; over 100,000 were displaced
in the month of February, 1994. The U.N. Secretary-General expressed his deep
concern over the renewed fighting and called on all the parties to cease all hostilities
immediately to put an end to the suffering of the innocent civilian population.122

121
Ibid.

122
U.N. press release, "Sudan 3," EIN/06/94, New York, February 14, 1994. The
offensive struck in the middle of a country-wide UNICEF immunization campaign to
protect Sudan's 4.5 million children against measles and polio. The regional director of
UNICEF appealed for temporary ceasefires to allow the immunization teams to reach
800,000 war-affected children in southern Sudan. A measles outbreak had just claimed
110 Civilian Devastation

Shortly before the 1994 offensive began, the government removed Kajo
Kaji, Kaya, Mundri, Maridi and Nimule (in all the area of the offensive in
Equatoria) and four other locations from the list of destinations where food aid
could be safely delivered by the U.N. Striking out the above named food
distribution centers exposed over 200,000 displaced to risk of starvation.123

fifty-five lives in Juba. UNICEF press release, "Sudan 2: Displaced Sudanese Flee
Camps As Fighting Escalates," EIN/05/94, New York, February 8, 1994.

123
OLS (Southern Sector) Sitatuion Report No. 53, February 1-15, 1994, p. 5; OLS
(Southern Sector) press release, "UNICEF and WFP Request Urgent Funding for War-
Torn Southern Sudan," Nairobi, Kenya, February 14, 1994, p. 2; Richard Dowden,
"Sudan army poised to cut off rebels in the south," The Independent (London),
February 8, 1994.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 111

The government had been massing troops in its garrisons at Juba, Wau and
Torit for weeks. It appeared to have the capture of Nimule, a White Nile town very
near the Uganda border, and Kaya, another Uganda border town, as military
objectives, in an effort to cut the SPLA's military supply lines to Uganda. These
routes are also essential to the international relief effort to feed millions of needy
displaced southerners,124 including over 100,000 huddled together in three camps at
Ame, Aswa and Atepe (called the Triple A camps) on the east bank of the White
Nile between Juba and Nimule. The Triple A camps were the single largest
concentration of displaced in southern Sudan.125
The government also was after Mundri and Maridi, a few hundred
kilometers to the west of the White Nile; they sit astride the road to Zaire. Over
30,000 displaced lived near Mundri.126
As for the Triple A area, bombs began to fall in January, 1994 on Loa, the
site of a Catholic mission and several NGO offices. Loa is located between two
Triple A camps, Aswa and Atepi, which were largely Dinka, although many other
groups were represented: Uduk, Nuba, Lotuko, Pari, Murle, to name a few.
The expected government dry season offensive did not open, however,
until February 4, when the government launched an artillery attack on established
SPLA-Torit positions near the front line at Kit, south of Juba. On that same day,
Arapi was bombed; the SPLA-Torit reportedly had a headquarters in Arapi,

124
Keith B. Richburg, "Sudan Opens Offensive Against Rebels," The Washington
Post, February 8, 1994, p. A14.

125
See Eastern Equatoria map, facing Chapter IV.

126
Richard Dowden, "Sudan army poised to cut off rebels in the south," The
Independent (London), February 8, 1994.
112 Civilian Devastation

between Loa and Pageri and also in the vicinity of the Triple A camps.127 No
casualties were reported, although some bombs again fell near NGO compounds in
nearby Loa.

127
Ibid.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 113

Shortly thereafter, the Mandari government-supported militia was reported

to have attacked the Ame camp; one source said that this nighttime attack on the
camp left two women and two children dead and sparked the exodus from this
camp128 that held about 40,000 displaced, largely Dinka survivors of the 1991 Bor
massacre. Ame had never before been attacked and although some journalists were
unclear how such a small attack could have caused the relocation of tens of
thousands of displaced,129 Ame is very close to the front line at Kit.
A particularly bad bombing occurred on February 7 at Parajok east of
Nimule and south of Palataka, near the Ugandan border. According to reports, there
were eighteen people killed and twenty-eight injured.
The following day, Pageri was bombed, leaving eight dead. About half of
the 10,000 people living in Pageri were displaced. The bombing was witnessed by
several reporters who "had to dive for cover as a lumbering Soviet-built Antonov
military plane dropped four bombs shortly before noon on the village."130 The

128
Keith B. Richburg, "Sudan Opens Offensive Against Rebels," The Washington
Post, February 8, 1994, p. A14.

129
Richard Dowden, "Attack forces Sudan refugees to flee camp," The Independent
(London), February 10, 1994.

130
Agence France Press news agency, "Government planes bomb village and refugee
camp near Ugandan border," Paris, February 8, 1994, reprinted in BBC Summary of
114 Civilian Devastation

bombs on Pageri hit a building containing arms and ammunition which was set off,
but the SPLA-Torit denied the locale was a rebel base, claiming that a "military
police station" was hit.131 Pageri was a continued target almost daily between 10
A.M. and 2 P.M. even after it was deserted by most civilians; few houses escaped
damage and the few civilians who remained spent the day in the bush, hiding from
the bombers.132

World Broadcasts, the Middle East, Part 4, in ME/1918 MED/16 [37], London,
February 10, 1994; see David Chazan, "Khartoum bombers hit divided rebels," The
Times of London, February 10, 1994. Minutes later the Antonov dropped another two
bombs which fell close to Aswa camp but did not cause casualties. Ibid.

131
Ibid.

132
Mwambu Wanendeya, "Sudan air terror sets off exodus of refugees," The Sunday
Times of London, February 20, 1994.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 115

On February 12, Arapi was bombed again. Former residents of Arapi and
of the camps at Ame and Atepi walked five days and fifty kilometers east of Nimule
to Laboni, which almost overnight became a displaced persons camp for 70,000.
Laboni, reachable through Parajok and just north of the Uganda border, is cold at
night and access over a mountain road and destroyed bridges is difficult; the tens of
thousands of displaced were stranded without food for five days upon arrival at
Laboni. The displaced abandoned most of their belongings when leaving Ame and
Atepi, which, along with the village of Apari, were completely deserted. According
to a U.N. relief worker who visited Ame shortly after, "All relief items were
destroyed by the attacking forces. Tons of food was scattered in the village, and
medicines and immunization equipment were destroyed."133
Some 10,000 former Ame, Atepi and Apari residents went south to the
Aswa displaced camp, the only one of the Triple A camps still operating.134 Due to
the threat of further military activity in the area, the SRRA targeted the displaced
population of Aswa camp and the displaced of Pageri, about 37,000 persons, for
relocation to Mongali, 18 kilometers east of Nimule.135

133
UNICEF press release, "Sudan 2: Displaced Sudanese Flee Camps as Fighting
Escalates."

134
OLS (Southern Sector) Situation Report No. 53, February 1-15, 1994, p. 1; OLS
(Southern Sector) press release, "UNICEF and WFP Request Urgent Funding for War-
Torn Southern Sudan."

135
Ibid.
116 Civilian Devastation

On March 1, 1994, the bombing moved further south in the Triple A area.
Twenty-four bombs fell in and around Nimule and Aswa displaced persons camp.
The bombs fell in the town of Nimule, near the bridge, and near the hospital. One
killed a twelve-year-old girl in Nimule and a total of nine civilians were injured,
five of them near the hospital.
On February 4, the same day the government attacks started in the Triple A
area, another front was opened 250 kilometers northwest of the Triple A camps.
The Mandari tribal militia launched a ground attack on Mundri136 and government
planes bombed Maridi southwest of Mundri.137 Mundri, by then deserted, was
subjected to a ground attack on February 12 and bombed on February 19 and 20,
although no civilians were left there or at the nearby Kotobi displaced persons
camp, from which the estimated 30,000-35,000 displaced had fled.

136
Ibid.

137
See Western Equatoria and Bahr El Ghazal map facing Chapter III.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 117

This second large group of displaced fled to Angutua displaced persons

camp, twenty-four kilometers southeast of Maridi near the Zaire border. The
deserted town of Mundri went back and forth between the SPLA-Torit and the
government, which managed to hold on to Amadi which it took in February.138 The
SPLA-Torit reported that 281 people had been killed or injured by the government
shelling of Mundri.139

LEGAL STANDARDS
APPLICABLE TO BOMBING AND SHELLING

Many of the bombing attacks described above were indiscriminate and

violated the rules of war.140 Indiscriminate attacks are defined in Protocol I, article
51 (4), as:

a) those which are not directed at a specific military objective;

b) those which employ a method or means of combat which cannot be

directed at a specific military objective; or

c) those which employ a method or means of combat the effects of which

cannot be limited as required by this Protocol; and consequently, in each
such case, are of a nature to strike military objectives and civilians or
civilian objects without distinction.

A further definition of indiscriminate attacks is in Protocol I, article 51

(5)(b), referring to those attacks which may be expected to cause incidental loss of
civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof,
which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage
anticipated. This codifies the rule of proportionality: an attack which may be

138
Julian Bedford, "War 'like football' smiles rebel chief," The Guardian (London),
February 16, 1994.

139
Scott Peterson, "Fresh fighting raises fears of Sudan famine," Daily Telegraph of
London, February 15, 1994.

140
See Appendix A.
118 Civilian Devastation

expected to cause excessive civilian casualties and damage is a disproportionate

attack. The rule reflects a balance between 1) the foreseeable extent of incidental
("collateral") civilian casualties or damage, and 2) the relative importance of the
military objective as a target. No matter what the value of the military objective, it
never justifies excessive civilian casualties.
The government has offered several defenses of its practices. With
reference to the Kaya attacks in February, 1993, the government denied that the
bombings were indiscriminate and that it was aiming at military targets of the armed
opposition. This defense was weakened by the government's further claim that there
were no camps for displaced persons in the SPLA controlled areas, but only military
camps.141 HRW/Africa joins the Special Rapporteur in dismissing the latter
assertion; not only eyewitness accounts told to HRW/Africa researchers but also
U.N. and NGO staff more than refute that specious contention. These agencies,
working with 150 international staff in twenty SPLA-held areas to feed and assist
over one million needy, generated thousands of pages of reports detailing the
movement of the displaced inside SPLA-controlled areas of south Sudan.
If the government was aiming at a military objective in Kaya, it did not hit
the target but instead hit a market during daytime hours. The circumstances strongly
suggest that, if the government was not engaging in the forbidden practice of
deliberately targeting civilians, it was engaging in the forbidden practice of using a
means of attack which was not capable of being directed at a military target.
Attacks that employ a "method or means of combat which cannot be
directed at a specific military objective" are forbidden. The bombing methods used
by the Sudan government air force have been described time and again as hand-
rolling bombs out the back hatch of Antinovs as they fly at high altitudes.142 This
method or means of attack is the very definition of indiscriminate. If a high-flying
plane manages to deliver a hand-rolled bomb out of the hatch and on to a military
target, it is simply a matter of luck.
Such complete lack of targeting ability is consistent with accounts of
bombs frequently landing two to five kilometers from known military targets. In the
case of the bombings in the Didinga area, for example, the civilians believed that

141
U.N. Commission on Human Rights, "Situation of human rights in the Sudan,
Report of the Special Rapporteur," p. 9, citing government reply.

142
Richard Dowden, "Sudan army poised to cut off rebels in the south," The
Independent (London), February 8, 1994. Attacks have also been made by Chinese-built
MiG-19 aircraft strafing roads and villages. Ibid.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 119

the Sudan government was aiming at SPLA-Torit military bases in the region, even
though they missed such targets sometimes by as much as eight kilometers.
Where the military target is in a non-populated area, the lack of targeting
capability would not be a barrier to bombing. When the government attempts to use
bombing systems that have no apparent targeting mechanisms in populated areas,
however, it clearly is engaged in indiscriminate bombing.
Furthermore, since the attack on the Kaya market as well as the other
attacks described above were during the day, the government does not have the
excuse that a civilian concentration such as a market was not visible. It is the duty of
the attacker to take reasonable precautions to avoid inflicting excessive civilian
casualties, and to refrain from attack if such avoidance is not possible.
In early 1994, the government again defended its bombing practices,
describing allegations of military offensives on civilians as "completely false and
baseless." Instead of maintaining, as they had only a few months before, that there
were no displaced persons' camps inside SPLA zones, the government sought to
blame the SPLA-Torit and Garang for using civilians as human shields, by locating
military bases near civilian concentrations, presumably referring to the Triple A
area (Loa) and Thiet (Bahr El Ghazal) bombings.143
Whatever the conduct of the SPLA-Torit, it can never excuse the
government from launching attacks that foreseeably will cause excessive civilian
casualties. Even if the SPLA-Torit deliberately located bases in immediate
proximity to displaced persons camps, the government must still adhere to the rule
of proportionality and either use precision weapons as a necessary precaution to
avoid such casualties, or, if it does not have the means to avoid such civilian harm,
refrain from attack.
Finally, several of the attacks described above do not appear to be directed
at a specific military objective--a grain warehouse is not a legitimate military
objective, nor is a column of fleeing civilians, nor a marketplace. The civilian
population as a whole as well as individual civilians are to be protected against

143
"Foreign minister denies allegations of government attacks on civilians in south,"
Radio National Unity, Omdurman, Sudan, February 16, 1994, quoted in BBC Summary
of World Broadcasts, The Middle East, Part 4, ME/1925 MED/12 [28], London,
February 18, 1994.
120 Civilian Devastation

attack. Civilians and civilian objectives are not legitimate military objectives and
they may not be directly targeted.
Violations of the Rules of War by Government Forces 121

PLACE MAP #4 HERE

 IV. SPLA VIOLATIONS OF THE RULES OF WAR

On August 28, 1991, two Upper Nile SPLA commanders, Riek Machar
Terry Dhurgon, Lam Akol Ajawin, and another SPLA commander, Gordon Kong
Cuol, called for the ouster of SPLA Commander-in-Chief John Garang de Mabior.
Their garrison at Nasir was joined by the SPLA barracks at Ayod, Waat, Abwong,
Adok, Ler, and Akobo, and some Anya-Nya II Nuer militia that for several years
had fought on the side of the government. The stated goals of the breakaway group,
known as the Nasir faction, were of democratizing the SPLA, stopping human rights
abuses, and reorienting the SPLA's objective from a united, secular Sudan to
independence for the south.
This strategy backfired in part because of widespread human rights abuses
committed by the SPLA-Nasir forces in the 1991 fighting. These abuses introduced
more mistrust into already strained tribal relations among southerners.
The fighting between the two factions has persisted for the two and a half
years since the August 1991 split; since then it has extracted a higher civilian toll
even than the government offensives.1 The devastating toll is due directly to the way
the factions have waged war in violation of the rules of war.
Among the violations of the rules of war committed by the two SPLA
factions are indiscriminate attacks on civilians living in the territory of the other
SPLA faction; summary executions and disappearances; torture; holding prisoners
in harsh conditions; pillage of civilian assets (cattle and grain) and destruction of
civilian property (the burning of houses) in the opposing faction's territory; taking
food from civilians by force; capturing civilians, principally women and children,
from the territory of the other faction; and denying unaccompanied minors the
opportunity to be voluntarily reunited with their families by the SPLA-Torit and in
1993 by the SPLA-Nasir/United. Abuses particular to the SPLA-Nasir/United
include directing the movement of the civilian population to Yuai in Upper Nile in
order to facilitate creation of a military outpost in this front-line position, thus
exposing the civilians to military danger rather than taking precautions to protect
them. SPLA-
Torit abuses included siege of garrison towns that in some cases amounts to using
starvation of civilians as a method of combat; indiscriminate shelling of Juba;
holding SPLA political prisoners and Ugandan rebel dissidents in prolonged

1
Jean, Life, Death and Aid, p. 17.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 123

arbitrary detention; forcible recruitment, largely of Equatorians; forced portering;

and the creation of tens of thousands of "unaccompanied minors"--boys originally
brought or lured to Ethiopian refugee camps for educational opportunities, who
were then segregated from their families and trained and deployed as soldiers.
The total impact of these abusive practices has been to rip apart the safety
net the southern Sudanese utilize as a protection from hunger in times of food
scarcity in this environmentally precarious region. The safety net consists in the first
instance of self-help measures or survival strategies such as sale of assets, primarily
cattle, as well as migration to find work, to fish and gather wild fruits, and to call
upon the network of relatives and others -- sometimes of different tribes -- who are
indebted to the potential famine victim. Where assets have been plundered, and
migration is impossible because of renewed tribal animosity or useless because the
place of migration has been raided as well, the civilian victims of military attacks
must look to other sources of food. One of those sources is the international
community. Its efforts to bridge the hunger gap caused by the conflict, however,
frequently have been stymied by the same conflict, as all parties take advantage of
their armed might to compel civilians to part with their meager rations and not
infrequently block relief deliveries with reckless disregard for civilian welfare.
Thus pockets of hunger have persisted and hundreds of thousands have
died of food scarcity and disease as a direct result of the factions' brutality and
callous disregard for the rules of war and the civilians those rules would protect.

SPLA FACTION FIGHTING

IN UPPER NILE PROVINCE FROM 1991-19922

In September 1991 it was by no means certain which units and areas were
loyal to Riek and which to Garang, especially in the border areas along the Duk
Ridge in Upper Nile, where there had been intermarriage for many generations.3

2
See Upper Nile map, facing Chapter II.

3
Some of the SPLA units in Nasir wanted to stay loyal to Garang and there were
shootouts. The Shillok tribe was divided.
124 Civilian Devastation

The Nasir faction hoped to demonstrate military superiority by taking the Upper
Nile home territory of Garang, a Bor Dinka, thereby convincing wavering
commanders to switch sides.
From September through November 1991, SPLA-Nasir forces raided a
series of villages in the Dinka districts of Bor and Kongor in Upper Nile Province.
These raids, in which some 2,000 civilians perished, became known as the Bor
Massacre. Many of the deaths occurred as civilians tried to prevent SPLA-Nasir
raiders from looting cattle. The raiders killed women and children as well as men,
and took other women and children captive.
The widespread killing, looting, and kidnapping, as well as the burning of
civilian homes, were clear violations of the rules of war. The Dinka villages and
cattle camps that were attacked and looted were not legitimate military targets, and
the civilian population and objects in them were not caught in military cross-fire.
The attacks often took place in villages where there was no SPLA-Torit or other
military presence.
The number of civilians who died of hunger and disease after the raids will
probably never be known. However, it was very high in the Bor and Kongor
districts, judging from the accounts of the Dinka who fled to the toic (river-flooded
grassland) to hide and search for food there. Many children died in the toic after the
fighting was over.
The SPLA-Torit launched a counteroffensive against the SPLA-Nasir areas
in Upper Nile in early 1992, which continued into the rainy season.4 These reprisal
raids followed the pattern set in the Bor Massacre of violating the rules of war by
indiscriminately killing civilians and looting and destroying civilian property.

Killings and Looting During September/October 1991

In the September-October 1991 SPLA-Nasir raids, the attackers proceeded
south from Nuer territory to the Dinka administrative center of Kongor, looting and
killing as they went. Once in Kongor, they turned back north to Nuer territory.
On the way to Kongor, they encountered a group of SPLA-Torit soldiers
commanded by a Nuer, William Nyoun Bany,5 which had overrun a small
contingent of Nasir loyalists in Kuac Deng (four hours or twelve miles south of
Ayod and still in Nuer territory) and taken their cattle. Apparently the factions

4
The rainy season in Upper Nile starts in April or May.

5
Commander William was the most active Nuer commander in the SPLA and
remained loyal to Garang until he also defected one year later.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 125

clashed on September 5, 1991, south of Kuac Deng and the Garang forces occupied
Duk Fadiat, a Dinka outpost some thirty-five kilometers south of Kuac Deng.6

6
Although some of the participants in these military events claim to remember the
exact dates, all dates are approximate. It is very hard to establish exact dates in general,
especially for this period of time.
126 Civilian Devastation

Much of the faction fighting has been along the Duk Ridge, a series of
sandy knolls which run from Mogogh in the north to Ayod and Kuac Deng then to
Duk Fadiat and Duk Faiwil.7 The northern section is occupied by Nuer, the southern
by Dinka. The ridge is less subject to flooding than the surrounding area and is
planted with sorghum. The Jonglei Canal, whose construction was interrupted by
the conflict, runs along the Duk Ridge.
Three days after the clash in Kuac Deng, the two factions fought in Duk
Fadiat, where the line between Nuer and Dinka is not hard and fast, and
intermarriage is common.8 A witness told HRW/Africa that both sides engaged in

7
Johnson, "Political Ecology in the Upper Nile," p. 468.

8
Dinka tribes in Duk Fadiat (Ghor and Nyarweng) as well as other Dinka who
border on the Nuer areas have facial scarrings, parallel markings, similar to those used
in the area by the Nuer. One Dinka Christian pastor said that the Dinka in Bor/Kongor
discriminated against the Ghor Dinka "because we are marked like Nuer."
These Dinka use the parallel markings because "They are more manly. Only
the men have these marks. The men and women of Bor have the same marks," in
contrast. The Bor and Twic Dinka have inverted chevron-shaped markings on their
foreheads common to the Mundari from whom the markings were adopted.
Markings indicate two things: that men so marked can marry the women from
groups who adopt similar markings, and that boys of such groups are often initiated in
the same age-sets together.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 127

looting in Duk Fadiat. No civilians were killed or injured in Duk Fadiat then, and no
huts were burned. The Garang forces retreated to Pok Tap in Dinka territory, south
of the Duk Ridge. There the SPLA-Nasir under Commander Elijah Hon Top
attacked and overran Pok Tap on September 15.
The SPLA-Nasir then proceeded to Duk Faiwil, a village of about 500 Bor
Dinka, four hours south of Duk Fadiat, according to a chief of that village. Prior to
the Nasir revolt, there had been no fighting in Duk Faiwil. The SPLA-Nasir forces
arrived at 5 A.M. and looted all the cattle, goats, sheep, tobacco, and grain. The
village chief told HRW/Africa that all of his 103 cattle and 150 goats were looted.
A second chief lost an entire herd of 2,000 cattle.
The father, mother, and three children of the first chief were killed. "No
people were captured; they just killed whomever they saw," he said. He escaped by
fleeing to the toic.
The youngest wife and three children--ages seven, four, and an infant--of
the second chief were killed in the attack. "I saw so many bodies lying down, dead,
as I fled. My people are all killed," he said. The attackers had burned his stored-up
sorghum inside his hut. "I remain with nothing," he said. He described the
devastation caused by the attackers:

The attackers did not leave anything standing. They destroyed

what they could not carry with them. They destroyed the hand
pump and wells. They did not leave anything useful to human
life. If they could not carry the grain, they burned it or dumped it
in the water to make the water rotten, useless.

The attackers were in two groups: soldiers wearing khaki and military
boots came first, armed with Kalashnikovs, RPGs (rocket-propelled grenade

Despite the confusion of facial scars, the villagers knew who was on which side
because "it was known which side the different chiefs were on, and their followers
automatically were on the same side." Indeed, after this looting in Duk Fadiat, the local
Ghor Dinka civilians and chiefs, including the court president and chief, left Duk Fadiat
and fled north to Ayod, a Nuer outpost, where their Nuer relatives were.
128 Civilian Devastation

launchers), and mortars. Another group, who wore sheets and were armed with
sticks and spears, came behind the soldiers. They all came on foot, without vehicles,
because the area was flooded and impassable.
The first chief returned to the village after the raid but when he saw that
everything had been destroyed, he returned to the toic, where survivors were forced
to eat water lilies, a traditional famine food.
The second chief said he and many other Dinka stayed in the toic for three
months while the Nuer occupied Bor and Kongor. Hunger and mosquitos were
constant problems. Two of the second chief's wives survived, but his seven children,
who survived the attack, died of hunger, either in the toic or after they moved back
to Duk Faiwil.
As they pushed south, the SPLA-Nasir forces also attacked Wernyol, a
Dinka village south of Pok Tap and north of Kongor, in September 1991. The
SPLA-Nasir forces killed an unknown number of civilians in the raid, including the
six uncles, one cousin, and one niece of a twenty-year-old Dinka woman who spoke
with HRW/Africa. The raiders took women and female children captive, including
five of her cousins. She was not sure whether they took them as wives or slaves.
Riek's forces would "rape them and take the ones that they liked. They took only
female children. If they could, they killed the boys," she said. Typical of the other
villagers, she and her husband lost all their animals to the raiders: they had seventy
head of cattle, fifteen goats, and ten chickens. All of their stored grain was looted.
The attackers burned some of the tukls. She and her surviving relatives ran to the
toic and returned to Wernyol in December 1991. She was there when it was
reattacked in 1992.
The Garang troops pulled back south to Kongor, a Dinka center, by
October 9, 1991, followed by the Nasir forces who occupied it without resistance
from SPLA-Torit but at considerable cost in civilian life. The Kongor area is a
grain-producing area, the home of the Twic Dinka, who historically migrated
annually during the dry season north to the toic of the Nuer to water their cattle.9
Kongor was the main commercial center of Kongor district, although the more
permanent settlements were the dispersed villages and districts that surrounded
Kongor.
A chief of Kongor was in one of these outlying villages during the attack.
When it was over, he entered Kongor and found its entire center burned down. His
people told him that the Nuer had attacked. He found many bodies of children,

9
Historically, occasional raids occurred between tribes but they were settled by
negotiations. The Dinka and Nuer in this area had economic and familial ties.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 129

women, and men who had been shot. Two sons, one nineteen and one seventeen
years old, tried to move his cows to the toic to hide them. The Nuer caught the sons
and killed them; they also took his 200 cattle. They also killed his fifteen-year-old
daughter who was with his sons in the cattle camp. On the way out of Kongor that
morning, the chief caught sight of the Nuer as they were stealing cows, and he hid
from them. "They were mostly wearing uniforms, but some had on sheets," he said.
The chief and others fled to the toic, where they did not build any houses
but "collected grass on the water and slept on it." He described the hardships of life
in the toic:

There were so many difficulties with the rain and mosquitos. We

had no proper food. We sometimes ate fish and sometimes did
not have anything to eat. If you want to count by name all the
people who died of hunger in the toic, it will take until evening.

After a few days in Kongor, the Nasir forces abandoned Kongor and
returned north to their home territory with the cattle they had looted along the way.

SPLA-Torit Attack on Adok, Upper Nile

In the meantime, the SPLA-Torit under Commander William Nyuon Bany
tried to open another front in western Upper Nile, around Bentiu.10 The SPLA-Torit
forces occupied the area for one week, attacking Adok, Riek's home town. The
SPLA-Torit apparently commandeered an ICRC barge in Bentiu, filled it with 400
soldiers, and proceeded to Adok where the small SPLA-Nasir force was easily
defeated. There was a clash in Ler, also in western Upper Nile, where the hospital
was ransacked. It is not clear if the ransacking was done by Anya-Nya II
reinforcements called in to assist SPLA-Nasir, or by SPLA-Torit. SPLA-Torit
forces then returned to Bor, raiding cattle from Adok.

SPLA-Nasir Second Raids into Kongor/Bor Area in 1991

Commander Riek at the time expressed annoyance at the attack on his
hometown and announced that his troops then in Badiet (a Dinka area north of Bor)
would take Bor,11 the heartland of Garang's support.12 Garang may have been

10
See Western Equatoria and Bahr El Ghazal map, facing Chapter III.

11
Riek stated this intention in an interview conducted in mid-November 1991 with a
U.N. staffperson.
130 Civilian Devastation

readying his forces for a counterattack into Nuer territory at the time; his troops
moved north. The two factions clashed in Duk Fadiat again, in November 1991. By
that time the Duk Fadiat residents were all in hiding. Commander Elijah Hon Top
told HRW/Africa that he took his SPLA-Nasir troops south at that time only as far
as Duk Fadiat and that Commander Gordon Kong Banypin13 of Nasir, the zonal
commander, took over from him there and conducted the rest of the campaign.14 In
this raid, the attackers reached Kongor and then continued farther south, to capture
Bor on November 23 and then Jemeiza.15

12
Garang's hometown is Aborom, south of Kongor.

13
Gordon Kong Banypin is not to be confused with Commander Gordon Kong Cuol,
also of SPLA-Nasir, who led his Nuer government-backed Anya-Nya II militia into the
SPLA in 1987. In 1993, according to SPLA-Nasir Commander Elijah Hon Top, Gordon
Kong Cuol was secretary of International Affairs of the SPLA-Nasir/United in Nairobi.
Commander Gordon Kong Banypiny of Nasir was stationed at Abwong on the Sobat
River in 1993 but had been ill.

14
Commander Gordon Kong Banypin joined the SPLA from the government-
sponsored Anya-Nya II in 1986.

15
It is unclear what role the SPLA-Nasir troops in Badiet played in this campaign.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 131

HRW/Africa interviewed several witnesses to attacks on various villages

during this second thrust into Dinka territory. One, a chief of Jonglei, a village
approximately twenty-four miles or six hours south of Kongor, said that the
villagers did not hear the attack on Kongor or see the smoke. The attack was
conducted by uniformed armed men and by men in sheets wielding axes and spears.
When the attackers entered at about 5 A.M., this Jonglei chief said he quickly hid in
a pool of water and high grass (the area was flooded). He stayed in chest-high water
out of sight until 10 P.M. when he thought it was safe to flee. He said that at 10 A.M.,
he "was a witness to the Nuer dividing up people into groups or lines of fifty, by
age." He was about seventy-five feet from the place where this was happening, an
open area of which he had an unobstructed view. The attackers could not see him.
After dividing up the village by age, the Nuer started killing the residents in groups:
small children, women, and men. They separated out "the more beautiful" young
women and girls and took them away; they were killed if they refused to go.16 About
an hour after the raiders finished killing, he saw them take the cooking fire and set
the roofs of the huts ablaze.
He sneaked away that night and only reentered the village after the Nuer
had taken the cows and left. He counted the bodies of some forty children, 160
women, and 400 men that had been left lying on the ground. He and other Dinka
civilians moved to the toic and lived on leaves and water lilies.
Another attack occurred on Paliau village to the south of Kongor center.
As described by a fifty-five-year-old Dinka survivor from Paliau, the attackers came
from the north during the flood time and began killing and looting: "It was Riek's
soldiers plus Nuer militia and Nuer villagers. They came in the morning and took all
the cattle, shot all the men that they could, and took whatever women they could
capture."
The troops took some of the sorghum that was growing and burned the
rest. The entire attack by the Nasir forces lasted twelve days. The troops shot and
killed this survivor's brother when he was trying to take back some of his cattle.

16
The chief understood one word they were speaking, which was in Arabic:
"Adrup!," which he understood to mean "Fire!" (Literally, "adrup" means "hit.") An
officer in uniform would give this order, and the others would raise their guns and fire
at a group.
132 Civilian Devastation

They kidnapped his daughter, then fifteen years old. He has not seen her since, and
has no knowledge of her fate. He lost his entire herd of sixty head of cattle and eight
goats. "Riek's forces" disassembled his house and used the wood for cooking, and
looted his possessions, including utensils and grain.
Many residents ran under bushes to hide, then went to the toic when they
got sick and too hungry. A few months later, after Riek's forces had left, they came
back to Paliau. During the raids, there was no defense from Garang's forces. The
Riek forces reportedly laid down land mines in Maar, another village in Kongor
district, which killed one woman and injured others.
Still the Nasir forces continued south, toward Bor. A twenty-eight-year-old
Dinka said that his family was in Jalle, a village in Bor district thirty miles north of
Bor, at the time the Nuer came in November 1991. His grandfather, guarding his
cattle, was killed and the cows taken. Another nineteen family members were killed
at the same time and place, of whom nine were children, the youngest age five. This
young man was with his cows south of Bor when the Nuer raided Bor center. He
moved them six hours farther south, traveling with five other men and their cattle;
they acted quickly to save their herds when word reached them of the looters.
On his way back to his home in Bor, after the Nuer left, he saw many
people lying dead on the ground. "There were no cattle and all the houses were
burned, including mine in Bor."
No accurate count was ever made of those who were killed in all the raided
villages; Amnesty International estimates it was at least 2,000.17

Fighting Resumes After First Cease-Fire in 1991

Through the mediation of the churches, representatives of the two SPLA
factions met in Nairobi on November 23 and agreed to a cease-fire, effective
November 27, 1991, at 6 A.M.18 It lasted only a few days. Garang's SPLA-Torit
recaptured Bor on or about November 29, 1991. In December, 1991, Garang's
forces re-occupied Kongor and Pok Tap, moving farther north but still in Dinka
territory.
The two factions issued a joint press statement on December 17, 1991,
reconfirming the cease-fire. It was soon broken. SPLA-Torit Commander Bior

17
Amnesty International, "Sudan: A continuing human rights crisis," AI Index: AFR
54/03/92 (London: Amnesty International, April 15, 1992), p. 17.

18
Press Release, Agreement signed by Commander James Wani Igga [SPLA-Torit]
and Commander Lam Akol Ajawin [SPLA-Nasir], Nairobi, Kenya, November 26, 1991.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 133

Ajang Duot admitted that he started a counterattack into Nuer territory from
Mongalla on December 30, 1991, pursuing the Riek forces to Kuac Deng in the
border territory.

SPLA-Nasir Accountability for the Bor Massacre

International law, set forth in greater detail in the appendix, is quite clear
that summary executions and targeting of civilians are prohibited, as are kidnapping
women and children, pillaging, looting, and destruction of civilian property.
The atrocities that occurred in the course of the SPLA-Nasir raids are the
responsibility of the SPLA-Nasir faction. The 1991 raids initially were conducted
by SPLA-Nasir and its followers for the military objective of capturing Bor Dinka
territory, Garang's homeland, to turn the military and political tide in favor of the
SPLA-Nasir forces. That faction has taken no serious steps to investigate and
discipline the individuals and commanders responsible.

The SPLA-Nasir Forces Involved

Those who participated in the Bor Massacre comprised three separate
groups:

1. SPLA military forces which responded to Riek, Lam Akol, and Gordon
Kong's call to depose Garang, principally the unit based in Ayod19 under
the command of Vincent Kuang. Commander Elijah Hon Top and Thomas
Duoth, a local Gaawar Nuer commander, were there also. A relief worker
in the area at the time told HRW/Africa that Commander Elijah Hon Top
set off with his troops for Kongor in October-November 1991, while
Thomas Duoth and Vincent Kuang remained in Ayod, contrary to what
Commander Elijah maintains;
2. Members of Anya-Nya II, a government-sponsored Nuer militia that
switched its allegiance to Riek when he broke from Garang. It is not
known which units participated in the raids, but those who sided with the
Nasir faction included Brig. Paulino Matiep Nhial;

19
The old SPLA garrison in Ayod, which defected to Riek, was not numerous; many
troops had been transferred to the battlefront at the southern "capital" of Juba in
Equatoria, whose capture was the focus of the SPLA's concerted military efforts.
134 Civilian Devastation

3. Nuer civilians loosely known as the "White Army" who took up arms, or
sometimes spears, to participate in the military campaign, mostly for
purposes of looting and revenge.

Members of the SPLA-Nasir tried to deny responsibility for the Bor

Massacre because of the participation of Anya-Nya II and civilian Nuer raiding
groups they could not control. However, as the testimonies demonstrate, the SPLA-
Nasir forces participated in the raids and killing of civilians. Furthermore, the
civilian participants were not sufficiently well armed to penetrate deep into Dinka
territory unless they were operating in tandem with the SPLA-Nasir and Anya-Nya
II.
The SPLA-Nasir is responsible for the conduct of the whole army because
it encouraged these part-time combatants to participate in the raids. SPLA-Nasir and
Anya-Nya II forces together apparently were not judged sufficiently strong to take
the campaign to Kongor, and the White Army was encouraged to go along to
participate, almost certainly with the lure of looting cattle. SPLA-Nasir is also
responsible for the conduct of the Anya-Nya II militia units that joined the raids.
According to an informed observer, the first Kongor invasion was led by
the Anya-Nya II group that so recently joined Riek's forces and civilians who had
no relatives living in Kongor. The SPLA-Torit estimated that about 30,000 forces
were used against them in Bor, of which Riek's troops were 10,000, Anya-Nya II's
were 5,000, and the 15,000 remaining were Nuer civilian "White Army." Riek
maintains that Anya-Nya II did not even have 200 men at the time. Probably neither
figure is correct.

Anya-Nya II
When it was still a government militia, Anya-Nya II had suffered
numerous defeats at the hands of the SPLA and was eager for an opportunity for
revenge. The Anya-Nya II units that had just joined the SPLA in mid-199120 had
not been incorporated into its military structure; they had no SPLA training,
officers, or duties. (SPLA training until May 1991 was conducted at its training
camps in Ethiopia.) Another Anya-Nya II unit did not desert the government until

20
Vincent Kuang, an old Any-Nya II commander before he joined the SPLA, had
been sent by Garang in about April 1991 to persuade the Anya-Nya II at New Fangak
and Doleib Hill in Upper Nile to join the SPLA. By June 1991 it was being reported that
these Anya-Nya II units had joined the SPLA.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 135

the Nasir faction split from Garang.21 As late as October, 1992, some Anya-Nya II
units were still drawing rations and pay from the government, although they had
mixed in with the Nasir faction forces by that time; some had been transferred to
Nasir and replaced by regular SPLA.

"White Army"

21
This included Brig. Paulino Matiep Nhial of Mayom, who drew his support from
the Bul Nuer of the Bentiu area, Upper Nile. Johnson and Prunier, "Formation and
Expansion," p. 152.
136 Civilian Devastation

The "White Army" or "Decbor" is a term now used for what was at the
time a very informal arrangement among Nuer men in Upper Nile,22 named "white"
named because of its weapons, the white metal of their spears or pangas,23 a cheap
and readily available weapon. It was an informal part-time military force drawn by
local leaders from civilians in their home areas for the purpose of conducting
traditional cattle raids or of settling scores for cattle raids. The White Army
members live in their own homes and have their own commanders. They are not
considered by the SPLA-Nasir to be a militia because they are untrained and have
no semi-automatic weapons.
Many Nuer believed it was time to settle scores with the Dinka, which they
equated with the SPLA-Torit. Nuer civilians from Upper Nile had been targeted in
SPLA reprisals against Anya-Nya II operational areas.24 These Nuer claimed they

22
In 1993, under Wut Nyang, the White Army took on a more permanent
organization and many of his followers wore white sheets or covered themselves in
white ash. They played a role in the attack on government-held Malakal in October
1992.

23
Normally the razor-sharp spears are used to cut the throat of cattle. The blade is
shaped somewhat like a foot-long flat iron leaf at the end of a long wooden pole.

24
The SPLA reprisals were brought on by Anya-Nya II's attacks in the mid-1980s on
Dinka recruits passing through to Ethiopia for military training, and on other Dinka
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 137

had been heavily taxed by the SPLA and were subjected to SPLA abuses, such as
looting cattle, confiscating food, taking young women to be wives of soldiers,25 and
forced recruitment. Some of the grievances, however, particularly the references to
heavy taxation, may well be post hoc justification for the Bor Massacre.
Some believed that Garang's forces diverted to Kongor and the Dinka
those U.N. supplies destined for Ayod. Dinka civilians brought these relief supplies
back up to trade for Nuer cattle. "We in the White Army went with Riek to retake
the cattle that had been traded for supplies that should have gone to the Nuer
anyway, or that were taken as an unfair tax," in the words of a Nuer chief. Of 500
people who lived in his village of Pagau, 300 went to Kongor/Bor with Riek in
September 1991. The same numbers came from Kuac Deng, Pading, and Pathai
villages, "all with the intention of retaking our cattle." He believed that the raids
then sparked retaliatory raids in 1992 and 1993 by Garang on these same Nuer
villages.

civilians fleeing Arab militia raiding and famine in Bahr El Ghazal. They had to pass
through Nuer territory to reach Ethiopia. Johnson and Prunier, "Foundation and
Expansion," pp. 127-28. But the Nuer attacks of the mid-1980s were also the product of
Dinka/SPLA attacks on Nuer earlier, and on and on.

25
Soldiers taking advantage of combat to abduct women to marry, without paying the
usual dowry, is a common complaint.
138 Civilian Devastation

According to a later study,26 the Nuers' suspicion in August and September

1991 that Garang and the SPLA were hoarding U.N. relief supplies in Bor for the
Dinka was not accurate. The U.N. had information about the need in this Nuer area,
but a plan of action to bring supplies from the south to this area was vetoed by
higher authorities in the U.N./WFP, because the Sudan government refused
permission. The SPLA did not veto the plan.
In the early days of the split, in order to secure popular support against
Garang, the Nasir faction deliberately propagated the false allegation that Garang
diverted relief supplies to Bor. The propaganda fed on the existing perception that
the Nuer districts were being shortchanged by the U.N. and others in development
resources, which in early 1991 were concentrated in Kongor and Bor. The U.N.'s
refusal to stand up to the Sudan government thus contributed in part to the later
tragedy, but was not responsible for it.
Ayod residents reported later that one reason why their men joined the
SPLA-Nasir faction in raiding the Dinka in Kongor and Bor was that the Nuer cattle
were dying. The plan backfired: Not only did it provoke reprisal raids in early 1992,
but the raided Dinka cattle brought diseases to the Nuer cattle, and both died by the
thousands. Some of the Nuer raiders did not keep the looted cattle because of the
fear that the Dinka would come to reclaim them, so they rushed to sell them in
Malakal, Kosti, and Khartoum. According to one report, Anya-Nya II forces that
participated in the raids retreated to Malakal with over a thousand head of livestock,
sharply driving the price down.

Steps Taken by SPLA-Nasir to Investigate and Punish Their Own

Forces Who Violated the Rules of War
HRW/Africa concludes that there was no serious investigation undertaken
or punishment meted out by SPLA-Nasir to forces under its control, including
Anya-Nya II and the White Army, in connection with the Bor Massacre. This lack
of responsibility continues despite repeated inquiries and requests for such
accountability, and the fact that more than two years have elapsed since the events
in question.
Military commanders have a duty under the rules of war to assure that
those under their command respect the rules of war, do not target civilians, and
respect civilian property. If a soldier deviates from respect for these rules, then it is

26
Scott-Villiers, "Repatriation of Sudanese Refugees," pp. 206-07.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 139

the duty of the command to investigate and mete out appropriately severe
punishment. Regardless of the difficulty of identifying each individual soldier
responsible when many participate in a massacre, it is possible to identify the chain
of command. Commanders are responsible for the conduct of their troops and
should themselves be investigated and punished if they ordered troops to commit
violations of the rules of war. They are responsible even if they passively permitted
or tolerated abuses by their troops. They are also responsible for any cover-ups after
the fact.
The lack of will and/or the ability to deal with charges of violating the
rules of war is demonstrated by the contradictory responses of SPLA-Nasir
commanders to HRW/Africa's questions about accountability for the abuses.
Commander Riek told HRW/Africa in July 1993 that he himself
"investigated" the allegations of killings of civilians in Bor in 1991.27 His
investigation consisted of going to Bor and Kongor and talking "to everyone." Upon
further questioning, however, it became clear that his investigation consisted only of
attending political meetings where questions about the Bor Massacre were raised by
local Dinka chiefs.
Commander Riek claimed that there were no civilians in Bor when it was
attacked: "My troops attacked by night. They used heavy artillery. All civilians were
evacuated. People came back, about 500, the day after we captured Bor. They came
back for food, the commander told me." As described above, however, the
massacres occurred in many villages in addition to Bor.
Commander Riek stressed that it was difficult to know whom to punish
because the situation was too confused. "Bor was a big fight. You cannot know who
did what," he said. This excuse might explain one isolated battle, but the Bor
Massacre was not a one-day incident. Sustained campaigns cannot be brushed off as
"confusion."

27
Interview with Commander Riek Machar, Upper Nile, Sudan, July 5, 1993.
140 Civilian Devastation

In 1992, Commander Riek offered a different version of accountability for

the massacre. He told the U.N. that he had dismissed Commander Vincent Kuang as
the man responsible for Bor.28 According to a relief worker who saw Commander
Vincent before the raid on Bor, he was depressed, and after Bor he was in a severe
depression even though he was not actually in Bor itself. He was the most senior
officer in charge and appeared distressed about what happened there. In 1993, Riek
did not mention to HRW/Africa that Commander Vincent had any responsibility or
had received any punishment.
Yet another version of accountability was offered by SPLA-Nasir
Commander Elijah Hon Top of Ayod.29 In late 1991, Commander Elijah was in a
position to assume responsibility because he participated as a commander in the
raids and may be one of the ones ultimately responsible. He tried initially to excuse
the SPLA-Nasir's failure to assign blame as a function of extraordinary
circumstances. Upon being pressed, however, Commander Elijah claimed that
several officers were court-martialed in early 1993 and eventually came up with
their names: Capt. Lom Luat Chol and Capt. David Thon Dang, who were "demoted
for fighting at Kongor and Pok Tap and for carrying out abuses." Commander
Elijah said the two were in custody in Ayod jail until they were tried in a court
martial in early 1993. Their punishment was being demoted to lieutenant, a rank
they still hold. They were demoted during a general parade.
If his version of events is true, the punishment is wholly inadequate for the
nature and extent of the abuses committed, including thousands of civilian deaths,
kidnapping women and children, widespread cattle raiding, and house burning.
Commander Elijah then claimed that he was the one who pursued the proceedings
and formed the court martial, on orders from Riek, to whom the decision was sent
and who confirmed the decision. However, Commander Riek, in an interview with

28
At the time in 1991 Commander Vincent Kuang was in charge of Ayod and
Commander Elijah Hon Top and Thomas Duoth, a local Gaawar Nuer commander,
were there also.

29
Interview with Commander Elijah Hon Top, Upper Nile, Sudan, July 11, 1993.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 141

HRW/Africa earlier the same month, did not mention any of these names, events or
punishments.
As to the defense that the civilians were outside of his control, Riek later
admitted that the White Army "can be controlled if the other side respects cease-fire
or demilitarized zone agreements." Commander Elijah also claimed that the White
Army regularly went off on their own to raid cattle. He conceded, however, that
they cannot operate alone but need regular soldiers to facilitate their raids far from
home.
As to the Dinka women and children abducted during the raids,
Commander Riek claimed that civilians returning from Bor had women with them
whom he released and sent back. A historian, however, told HRW/Africa that
during the first civil war it was easier to have cattle than women returned through
tribal negotiations, and added that it would have been difficult for Riek to enforce
any order to return the women and children taken. Indeed, several Dinka witnesses
mentioned names of female family members who were abducted and never seen
again.
When the idea was raised of compensation for the cattle that were raided, a
traditional means of solving this type of dispute, one SPLA-Nasir/United leader,
Simon Mori, succinctly rejected such a solution: "Raiding is what takes place in
peacetime. This is booty."

SPLA-Torit Accountability for the Counterattack

As already discussed, the SPLA-Torit leadership did not meet with
HRW/Africa, despite repeated requests for an interview. They have not even
attempted to offer any excuses or insights into their continuing abuses of the rules of
war.
Publicly, the forces of the SPLA-Torit have offered no excuse for their
conduct; they claim that the abuses never took place. The responsibility of the
SPLA-Torit to account for the conduct of their troops is the same as described
above: to investigate reports of violations of the rules of war and punish their troops
accordingly. Nothing of the kind has been done, as far as we have learned.
SPLA-Torit accountability for other violations of the rules of war will be
discussed further below.

SPLA-Nasir Attacks in Bahr El Ghazal in 1992

Western Bahr El Ghazal30 was formerly the most densely populated area of
southern Sudan, with a population of the flood plain area of Aweil and Gogrial

30
See Western Equatoria and Bahr El Ghazal map, facing Chapter III.
142 Civilian Devastation

estimated at 1.5 million in 1986.31 Flooding was responsible for a poor harvest in
1991 and destroyed many crops in 1992. Permission to fly into the area to deliver
relief supplies was suspended by the government in early 1990 and was only
reinstated in December 1992.

31
OLS (Southern Sector), "1992/93 Situation Assessment," Nairobi, Kenya,
February 1993, p. 20. Others note that the 1983 census for Aweil area council was
691,309 and for Gogrial area council 322,734, totaling 1,214,043. This census was
disrupted, however, and its figures are often rejected by southerners.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 143

The relative calm in the area was disrupted in early 1992 when the SPLA-
Nasir forces along with Nuer civilians carried out numerous incursions into the
Dinka areas of eastern Bahr El Ghazal. Most of the attacks in the Yirol, Rumbek,
Tonj, and Gogrial areas of Bahr El Ghazal were either against areas with little or no
SPLA-Torit presence, or were carried out soon after government raids in April
1992.32
Amnesty International reported that on January 22, 1992, SPLA-Nasir
forces attacked the villages of Pagarau and Adermuoth near Yirol in eastern Bahr El
Ghazal, arbitrarily killing ninety-two civilians, among them patients at a leprosy
hospital. Some twenty women and children were reported to have been abducted
and villages burned down. Amnesty International also reported an attack by SPLA-
Nasir on a large Dinka cattle camp, Wun Riit, near Shambe, which resulted in forty
civilian deaths.33
Shortly thereafter, the fighting in this area between the SPLA factions was
contained. In an interview with HRW/Africa, Commander Riek said that the tribes
settled their differences through negotiations and that women and children abducted
by the Nuer had been returned, although some say such a directive is very difficult
to enforce. This April 1992 local peace agreement with the SPLA-Torit lasted until
an attack by the Garang forces in June 1993, according to SPLA-Nasir.

SPLA-Torit Counterattack on Nasir Territory in Early 1992

In early 1992, the SPLA-Torit continued the counterattack, while the
SPLA-Nasir attacked and then withdrew from some Dinka areas of western Bahr El
Ghazal.
The government took advantage of the opening that the faction fighting
provided and made its most significant military gains in years, starting in March
1992 by launching a four-pronged attack on SPLA territory and recapturing most of
the main population centers held by the SPLA, including Bor, on April 4, 1992.
(See Chapter III.)

32
See Chapter III above.

33
Amnesty International, "Ravages of war," p. 23.
144 Civilian Devastation

Wunerud, a Nuer village in the Ayod district "one morning's walk" from
the Ayod outpost, was raided by "the Dinka," some in uniform, some in civilian
clothes, in January 1992, according to a thirty-eight-year-old male Nuer resident.
Prior to the raid, Dinkas had lived in the Ayod district and its villages and had
enjoyed good relations and intermarried with the Nuer. The Dinka in the village
were not spared in the attack. The witness said that the attackers came at 8 A.M.,
some with rifles, some with spears "like us." The Nuer had only fishing spears and
sticks with which to defend themselves. The witness's fifteen head of cattle were all
taken. He said that some of the villagers were killed when they ran after the
attackers to try to reclaim their cattle. "There was too much starvation. We could
not endure it," he said. The attackers were responsible for taking all cattle of the
village and for "killing and injuring many Nuer."
After the raid, there was no food left because the area had recently been
flooded. The villagers received no food assistance, and many children died from
illness and starvation. In December, 1992, the witness's family (he had ten children,
ages fifteen to infant) and three other families walked fifteen days to Nasir for food,
eating leaves on the way.
SPLA-Torit continued the counterattack with raids in Pagau and nearby
villages to the east of Ayod. There was no military presence of the SPLA-Nasir in
Pagau at the time of the SPLA-Torit raid. There were some twenty people in Pagau
who were part of the White Army, a number "too small to fight Garang's forces,"
according to a forty-five-year-old Nuer chief from Pagau who believed that
Garang's forces came to attack villages and "take back their cattle."34 This witness
told HRW/Africa that by February 1992, Garang's forces had reached Pagau village
where many of the Nuer cattle from the region had been taken for water. This man
lost fifty-one cattle, fifteen sheep, and twenty-two goats to the raiders. Thirty-three
people were burned to death during the raid, including two of his children. In
addition, ninety-seven people were shot and killed, either in the village or while
running out of the village, he estimated.
During this period in 1992, Commander George Asor of SPLA-Torit
emerged from his base in Atar to the north, near Malakal, and entered the Nuer area
of Jol, near Waidien and north of Ayod, where he looted cattle and killed civilians.
Then he withdrew north to Atar again.35

34
This witness was sick, he told HRW/Africa, so he did not go to Kongor with SPLA-
Nasir and the White Army as many of his relatives did. In the attack on Kongor, these
combatants "killed Dinka cattle and goats and ate them."

35
Commander George Asor was also reported by Nuer in the area to have attacked
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 145

from his SPLA-Torit base in Atar into the Pagil administrative district five days north
of Ayod, looting, killing and capturing Nuers there, in September 1991.
On February 24, 1994, Commander George attracted attention when he
detained five U.N. staff engaging in relief assessment and vaccinations in Abek village
near his Atar SPLA-Torit base; they had arrived in the area in a U.N. barge. He
accused them of "spying for the government" but treated them well. They were not
released until March 6, 1994.
146 Civilian Devastation

Witnesses told HRW/Africa that the SPLA-Torit continued its

counterattack into Nuer territory in March. A fifty-year-old Nuer man from Fadiak
(two hours' walk south of Yuai) was present during four attacks by SPLA-Torit
forces in the three villages of Fadiak, Pathai, and Kuac Deng. He told HRW/Africa
that in February 1992, "Dinka soldiers" came and burned Fadiak completely and
engaged in widespread random shooting. This witness lost all of his livestock
except for three cows. In March 1992, Garang's forces attacked Kuac Deng near
Ayod, where the witness and his family had fled after the Fadiak attack. There, as in
Fadiak, many civilians were shot and killed, including the witness's stepbrother.
Again, grain, livestock, and other property were looted from the villagers, and most
of the houses were burned to the ground. His family fled to Pathai, east of Kuac
Deng.

Fighting in Upper Nile in mid-1992

On June 7, 1992, SPLA-Torit succeeded in penetrating into the southern
capital of Juba before being driven out by the government. The SPLA-Torit again
attacked Juba on July 6, 1992, holding onto some areas of the city for a few days
before withdrawing.
In Nairobi on June 19, 1992, the two factions agreed to take immediate
steps to revive the reunification talks as reflected in their joint statement of
December 17, 1991.36 During this period of mid-1992, the two factions conducted
raids back and forth on villages along the Duk Ridge. HRW/Africa was unable to
ascertain the exact chronology of these attacks.
In June or July, 1992, Garang's forces again attacked north into Nuer
territory around Ayod, including the village of Pathai, which this time they burned
to the ground, according to a witness. The attack once again involved systematic
looting of the personal property of the villagers and indiscriminate shooting. This
was the third SPLA-Torit attack on Pathai in 1992.
The next and fourth attack on Pathai by SPLA-Torit in 1992 took place in
July. The witness told HRW/Africa that "soldiers of Garang" attacked in the

36
Agreement on Reconciliation of the Divided SPLM/SPLA, Nairobi, Kenya, June
19, 1992, signed by Commander William Nyuon Bany (for SPLA-Torit) and
Commander Lam Akol Ajawin (for SPLA-Nasir).
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 147

morning. The witness's brother, stepbrother, and sons of two brothers were shot and
killed.
SPLA-Nasir attacked the Dinka village of Pok Tap, about five miles south
of Duk Fadiat, in June or July 1992. The SPLA-Nasir entered the Pok Tap area at
dawn, surrounded it, and started shooting. They killed the head chief, Panom Atem
Goc, along with Chief Lual Akoc Lual and Chief Awuol Malual, and all their
families. Another chief of that town told HRW/Africa that he and his wife escaped
back to the toic, but that the Nuer cut and destroyed his new crops. The witness
came back when the attackers left and helped bury the three chiefs and their wives.
He saw how they had been shot: Panom was shot in the temple and Lual in the
stomach; Lual died two days later. In all, in the Pok Tap area, seventy-eight
civilians were killed. All the huts in Pok Tap and the surrounding area were burned.
The ethnic enmity that was building up with the factional fighting is
reflected in the chief's comment that "The Nuers do not like the Dinkas to live, to
survive. They were looking for people to kill in 1992; there were no more cows,
sheep or goats left by that time."
A twenty-year-old Dinka woman from Wernyol, south of Pok Tap and
north of Kongor, was present during the second attack on her village, which she
believed occurred in June or July 1992. In the indiscriminate shooting, the SPLA-
Nasir raiders killed eleven of her relatives, seven of whom were women. Her
family's sorghum and pumpkin crops were cut down and destroyed, and more
houses were burned. She fled to the toic with her family and never again returned to
Wernyol.
Two chiefs of Wernyol village displaced by the 1991 fighting walked back
to their village during the wet season of 1992 in order to plant with U.N.-donated
seeds. Each had built two or three tukls, depending on the number of his wives.
They were in Wernyol during the SPLA-Nasir attack in June or July 1992. The
Nuer destroyed their new crops and new tukls, and the two witnesses, along with
other survivors, fled to the toic again, but there was no food. "Many children died of
hunger. The number killed by hunger is three times the number alive now," they
said. Ten children, the wife, and a brother of one of the chiefs died of hunger while
in the toic or on the way back to the village. About twenty-five family members of
the other chief died of hunger on the same journey. They included two wives, a
brother, his brother's three children, and several of his own children.
The SPLA-Nasir forces apparently went as far south as Paliau, south of
Kongor town, in June or July 1992. According to a fifty-five-year-old resident, the
SPLA-Nasir forces killed the oldest man in the area, Bior Aguer, who was over one
148 Civilian Devastation

hundred years old.37 "They killed many who could not run," he added. This
witness's six children and wife died of hunger after they fled into the toic to hide.
He said they had not been able to go to Kongor "because Riek's forces were there."
He described the SPLA-Nasir attack bluntly: "They kill who they wanted to kill, and
take what they wanted to take," including women and children.

ABUSES IN EQUATORIA DURING 1992

SPLA-Torit Abuses During and After its Two Attacks on Juba from June-
August 1992
In the summer of 1992 SPLA-Torit made two military incursions into the
southern capital of Juba, and nearly captured the city. The SPLA-Torit allegedly
committed summary executions during the June 7 incursion, and indiscriminate
shelling during and after the July 6 incursion. The shelling of the airport after the
battle for Juba was over violated the rules of war because, under the circumstances
at the time, the airport was the sole point of entry for relief food to reach over
100,000 recently displaced in that garrison town.
HRW/Africa attempts to investigate reports of summary executions by the
SPLA were stymied in part by the government's denial of permission for us to visit
government-controlled areas where these abuses allegedly occurred. Thereafter the
government cut off all dialogue with HRW/Africa. We were therefore unable to
confirm or deny the summary execution allegations, including allegations that the
SPLA-Torit entered Juba through Lalogo and summarily executed sixty-nine
soldiers from Battalion 116 by killing them in their beds. Soldiers are legitimate
military targets, and further examination of the circumstances is required before it
can be concluded that their deaths were violations of the rules of war.

Shelling of Juba Airport

37
An historian notes that this man was in his late twenties or early thirties in 1931,
making him slightly less than 100 years old in 1993. He was clearly the oldest man in the
area.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 149

There have been frequent allegations that the SPLA-Torit has shelled the
town of Juba, in violation of the rules of war. We examine those allegations with
reference to mid-1992.38
The worst SPLA-Torit shelling of Juba occurred from July 6-15, 1992,
affecting both civilian and military areas. The targets apparently were the military
headquarters and the airport, but the shells often went astray. On July 13 an SPLA
shell hit the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) compound, damaging it
but injuring no one.

38
It is evident that some were injured in the June 1992 fighting in Juba, but it is not
clear who was responsible for the injuries or how they were inflicted, whether in cross-
fire, by SPLA shelling, or by direct government attacks. Some 198 war wounded from
this June fighting in Juba were taken over the border by land to the ICRC hospital in
Lokichokio, Kenya. In Juba, local ICRC staff and the Sudanese Red Crescent assisted
the victims and transported hundreds of
wounded to hospital. ICRC Annual Report 1992, p. 51.
150 Civilian Devastation

The SPLA advised foreigners and civilians to leave Juba "for their own
safety" during this July assault on Juba. "SPLA is dead serious of this warning.
Those who cannot leave Juba are advised to remain in their houses wherever there
is shooting and to take cover. The SPLA has strict orders to avoid civilian areas and
to protect and to take to safety civilians who may be in distress," an SPLA
communiqué said.39
Even after the battle for Juba subsided in mid-July, the SPLA-Torit
continued to shell the airport and the town. As of August 5, there had been no U.N.
relief airlifts into Juba since July 1840 inpart because of the SPLA-Torit shelling of
the airport. Relief agencies estimated that available food stocks would last only
through August 7.41
On August 11, the consortium of nongovernmental organizations
supporting CART (Combined Agencies Relief Team)42 asserted:

39
"Renewed Assault on Juba," Sudan Update, vol. 3, no. 21 (London: July 13, 1992),
p.1, quoting SPLM/A bulletin issued in London on July 7, 1992.

40
OLS (Southern Sector), Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 22, July 21-August 5,
1992, p. 2.

41
Ibid.

42
CART was established by international and national NGOs based in Juba and as of
1986 shouldered the main responsibility for receiving and allocating a shared pool of
relief supplies for Juba.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 151

300,000 people trapped in the besieged town of Juba have run

out of food and face imminent starvation. The airlift bringing
food into the town has been suspended. Aid agencies now say if
the airlift is not resumed immediately people will die.43

43
Oxfam, Christian Aid, CAFOD, Norwegian Church Aid, Appeal of August 11,
1992, cited in "Starvation Imminent," Sudan Update, vol. 3, no. 24 (London: August 20,
1992), p.1.
152 Civilian Devastation

These public warnings were repeated by Amb. Darko Silovic of the U.N.
department of humanitarian affairs a few days later. "Today in Juba there is no food
left. If immediate assistance is not provided, large-scale deaths will certainly
follow."44
In the case of Juba in mid-1992, preventing any planes from landing was
the culmination of a long process of debilitation of the civilian population. It came
on top of a several-years-long siege of Juba by the SPLA-Torit, which for many
years had totally prevented land access (vehicles were subject to attacks and land
mines) and access through the White Nile (which passed through SPLA-Torit
territory to reach Juba). Airlifts became a very significant source of food to the
population of almost 300,000.
Food supplementation was necessary in part because the population of
Juba had doubled since the start of the war, swelled by the arrivals of the war-
displaced. Furthermore, the majority of the displaced newcomers consisted
probably of persons who did not support the SPLA and who had fled their homes as
a result of SPLA military advances and, in some cases, SPLA abuses.
The actions of the government also contributed to the dire straits on which
CART sounded the alarm. For military and political reasons, the government had
forcibly displaced whole neighborhoods and suburbs of Juba in the aftermath of the
SPLA-Torit July attack, driving the civilians into the crowded and unhygienic
center of the town and burning their homes and crops. Many of those so affected
were displaced persons from outside Juba. (See Chapter III.)
The shelling of the airport must be judged in the circumstances in which it
occurred, that is, of extraordinary pressure on the food supply and the precarious
survival of the civilian population. Under these particular circumstances, which
were known to the SPLA-Torit since they were a matter of public protest by relief
agencies, shelling attacks upon the airport which led to its closure would have the
foreseeable effect of causing excessive civilian casualties.

44
Julian Ozanne, "UN relief attacked by south Sudan rebels," The Financial Times
(London), August 18, 1992.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 153

After Amb. Darko Silovic of the U.N. department of humanitarian affairs

told reporters on August 17 that a resumed U.N. airlift would begin to move 1,075
tons of food, medicine, and shelter materials to the city, the initiative was attacked
by the SPLA as "provocative."45

45
Julian Ozanne, "U.N. relief attacked by south Sudan rebels," The Financial Times
(London), August 18, 1992.
154 Civilian Devastation

U.N. flights carrying food relief resumed on August 20 after a four-week

suspension. Twice-daily trips were scheduled.46 The WFP airlift to Juba was
interrupted on August 23 when a shell fell less than 100 metres from a U.N. airplane
unloading relief supplies in Juba. It resumed two days later, although without
clearance from the SPLA-Torit.47
In late August 1992 the Southern Sudan Peace Forum called for the
creation of "safe havens" for civilians. It summed up the dilemma for Juban
civilians: the army herded people into crowded open spaces where they became
sitting ducks for the SPLA. "In the first place, Garang and his SPLA men chased
most of the villagers into Juba through their policy of 'live out of your gun.' Thus
their advice for the civilians to get out has always been seen as a mockery by the
defenseless inhabitants and displaced people."48 The SPLA knew the perimeter was

46
"U.N. Begins Sudan Airlift Despite Rebel Threats," Reuter, Nairobi, Kenya,
August 20, 1992.

47
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 24, August 23 -
September 4, 1992, p. 1.

48
Letter, The Southern Sudan Peace Forum to U.N. Secretary-General (Nairobi,
Kenya: Peace Forum, August 20, 1992), p. 2. "Live out of your gun" in this context
means using the gun to extort a living. As with many tactics during this long war, this
one has been more true during certain years and in certain regions than in others. Thus,
"living out of your gun" was very much the policy in Eastern Equatoria in 1984-88, and
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 155

heavily mined and guarded by armed fanatics who shot on sight. "Yet," as the letter
read, "the helpless people are being treated as if it is within their choice to leave or
stay in such a precarious situation."49 The group advocated that the parties agree to
a cease-fire, that Juba be designated a safe haven, and that U.N. security forces
deliver food and other necessities to Juba to "ensure their fair distribution. It is an
open secret that both combatants have earlier confiscated food meant for the
displaced and defenseless civilians."50

since 1992.

49
Ibid.

50
Ibid., p. 4.
156 Civilian Devastation

CART also called on the parties to establish safe corridors out of Juba so
that civilians could evacuate to a non-war zone of their choice.51
The SPLA-Torit also called on the Sudan regime to allow the evacuation
of the city, with questionable bona fides since its military and political strategy
often called for civilians to abandon the garrison towns.
The relief flights to Juba continued with interruptions and always under
threat. In mid September 1992, The New York Times reported that the situation
remained precarious:

The relief planes stay on the ground just long enough to unload,
but often come under shelling on the airstrip and are forced to
take off before doing so. Emergency food flights to Juba resumed
on Monday after a weeklong suspension to repair the runway,
which was damaged by rebel artillery . . . . 52

51
"Starvation Imminent," Sudan Update, vol. 3, no. 24 (London, August 20, 1992), p.
1.

52
Jane Perlez, "A Hidden Disaster Looms in Sudan, Aid Officials Say," The New
York Times, September 16, 1992.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 157

While this report's analysis of the legality of the SPLA-Torit shelling of the
airport is limited to the July-August 1992 period, it is worth mentioning that even
after the flights recommenced in September, the situation remained precarious. In
the fall of 1992, U.N. Under Secretary for Humanitarian Affairs Amb. Jan Eliasson
visited Juba and reported 70 percent malnutrition among children located around
Juba Hospital.53 At the beginning of October 1992, U.S.AID reported that the
240,000 to 300,000 civilians54 trapped in Juba faced starvation unless safe corridors
for their evacuation were opened and a regular food pipeline was immediately
established. UNIMIX (enriched biscuits) stocks were completely exhausted, and
people were forced prematurely to harvest sorghum crops to survive. Because those
remaining in Juba were forced to live on one-quarter of the land area of the town to
escape the fighting, the "concentration of people in such a small area has caused the
virtual collapse of sanitation systems in Juba."55
The SPLA-Torit offered various defenses for its acts. After the BBC and
Voice of America reported in August that the SPLA-Torit had fired two missiles
(which missed) at U.N. relief aircraft over Juba, SPLA Radio announced that "the
U.N. Operation Lifeline Sudan officials who said that their aircraft came under fire
at Juba airport should be made to understand that they had no agreement with the
SPLA."56 The SPLA-Torit said that it was not aiming at aircraft used for supplying
relief, but warned that there was combat going on in Juba. It said that the U.N.
aircraft "landed at a time when the government troops were attacking the SPLA in
their positions. . . . It is the U.N. which insists on coming to a place of fierce
fighting like this. Well, it is up to them."57 It said that

53
Burr, Genocide, p. 54.

54
As always, these numbers are open to question, especially since the government
prevents accurate counts. The government claimed there were 500,000 in Juba in mid-
1991; the U.N. accepted half that number. There have been no reliable reports of large
influxes of civilians into Juba since then, and there are reports of people managing to
leave.

55
USAID/OFDA Situation Report No. 55 (Sudan) (Washington, D.C.: U.S. AID,
October 7, 1992), p. 6.

56
SPLA Radio in Foreign Broadcast Information Service (hereafter FBIS), August 26,
1992.

57
Ibid.
158 Civilian Devastation

there was no way anyone could stop one, two, or even 50 shells
or missiles from falling near aircraft of the U.N.'s Operation
Lifeline Sudan or an aircraft standing at Juba airport . . . . The
relief aircraft of Operation Lifeline which landed in Juba still
land at their own risk because fighting is still going on up to this
moment.58

58
Ibid.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 159

The SPLA commander in charge of operations on the Juba front, Oiei

Deng Ajak, admitted that for military reasons he was trying to close the airport by
long-distance shelling from ten kilometers away. He also said his forces were under
strict instructions from Garang not to shoot down any relief planes. He threatened
that at a later time he might try to shoot down any planes entering Juba because the
government was using civilian aircraft to supply its troops with guns.59 The SPLA-
Torit's suspicion of "relief" flights used by the government for military purposes60
perhaps made the SPLA-Torit less than careful of their targeting. The SPLA has
shot down civilian aircraft, most spectaularly one taking off from Malakal in Upper
Nile in 1986, killing sixty.61
The SPLA-Torit was also resentful of what it perceived as the U.N.'s lack
of even-handedness in delivery of relief supplies. The Sudan government on many
occasions had refused permission for U.N. relief efforts in SPLA-Torit areas, and
the U.N. had acquiesced in this, while continuing to provide relief to government-
held areas. The SPLA-Torit interruption of OLS relief supplies going into Juba and
other towns under siege may have been part of a strategy to pressure the U.N. for
equal treatment.

59
Carstensen, "Southern Sudan - Report on a Forgotten Crisis," p. 3.

60
SPLA-Torit's suspicion of U.N. aircraft was heightened by the incident of a month
before when the government used aircraft with U.N. insignia to deliver arms to Juba.

61
Africa Watch, Denying the Honor of Living, p. 116.
160 Civilian Devastation

These justifications must be examined in light of the prohibition on

indiscriminate attacks and the rule of proportionality. Ordinarily, an airport used to
bring in military supplies is a legitimate military target.62 The SPLA-Torit admitted
that it was trying to close the airport by shelling. Shelling might deter aircraft from
landing and also damage the runway.
An attack, even on a legitimate military target, may be prohibited as
indiscriminate under certain circumstances. That is when the attack "may be
expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to
civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to
the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated."63 This is the principle of
proportionality.
In this case, the Juba airport may not be attacked when there would be
excessive damage to civilian objects in relation to the anticipated "concrete and
direct" military advantage. In the case of Juba in late July and early August 1992,
the airport served as the only way in which the relief food on which hundreds of
thousands of people were dependent could be delivered. Putting the airport out of
commission had a definitely adverse effect on the survival of the civilian
population. The real possibility of imminent starvation because of a cutoff of relief
supplies, which would be the direct result of an attack on the only access route to
Juba, constitutes excessive damage.

62
Military objectives are limited to those objects which by their nature, location,
purpose or use make an effective contribution to military action, and whose total or
partial destruction, capture or neutralization, in the circumstances ruling at the time,
offers a definite military advantage. Protocol I, article 52 (2).

63
Protocol I, article 51 (5) (b). This codifies the principle of proportionality. See
Appendix A.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 161

As to what military advantage might outweigh this suffering, it must be

concrete and direct. "Direct" means "'without intervening condition of agency.' . . .
A remote advantage to be gained at some unknown time in the future would not be a
proper consideration to weigh against civilian losses."64 Creating conditions
"conducive to surrender by means of attacks which incidentally harm the civilian
population"65 is too remote and insufficiently military to qualify as a "concrete and
direct" military advantage. "A military advantage can only consist in ground gained
and in annilihation or weakening the enemy armed forces."66
If there is no ongoing combat in Juba, the SPLA-Torit's "concrete and
direct military advantage" in the destruction or neutralization of the airport and all
planes landing there is not readily apparent.
The SPLA-Torit would have liked to prevent the Juba garrison from
resupplying and bringing in troops by air. Those troops might possibly launch an
attack on SPLA-Torit positions, which were on the frontline in Kit many kilometers
south of the airstrip. With supplies, the garrison could continue to resist the siege.
While this would make the airport a legitimate military target, it does not seem
sufficiently "concrete and direct." The possibility that the government would launch
an attack from Juba during this period of the rainy season and right after a
debilitating SPLA-Torit attack on Juba was not remote and not concrete.

64
M. Bothe, K. Partsch, & W. Solf, New Rules for Victims of Armed Conflicts:
Commentary on the Two 1977 Protocols Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 1949
(The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1982), p. 365.

65
International Committee of the Red Cross, Commentary on the Additional Protocols
of 1977 (Geneva: Martinus Nijhoff, 1987), p. 685.

66
ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p. 685.
162 Civilian Devastation

The situation at the time of these attacks on the airport had reverted to the
siege which had been in effect for years. While a successful siege would weaken the
enemy armed forces, it would also starve civilians. The possibility that the Juba
garrison would fall by siege in August 1992 was insufficiently "direct," defined as
"without intervening condition of agency,"67 to justify the excessive cost, in injury
and death, to hundreds of thousands of displaced civilians.
If the motivation for the attack was not a strictly military one, but was a
mixed political/military motive, such as to impede food deliveries to Juba in order
to pressure the U.N. to operate in a more even-handed manner, such an attack would
be additionally prohibited. Attacks on relief food for civilians are attacks on civilian
objects, not on military objects, and are strictly forbidden.
Finally, the SPLA-Torit's duty to avoid attacks which excessively injure
the civilian population is not discharged by its endorsement of evacuation of the
town. Such an opportunity for the civilian population never occurred, in part
because the government did not agree and in part because the town was ringed by
government and SPLA mines. Nor would evacuation of such a large and weakened
population to another destination on foot during the rainy season be practical. The
SPLA-Torit's obligations must be judged according to the actual circumstances of
the attack, not the hypothetical circumstances that the SPLA-Torit would prefer.
Juba had a desperately needy and trapped population of several hundred thousand at
the time of the attacks on its only line of relief supply, the airport.
Therefore, under the specific circumstances of late July and August 1992,
the military advantage anticipated from the attacks on the airport does not appear to
be sufficiently "concrete and direct" to justify the foreseeable excessive injury to
civilians. This shelling of the Juba airport violates the rules of war.

Siege of Garrison Towns by the SPLA-Torit and the Prohibition on Starvation

of Civilians as a Method of Combat
The SPLA-Torit on some occasions has attempted to starve civilians as a
method of combat, in violation of the rules of war. The attacks on the Juba airport
described above may qualify as using starvation of the civilian population as a
method of combat.

67
See Appendix A.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 163

Customary international law is clear in prohibiting the intentional

starvation of civilians as a method of combat. Protocol II, article 14,68 is declarative
of this customary law. It places legal limits on the military tactic of targeting the
civilian population by causing it hunger. This prohibition is a rule from which no
derogation may be made. No exception was made for imperative military necessity,
for instance.
What is crucial is the intention of using starvation as a method or weapon
to attack the civilian population.
Starvation of combatants, however, remains a permitted method of combat,
as in siege warfare or blockades. A siege "consists of encircling an enemy location,
cutting off those inside from any communication in order to bring about their
surrender."69 This is theoretically aimed at preventing military matériel from
reaching the combatants.
Except for the case where food supplies are specifically intended as
provisions for combatants, however, it is prohibited to destroy or attack objects
indispensable for civilian survival, even if the adversary may benefit from them.70
Therefore, even if the army might be diverting civilian relief food, commercializing
it or illegally benefiting from it, which has happened in southern Sudan and which is
also a violation of the rules of war, relief destined for civilians may not be blocked,
confiscated, prevented or destroyed.
Furthermore, under the duty to distinguish civilians from combatants,
besieging forces may not close their eyes to the effect upon civilians of a food
blockade or siege. It is well recognized that, "in case of shortages occasioned by

68
Protocol II, Article 14 -- Protection of objects indispensable to the survival of the
civilian population

Starvation of civilians as a method of combat is prohibited. It is

prohibited to attack, destroy, remove or render useless, for that
purpose, objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian
population, such as foodstuffs, agricultural areas for the production
of foodstuffs, crops, livestock, drinking water installations and
supplies and irrigation works.

69
ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p. 1457.

70
See Appendix A.
164 Civilian Devastation

armed conflict, the highest priority of available sustenance materials is assigned to

combatants".71
Sieges are a form of starvation by omission. Commentary by the
International Committee for the Red Cross notes that:

71
Bothe, New Rules for Victims of Armed Conflicts, p. 680.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 165

Starvation can also result from an omission. To deliberately

decide not to take measures to supply the population with objects
indispensable for its survival in a way would become a method of
combat by default, and would be prohibited under this rule.72

The SPLA's intention to starve civilians as a method of combat has been

discussed elsewhere. In the period between 1984 and 1988, "The SPLA policy on
food relief . . . was straightforward. They were determined to prevent food relief
from reaching government-held towns, in order to starve the population and force
them to surrender or leave."73 The SPLA surrounded Juba and started to attack the

72
ICRC, Commentary on the 1977 Protocols, p. 1458.

73
Africa Watch, Denying the Honor of Living, p. 115. Among the cited actions the
SPLA took was refusing permission for a convoy of 60 relief trucks for Juba from
Kenya (February 1986); shooting at a UNICEF plane in Wau (March 1986); attacking a
food convoy near Nimule, killing nine drivers (June 1986); rejecting the appeal of 10
relief agencies for a food truce to allow relief to reach Juba (June 1986); forcing closure
of Juba airport from July to December 1986 by attacks; shooting down a civilian
airplane taking off from Malakal, killing 60 (August 1986; as a result, no more airlifts to
Wau until December 1988); stating that it will continue to shoot down civilian aircraft
166 Civilian Devastation

city's airport by mortars and artillery by the end of 1985.74 The SPLA attacked the
various Equatorian tribal militias that were armed by the government such as the
Mundari militia in Terekeka and Jemeiza and also retaliated against the civilian
Mundari population,75 in September 1985 driving some 60,000 Mundari out of
Terekeka to the safety of Juba.76 The Mundari militia the next year attacked Dinkas
inside Juba, killing scores of civilians.77

(August 1986); threats to shoot down a UN airplane (September 1986). Ibid., p. 116.

74
Burr, Genocide, p. 17.

75
De Waal, "Starving out the South," p. 161.

76
Johnson and Prunier, "Foundation and Expansion," p. 130.

77
Burr, Genocide, p. 21.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 167

The SPLA ringed Juba with land mines. During 1987-88, road convoys to
Juba were at best intermittent; the SPLA mined the roads and ambushed anything
that moved on them.78 The SPLA also patrolled the outskirts of Juba and captured
those who managed to escape the army's clutches, frequently forcibly inducting the
young men among them into the SPLA-Torit army.79
The displaced population in Juba grew in the early months of 1989 alone
by over 50,000 people, because of SPLA destruction and looting of villages in the
area.80 The population of Juba came to be totally dependent on airlifts for most food
supplies due to insecurity of overland routes. Until recently, no agreement could be
achieved with the parties to the conflict to respect relief convoys moving overland
or by river.
One authority notes that from 1986:

until the start of Operation Lifeline [mid-1989], the siege of Juba

by the SPLA contributed to famine conditions, particularly

78
Africa Watch, Denying the Honor of Living, p. 117. In September 1988 an attack
killed 23 drivers and their assistants and cut off Juba from overland access for three
months. Ibid.

79
The SPLA has also helped civilians escape from Juba. For instance, in 1990 those
who left Juba crossing the White Nile to the east bank said that they did so with SPLA
assistance. The SPLA-Torit has not been consistent in this.

80
de Waal, "Starving out the South," p. 167.
168 Civilian Devastation

among the up-to-180,000 displaced people in the town. The

severity of these conditions increased and decreased with the
tightness of the siege and the numbers of displaced people.
Perhaps the worst period occurred between June and December
1988, during which time only one overland convoy reached the
town, and the airport was open only intermittently.81

The SPLA was not the only party responsible. The actions of profiteering merchants
and government military officers allied with them also influenced the severity of the
situation.82

81
De Waal, "Starving out the South," p. 160.

82
Ibid., p. 166.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 169

The senior medical officer at the government hospital in Juba claimed in

March 1989 that up to two-thirds of Juba's displaced suffered from malnutrition.
Even prisoners in Juba jail had died of hunger, and others were dying of disease
brought on or complicated by lack of food.83 In February 1989 ten children were
reported to die every day in Juba's two hospitals from famine and disease, and
undoubtedly more died at home, too weak to get to the hospitals. This lasted the rest
of the year.84
In November 1988, in a change of policy, the SPLA called on civilians to
leave Juba.85 The SPLA siege was maintained for all but airlifts, the SPLA
permitting ICRC airlifts to reach Juba in December 1988. In March 1989 the SPLA
also agreed to Operation Lifeline Sudan, the U.N. relief program, whereby relief
food was to reach SPLA-controlled areas as well as government garrison towns.
In January 1990, however, the SPLA threatened to shoot down any planes
flying to Juba,86 but relented after pressure the next month.87 At the same time, the
government cut off relief flights from November 1989 to February 1990.88

83
Burr, Genocide, p. 39-40.

84
Ibid., p. 40.

85
Africa Watch, Denying the Honor of Living, p. 77.

86
In January 1990 the SPLA attacked the airport and headquarters of the army's
Southern Command, killing nearly a score of civilians.
170 Civilian Devastation

In 1990, relief agencies operating in Juba registered nearly 190,000 people

inside the city in need of food aid; most subsisted on half rations. "Starving people
attempting to leave to forage for food in the countryside [were] turned back by the
army."89

87
Africa Watch, Denying the Honor of Living, p. 118.

88
Burr, Genocide, p. 47.

89
CART, "CART Budget for the Period 1st March 1989 to 28th February 1990,"
Juba, Sudan, February 1990, quoted in Burr, Genocide, p. 47, n. 199.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 171

After the SPLA-Torit lost its two battles for Juba in June and July 1992, it
continued the siege, including shelling the airport which had served as the only
place through which relief supplies could arrive. The shelling abated after an
international outcry on behalf of the starving civilians of Juba, and by early 1993, a
WFP relief airlift from Entebbe to Juba was reaching 236,000 beneficiaries.90
Since Juba is the largest city in the south and several NGO and U.N. relief
agencies have persisted over the years in trying to assist the vast displaced
population in Juba, there is perhaps more information and institutional memory in
Juba on the roles of all parties in contributing to the extreme hardship suffered by
civilians than elsewhere in Sudan. In other government garrison towns under siege,
the history is less accessible, especially since the government is hostile to relief
efforts not under its control and to human rights organizations that might otherwise
document abuses through visits to those towns.91
For instance, Torit was under siege by the SPLA from 1986 until it fell in
1989. During the SPLA siege of Torit, the Catholic Church among others had
actively advocated the cause of the civilians, and insisted that food be brought in for
their relief. The town suffered terribly during the siege; one person affiliated with
the Catholic Church told HRW/Africa that they buried 130 people in 1988 who died
from hunger while waiting for the relief convoy to arrive. When the convoy finally
arrived from Juba, it came with army escort. The SPLA opposed the convoy and
accused the government of bringing this convoy into Torit not for civilian use but to

90
USAID/OFDA Situation Report on Sudan, No. 2 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. AID,
February 13, 1993), p. 4. A nutritional survey of Juba concluded that the malnutrition
rate among children was 12.4 percent, an improvement over the 1992 rate. Ibid.

91
Time-consuming efforts to document (including from relief agency documents) the
dynamics of hunger and relief in several locations in south Sudan have paid off,
particularly in the writings of de Waal, including but not limited to his study "Starving
out the South."
172 Civilian Devastation

feed the garrison. According to the same Catholic Church source, the brigadier of
the local government army base refused to take any of that relief. Nor did this
brigadier contribute to the famine conditions, by preventing civilians from leaving
Torit, as did the army commander in charge of Juba. The Torit army commander
permitted Torit residents to come and go from the surrounding villages to look for
food. This helped save some people from starvation.
When Torit was taken by the SPLA in 1989, Bishop Paride Taban and
three priests of the Catholic Church's Diocese of Torit were arrested by the SPLA.
They were accused of prolonging Torit's resistance to the SPLA siege because they
ran a school and dispensary and provided food for the poor. They were accused of
feeding the army, which they denied.
The bishop and three priests spent three months in SPLA custody, along
with over 100 civilians who flooded into their compound as the SPLA was entering
Torit, fearing SPLA retaliation. All these captives were held in Kidepo, just across
the border from a large Ugandan national park and river. The priests could sit
outside the huts but they could not walk around the village, which was the location
for a school run for "unaccompanied minors" by an SPLA foundation,92 and for
SPLA prisoners, including 200 Sudan army soldiers and two officers captured
during the fall of Torit. The clergy were released after three months and the
civilians were released at about the same time.
The arrest of the clergy for assisting the civilian population of Torit
demonstrates the SPLA intention to deprive the civilian population of necessary
relief supplies and to punish even those who acted out of humanitarian impulses to
relieve the suffering of southerners.93 The SPLA intended in Torit to use civilian
starvation as a method of combat which, combined with other siege tactics, would
achieve the military goal of capturing Torit. It is impermissible to so target civilians.

These actions of the SPLA-Torit in Torit and in Juba demonstrate an

intention to use starvation of civilians as a method of combat, in violation of the

92
See below in this Chapter.

93
While relations between the SPLA and the Catholic Church have gone through
various phases, sometimes bad and more frequently good, those individuals who were
arrested by the SPLA were and are regarded with much greater hostility and suspicion
by the Khartoum government, which believes that they are effectively SPLA members.
Both the government and the SPLA have difficulty with the activities of an institution
which is not under their control.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 173

rules of war. It is simply not permissible to target civilians and make them bear the
brunt of the war.

Abuses Committed during William Nyuon's Defection from SPLA-Torit and

Associated Fighting in Equatoria in late 1992
In fighting between the SPLA-Torit and another breakaway faction in
Equatoria in late 1992, a number of serious abuses were committed for which there
has been no accounting. In particular the killing of three expatriate relief workers
and a Norwegian journalist during the Nyuon defection remains unexplained by
either the SPLA-Torit or the breakaway Commander William Nyuon Bany faction;
neither has taken serious steps to investigate the events. Nor has the U.N. made its
investigation public. The killers remain at large, enjoying impunity.
There is more information about the killing of these three expatriate relief
workers and one journalist than about most killings in Sudan, although the
information remains incomplete. Attention paid to foreign deaths does not in any
way discount the seriousness of abuses against Sudanese that have escaped scrutiny.
Killings of journalists, however, make the press less likely to cover the war and the
humanitarian emergency in Sudan. Killings of relief workers may affect the
willingness and ability of U.N. and relief organizations to help Sudanese victims of
the war. In these circumstances, it is even more disturbing that an official U.N.
judgment of responsibility in the case has never been arrived at or made public by
the U.N. No excuse has been offered for the U.N.'s continuing official muteness on
this highly unusual and well-publicized event.

The Killing of Three Expatriate Workers and a Journalist

William Nyuon and troops sympathetic to him defected from SPLA-Torit
to join the Nasir faction on September 27, 1992, a Saturday. They departed from the
SPLA-Torit headquarters in Pageri, heading northeast on the road to Magwe.
At about 5 P.M., the first or advance truck of defecting soldiers, carrying
between eighty-five and a hundred men, was ambushed at the junction to Ame,
north of Opari. Some of the defecting soldiers in that truck said they noticed a small
white car passing their truck on the left or west side, heading south, at the time the
ambush commenced from both sides of the road. The white car was "within the
174 Civilian Devastation

ambush zone."94 The truck and the white car were hit by the ambush, and both came
to a stop in the intersection, about five to seven meters apart.

94
Statement from Sgt. James Kueth Jam, taken in Nasir, June 9, 1993, taken by Jarl
Honoré, "Interviews with William Nyuon and Some of His Men about the Killings at
Ame Junction 27.9.92," Nairobi, Kenya, June 30, 1993, p. 7.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 175

Inside the white car were four expatriates: Myint Maung, resident project
officer for UNICEF (Burmese), Francis Ngure, UNICEF driver (Kenyan), Vilma
Gomez, working with the NGO InterAid (Philippina), and Tron Helge Hummelvoll,
a freelance journalist (Norwegian).95 The three relief workers were last seen alive
by their colleagues on the morning of September 27, Saturday, when they left the
OLS camp at Loa to visit Palataka, where bombings had been reported the day
before.96 The Norwegian journalist had a few days earlier left Torit and was likely
picked up at the Magwe junction by the three relief workers as they were returning
to Loa on Saturday night. He had earlier attempted to radio the Norwegian People's
Aid, which has an office in the area, for a truck to pick him up, but apparently his
message was not received until after his death.
A separate party of William Nyuon's followers who were in Opari heard
the shooting and came to the junction and saw the truck and car, but they left
without looking inside the car.97
A clearing-squad party sent to the ambush area later by Nyuon's troops
between 11 P.M. and midnight found the two vehicles, and inside the white car
found a man, a "foreigner," alive in the front seat, hanging over the steering wheel,
sobbing or sneezing. In the rear seat were two people. (The witness did not mention
a fourth passenger, although the woman passenger Gomez was alive at the time.)
Dr. Hoguor with the clearing-squad party examined the two in the back seat and
pronounced them dead. The party quickly moved on.98
Autopsies showed that Maung and Hummelvoll each died of multiple
gunshot wounds, probably on September 27, the date of the ambush.99 It may be
that the deaths of the two were unavoidable. They may have been the victims of
crossfire; if civilians are in an area of military combat, they assume the risk of injury

95
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 26, September 23 -
October 6, 1992, p. 2.

96
Ibid.

97
Statement from Grant, Honoré, "Interviews with William Nyuon," p. 8.

98
Statement from Capt. Michael Kuol, Honoré, "Interviews with William Nyuon," p.
10. Dr. Hoguor was not available for interview because he was apprehended by SPLA-
Torit in October 1992 and executed, according to Capt. Michael Kud. Ibid.

99
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 26, September 23 to
October 6, 1992, p. 2.
176 Civilian Devastation

or death. The ambush was a surprise, as all ambushes are intended to be. Its
principal target was a truckful of enemy soldiers, which is a legitimate military
target. It would have been the better course of action, for the attackers to have held
their fire once they caught sight of a white non-military car in the ambush range, to
verify that the car was a legitimate military target and to take reasonable precautions
to avoid civilian casualties.
It is not entirely certain, however, that the two were killed in the ambush.
As allegedly reported in a UNICEF internal document, an autopsy indicated that
they were shot in the back, as if running away.100
The white car was found blocking the road and "riddled with bullets,"
according to those who came on the scene later that night.101 Others who saw the car
later, however, doubted from the condition of the car that anyone had been killed
while inside it. There was a lack of blood inside the car, and the angles of the
bullets that sprayed the car suggested that the car was shot up without anyone inside
it, perhaps in an attempt to create the impression that those inside were killed in
crossfire.
On Monday, September 29, the forces of SPLA-Torit delivered the bodies
of Maung and Hummelvoll to Nimule to be picked up by the U.N. A staff member

100
Reuter saw the early UNICEF report to U.N. headquarters which concluded that
two were shot in the back, probably while trying to escape. Andrew Hill, "U.N.
Document accuses SPLA of 'Callous' Killings," Reuter, Nairobi, Kenya, October 4,
1992. The BBC was said to have reported, "Post-mortem examinations carried out in
Nairobi show that Maung and Hummelvoll were hit several times from the back. One
had sixteen wounds, the other six, and the angle of the bullets suggests that they were
running away from their captors." BBC Focus on Africa, October 1992, cited in "Vital
Questions Unanswered," Sudan Update, vol. 4, no. 3 (London: October 19, 1992), p.1.

101
Statement from Grant, Honoré, "Interviews with William Nyuon, p.8.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 177

of the Aswa Hospital told HRW/Africa that he washed the already dead bodies in
the Aswa Hospital on Saturday night, the night of the ambush.
The two foreigners surviving the ambush were missing for several days.
Their bodies were delivered to the U.N. on Wednesday, October 1, by the SPLA-
Torit forces.102 The two, Mr. Ngure and Ms. Gomez, each died of a single gunshot
wound to the head, probably on Tuesday, September 30.103 The same medical
worker who washed the first two bodies at the Aswa Hospital told HRW/Africa that
the dead bodies of the two "missing" foreigners were brought to the hospital on
Monday evening, which would be September 29, where they were washed.104 He
observed a fresh dressing on a wound on the woman's arm. He believed that she had
been treated in the Ame clinic. The wound on the woman's arm was older than the
wound on her head.
Those who saw the bodies on the day of their delivery to the U.N., and
who knew the victims, said that both the Kenyan driver and the Philippina relief
worker had their heads freshly shaved. They both were shot in the head, execution
style. They too observed that the woman had an arm wound that had been freshly
bandaged.
The conclusion compelled by these facts is that the two were captured and
later executed.105 This makes their deaths a violation of the most elementary rules of
war prohibiting summary execution of captured persons.
Apparently the SPLA-Torit had second thoughts about turning over the
bodies, because they reportedly tried at the last minute to retrieve them, telling the
U.N. workers who came to pick them up that they were "not the right bodies." Since

102
A statement put out by Elijah Malok of SPLA-Torit shortly after the incident
claimed that these bodies were found on a bush road forty-three miles north of the
Ugandan border, next to their vehicle. Didrikke Schanche, "Two More Relief Workers
Killed in Southern Sudan," Associated Press, Nairobi, Kenya, October 1, 1992.

103
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 26, September 23 -
October 6, 1992, p. 2.

104
The autopsy date of death, September 30, is inconsistent with this report of seeing
the dead bodies. The autopsy date is an estimate.

105
The BBC reported, "The examinations carried out on Wilma Gomez and Francis
Ngure show that they died later - possibly three days later. Gomez had been shot in the
neck, and Ngure in the temple, as if cold-bloodedly killed." BBC Focus on Africa, cited
in "Vital Questions Unanswered," Sudan Update, p.1.
178 Civilian Devastation

the dead had already been recognized, the bodies were not turned back over to the
SPLA-Torit.
A UNICEF report to the U.N. headquarters allegedly claimed that
autopsies of the three aid workers and the journalist refuted the rebel claims they
died in crossfire, and concluded that the SPLA tried to mislead the U.N. about the
deaths.106 "'Throughout this sad episode, the SPLA response can be best
summarized as callous, obstructive and deliberately committed to misinforming
us,'" Reuter quoted the UNICEF report.107

106
Several journalists obtained a copy of the report. The U.N. refused to release it
publicly. Andrew Hill, "U.N. Document Accuses SPLA of 'Callous' Killings," Reuter,
Nairobi, Kenya, October 4, 1992. Didrikke Schanche, "U.N. Urges Investigation Into
Killings of Aid Workers, Journalist," Associated Press, Nairobi, Kenya, October 8,
1992.

107
Ibid.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 179

Each SPLA faction blamed the other. John Garang said the victims were
abducted by the breakaway William Nyuon faction, to cover its tracks. He said that
the victims' bodies were found by SPLA-Torit troops.108 Another SPLA-Torit
spokesman, Elijah Malok, said that Nyuon killed Maung and Hummelvoll when
they refused to hand over the vehicle, and took Gomez and Ngure with him as he
fled the Garang-held region, killing them when the car ran out of gas.109
At first, the SPLA-Nasir claimed that the victims had been killed by a
Garang ambush.110 An SPLA-Nasir source later claimed that SPLA-Torit
Commander Obote Mamur, a Lotuko, captured the U.N. personnel and killed them
on higher orders. During a military confrontation between the troops of Commander
William and those of SPLA-Torit in Magwe a few weeks later, Commander
William Nyuon's troops claimed to have captured a briefcase belonging to SPLA-
Torit Commander Salva Kiir. In the briefcase, they allege, was a radio message
regarding the two foreigners who had been captured after the ambush, indicating
they were killed as a result of higher orders in the SPLA-Torit. HRW/Africa
requested a copy of the alleged radio message from SPLA-Nasir but never received
it; nor has it been produced to the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Sudan as requested.
In December, 1992, Garang reportedly conceded that his own forces
"might" have been responsible.111 It appears that the two were executed while in

108
Andrew Hill, "U.N. Document Accuses SPLA of 'Callous' Killings."

109
Didrikke Schanche, "Two More Relief Workers Killed in Southern Sudan." Many
saw the car at the ambush site, however.

110
Ibid.

111
Scott Peterson, Daily Telegraph (London), December 3, 1992, quoted in "Garang
Concession on U.N. Killings," Sudan Update, vol. 4, no. 6 (London: December 12, 1992),
180 Civilian Devastation

custody, probably while in SPLA-Torit custody, although the alternative, that they
were killed by the forces of Commander William Nyuon, has not been entirely
discarded because no satisfactory public investigation has been concluded.
An immediate result of the killings was the OLS suspension of all its
programs in this southern Torit area pending the outcome of U.N. and SPLA-Torit
investigations. The U.N. commenced negotiations with the SPLA-Torit for new
ground rules that would assure the safety of their workers, which took some time to
work out.

p. 2.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 181

In the meantime, the deaths and suspension of OLS activities in the area
had an extremely detrimental effect on the displaced civilians. Ms. Gomez had been
responsible for a feeding program, which came to a stop with her death. While
Norwegian People's Aid did not pull out of the area and a few NGOs and foreigners
soon returned with or without safety understandings with the SPLA-Torit forces
who controlled the area, their numbers were not adequate to the situation.112
There were approximately 100,000 displaced persons in the "Triple A"
camps of Ame, Aswa, and Atepi, which were accessible by SPLA-Torit-controlled
road from Uganda. In November 1992, Catholic Relief Services decided to begin to
bring in relief food by this route.113 Unfortunately for the displaced, however, the
food was not sufficient, and malnutrition worsened. In March 1993, a survey by the
U.S. Centers for Disease Control conducted in Ame indicated severe child
malnutrition and substantial excess mortality, even for the Horn of Africa; one half

112
International aid agencies operating in south Sudan are not required to belong to
OLS, and some, such as Norwegian People's Aid and Lutheran World Federation, have
chosen to remain outside the OLS umbrella. Agencies belonging to OLS are required to
adhere to its safety and other guidelines.

113
OFDA Quarterly Report (Sudan), Nov. 1992-March 1993 (Washington, D.C.: U.S.
AID, March 1993), p. 1.
182 Civilian Devastation

of child deaths in the forty days preceding the study were attributed to starvation.114
The OLS returned to work in the area on April 22, 1993, after an agreement with
SPLA-Torit regarding respect for relief personnel.115

Other Abuses in Equatoria during the Fighting between SPLA-Torit

and William Nyuon's Faction
SPLA-Torit forces targeted villages or centers which Commander Nyuon's
forces either passed through or took refuge in, in late 1992, including Lopit, Lafon,
and Magwe, and areas around Palataka and Ikotos, and burned some villages, killed
civilians, and abused some women to punish those civilians believed to have sided
with Commander William Nyuon, in violation of the rules of war. As a long-time
resident of south Sudan commented, "When people are perceived to support the
other side in the conflict, Garang feels they must be punished. This is why villages
are burned."
For instance, two Acholi men from Magwe, which was under Garang's
control in 1992, said that when William Nyuon defected, his forces passed through
Magwe from Pageri, fighting SPLA-Torit forces along the way but not attacking
any civilians. Three days after William Nyuon left, Garang's forces attacked the

114
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, "Nutrition and Mortality
Assessment-Southern Sudan, March 1993," Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, Vol.
24, No. 16 (Atlanta, Georgia: April 30, 1993), pp. 304-08. The Ame camp, settled first of
the three camps in early January, 1992, by people fleeing the Bor Massacre, should
have been in best condition because of the availability of farmland and good
infrastructure.

115
That agreement was breached on July 3, 1993, when thirty uniformed SPLA-Torit
troops broke into the OLS compound in Nimule at midnight, beat up the guard, and
searched the compound for "deserters," holding the terrified U.N. workers at gunpoint.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 183

civilian areas Nyuon passed through. The witnesses saw seven civilians executed by
the SPLA-Torit then: five young men had their throats cut in Meri, and a small girl
and small boy were shot. Several women were sexually abused, including one of the
witnesses' younger sisters. Clothes, food, and other items were taken from houses.
The houses in Magwe center were not burned because the SPLA forces took them
over, but livestock was taken. The goats, chicken, and sheep were taken from the
Acholi in the area, who normally do not have cattle, and grain was stolen. The many
granaries in Magwe were looted of sesame, sorghum, beans, and millet.
Garang's forces followed William Nyuon to an area nine kilometers away
from Magwe, burning houses and killing people. Before burning the houses, the
soldiers dismantled the roofs and used the wood for cooking. Garang's troops
brought many captives to Magwe center and held them there. The women were
released, but some of the men were killed, suspected of supporting William Nyuon.
Beginning in November, 1992, Garang's forces began looting items from the
Magwe market and attacking women going to the market.
William Nyuon returned to the area in November, 1992, attacking Magwe
center one morning and recapturing it. He held it for a week. According to the two
witnesses, he did not abuse the civilians. He then returned to the Torit area to fight
the Garang forces on the road to Ikotos. Garang re-occupied Magwe after three
days. To hide, civilians went to the bush or to Uganda. Garang's forces under
Commander Salva Kiir repeatedly thereafter attacked areas around Magwe in raids
reported to consist of looting, raping and killing.
Other reports indicate that in January 1993, at Ikotos, William Nyuon
forces defeated SPLA-Torit forces, who retaliated by looting the local Acholis of
the just-harvested grain and the property of the Catholic Church (Diocese of Torit)
in Palataka, including a tractor and Landcruiser.
In pursuit of the William Nyuon forces, the SPLA-Torit then attacked from
Obbo village, six miles from Palataka, according to an Acholi resident who was
present. They burned grass around Obbo because people were hiding there. Then
they burned houses, took four sheep and two chickens, raped many women, cut
three people's throats, and shot one person. Some were captured and taken to
Palataka. The SPLA-Torit soldiers allegedly charged the families money to release
the captives from prison.
The attacks on Obbo continued through at least July 1993. The witness
commented that "a unit of soldiers comes almost every day looking to loot." In
February 1993, a Garang soldier beat the witness's brother's pregnant wife. She was
kicked in the stomach, and later died.

Ethnically-Based Fears of Persecution

184 Civilian Devastation

As was the case after the Nasir group broke away from the SPLA, the
William Nyuon split from the SPLA-Torit aggravated ethnic tensions and led to
some targeted killing of people on account of their ethnic origin. Most of the reports
received indicate that such attacks took place in SPLA-controlled territory in
Eastern Equatoria against Nuers.
In July, 1992, the SPLA-Torit captured some Nuer civilians and held them
until the Nuer staff of the Aswa Hospital (in SPLA-Torit territory of Eastern
Equatoria, near the Triple A displaced persons camps) intervened and the matter
was settled by a higher-up SPLA officer.
Separately but on the same night of William Nyuon's defection, some
1,500 Nuer civilians displaced from Upper Nile living in Atepi displaced persons
camp (one of the Triple A camps) abruptly departed. They feared retaliation for
Nyuon's defection; he is a Nuer and they had heard about Dinka retaliation against
the Nuer after Nuer commander Riek Machar defected the previous year. Many of
the Nuer in the Atepi group had suffered harassment and beatings on account of
being Nuer. Although there were still Nuer officers in the SPLA-Torit, no ranking
Nuer officers were believed to be in the area of the Triple A camps.
In Aswa, the house of the Nuer director of the Aswa Hospital, Dr. Timothy
Tutlam, was surrounded on or about November 18, 1992, by armed SPLA-Torit
soldiers. Dr. Tutlam, who had received threats from some SPLA-Torit Dinka
officers, managed to escape with his life to Uganda, with the help of some SPLA-
Nasir combatants he had treated in the Aswa Hospital. The group was detained by
Ugandan authorities and kept in isolation from December 2, 1992, to January 4,
1993, until they were delivered to the UNHCR as refugees, following negotiations
between the Ugandan government and the UNHCR.

VILLAGE BURNINGS IN EQUATORIA IN EARLY 1993

SPLA in Lafon
Lafon is a Pari settlement in eastern Equatoria consisting of seven villages
located around a hill in the middle of a fertile flat plain. The area provides a case
study of how the SPLA-Torit gained and then, because of human rights abuses, lost
support among Equatorians. The 1993 abuses include looting and burning down the
entire seven-village complex and killing and injuring an unknown number of
civilians.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 185

Lafon's population in late 1992 was estimated by the OLS at 75,000 plus
some 3,000 displaced.116 The cattle were kept on the hill at night to protect them
from Toposa raiders.117 The Lafon area is considered militarily strategic by both
factions of the SPLA because it is the last source of food for those going north and
northwest over the desert to Upper Nile and the contested area of Kongor. The
Lafon area is fertile and usually produces a good supply of food.
An army garrison was located from 1985-86 in the Lafon Catholic school,
vacamt since the expulsion of foreign missionaries by the government in 1964.
The SPLA first came to the area in 1985. The villagers responded to the
SPLA's message and provided what one called the first battalion of soldiers
recruited by the SPLA from Equatoria; many village sons went to Ethiopia for
military training at the SPLA bases there. Food in Lafon was shared with the SPLA
soldiers, as well. The local Paris who had been trained in Ethiopia returned a year
later as SPLA troops and attacked the government army garrison in Lafon in April
1986. The army abandoned Lafon and to date have not returned.118
In 1988, the SPLA set up a headquarters in Lafon. The headquarters of the
SPLA was transferred to Torit in 1989 after its capture and villagers were required
to porter SPLA supplies to Torit, a three-day walk. Villagers complained that they
then felt abandoned by the SPLA, despite their considerable contribution in men
and food to the capture of Torit. They believed that they were short-changed by the
SRRA, the SPLA's relief arm, in medical and other supplies, and they complained
that the top administrative and military positions in Torit were filled by Dinka, who
are not native to the area.
In Lafon, the Pari, who were traditionally armed with guns bought or
bartered from some of the many Ugandan refugees fleeing strife in that country,

116
The OLS reported that these included 500 to 1,000 Nuer who fled from Garang-
controlled areas. OLS, "Situation Assessment 1992/93," p. 30.

117
Ibid., p. 29.

118
See Johnson and Prunier, "Foundation and Expansion," pp. 133-34.
186 Civilian Devastation

were "very organized and confrontational" according to one observer. The area was
never allied with government forces and initially did not take sides when the Nasir
group attempted to oust Garang in August, 1991. Some Equatorian commanders,
including some Pari, joined the Nasir faction in late 1991.
In 1992, the first crop failed, and the area was badly in need of food relief.
Reports from Torit indicated that 18,000 displaced persons from Lafon and Lopit
reached Torit in search of grain in June 1992, before it fell to the government. Many
of these displaced moved to the Triple A camps.
In October, 1992, a month after Commander William Nyuon defected from
the SPLA-Torit, he and his decimated band arrived in Lafon. The local leaders119
refused to take sides among the SPLA factions, instead urging reconciliation.
William Nyuon stayed two weeks in Lafon. Meanwhile, several hundred troops of
the Nasir faction moved down from Upper Nile to bolster Nyuon's troops. Together
they moved south to engage the SPLA-Torit troops in the Ifoto area. After various
clashes, some of which they lost, the SPLA-Nasir and Nyuon troops withdrew again
in the direction of Lafon, with SPLA-Torit troops in pursuit.

Attack on Lopit Villages by SPLA-Torit in December 1992

The Garang troops reached Lafon's southern neighbor, Lopit, burning two
and looting five villages there on December 25, 1992, and killing three women and
four men.120
Shortly before the Christmas Day attack on the Lopit village of Ngaboli,
two SPLA-Torit officers approached the village and asked a chief to give them
goats for their forces. The chief gave them five goats, but the officers insisted they
needed all the goats. He refused. The two officers also asked for manpower to fight
Riek. The leader refused, saying that the village had no problem with Riek so they
did not want to fight him. The soldiers asked about William Nyuon. The chief

119
Authority among the Pari is exercised by the "Majomiji" or ruling age graders.

120
Ngaboli and Longiro (total population 2,000) were looted and every house burned,
and Hurumo, Khaba and Akhamiling (total population 3,000) were looted but not
burned, according to a chief.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 187

replied that he had seen some men passing in the distance but he did not know the
whereabouts of William Nyuon. That same morning the leader was told by two
village women that they had just been raped by the Garang soldiers, so he asked the
emissaries, "What is wrong with you men of Garang? Why are you raping women?"
The officers had sharp words with the chief and left.
Shortly thereafter, at about 8 A.M., the soldiers opened fire on the village
and the people scattered, according to several men of the village. The soldiers
looted all the property and food in five villages, removing it in five lorries, then set
fire to the houses in two villages. As a result, the villagers had to eat wild fruit from
the bush; four people died from hunger and sickness.
This SPLA-Torit force then moved north in the direction of Lafon, joining
another Garang force in the Lopit Mountains less than twenty miles from Lafon.121

Attack on Lafon in January 1993

From this mountain area, on January 4, 1993, SPLA-Torit shelled Lafon
with long-range artillery. Even those present do not agree whether William Nyuon
and his troops were still in Lafon at that time, but it is clear that they had been
staying there just prior to the attack, some sleeping under a tree near the unrepaired
Catholic compound.
The SPLA-Torit, under the command of Isaac Obutu Mamur and Pieng
Deng Kuol, and William-Nasir forces clashed between Lopit and Lafon, and the
SPLA-Torit prevailed. Commander William Nyuon was advised by the Pari
leadership to leave the area to avoid further harm to the civilians, and he withdrew
west in the direction of Lirya, a government-controlled town.

121
One version of the events of December 1992 in Lafon, told by some villagers, is
that Garang's forces came December 15, seeking the support of the area in the form of
recruits, which the leaders declined to give them. The troops demanded bulls and grain,
and took "twelve stables" of cattle, one stable being from 500 to 4,000 head of cattle.
Other accounts do not mention a Garang presence in Lafon in the two months before it
was shelled on January 4, 1993.
188 Civilian Devastation

The villagers meanwhile had fled the Garang attack to their fields, several
hours away. Local Pari task forces and officers, created by the SPLA years before to
protect Lafon, fled as civilians with their families to the bush. They put up no
resistance and did not take sides.
A chief told HRW/Africa that thirty-one villagers were killed during this
January 4, 1993, attack on the Wiatwe village, one of the seven Lafon villages
around the hill. People were still sleeping when the surprise attack was launched.
Two women neighbors in the same village said that after the attack their tukls were
looted of all their grain and personal items, including cooking utensils, then burned.
All of the livestock both families possessed was taken.
A fifty-year-old woman from another Lafon village said that two of her
sons, nine-year-old Otar and eighteen-year-old Okidi, were killed when gunshots
were fired during this January attack. After the rest of the family fled, the soldiers
looted thirty-nine cows, goats, and sheep from her family; burned the house; stole
the groundnuts, sesame, and cowpeas; and burned the granaries of the village.
"They took everything. Now we have to go to a feeding program to survive," she
said.
It is difficult to know how many civilians were killed during the shelling of
Lafon, but the local RASS,122 the relief wing of SPLA-Nasir, put the number at 114.
Some houses nearest the Norwegian Church Aid (NCA) compound were damaged
in the shelling.123 The SPLA-Torit forces entered an empty Lafon and occupied the
NCA compound.
The villagers did not return to Lafon, fearing a counterattack by William
Nyuon. During the first month that they lived in the bush, many villagers died of
diseases, including malaria. The SPLA-Torit commander in Lafon, Piang Deng,
used threats to force the Pari civilians to return.

SPLA-Torit Burning and Looting of Lafon in February 1993

A chief said that on February 8 the SPLA-Torit and the Pari leadership
celebrated a new agreement at a ceremony. Bulls were brought to the SPLA, which
promised peace, food, and no further problems. Based on the promises, many
began to return to the areas.

122
The Relief Association of Southern Sudan.

123
As a result of military insecurity in the area, in 1985 NCA, which had built a large
brick complex and operated a development program in Lafon, pulled out.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 189

Two days later, however, the peace was shattered. On or about February 9,
1993, Commander William Nyuon apparently tried to approach the NCA compound
that was serving as an SPLA-Torit base. From over the hill, he shelled the SPLA-
Torit positions at the compound before being repulsed by Garang forces. Most
civilians fled again from the crossfire.124
After the Nyuon forces left, the SPLA-Torit commander took revenge on
the Lafon population, looting their deserted homes and burning down all the houses
in the seven villages. Nothing remained standing except for the NCA buildings,
some brick stores deserted by Arab traders almost a decade earlier, and the
crumbling brick Catholic compound. Reportedly thirty-seven people were burned to
death in their houses, wells and water sources (with the exception of two hand
pumps) were poisoned and six women were raped. No captives or prisoners were
taken.

124
The accounts of February 9, 1993, in Lafon are not consistent. Some villagers say
that SPLA-Torit attacked the village, without mentioning the presence of Commander
William Nyuon. We conclude that the most likely truth is that Nyuon tried to attack the
SPLA-Torit base.
190 Civilian Devastation

RASS officials in Nairobi estimated the dead during this attack at ninety-
eight civilians, including the burn victims.125 Among the items looted were valued
costumes of ostrich feathers and leather skins used in Pari traditional dancing.
At some point, SPLA-Torit sent a Pari commander and Pari soldiers to
meet with the leadership, but it was too late--the village had turned against that
faction because of the extensive destruction and looting of Lafon. The villagers built
huts in the fields and stayed there. When the SPLA-Torit troops based in Lafon
raided a Pari cattle camp, the Pari put up armed resistance.
In April, the SPLA-Torit forces pulled out of Lafon, heading in the
direction of Kongor, which other SPLA-Torit forces had just recaptured. The
SPLA-Nasir troops entered Lafon shortly thereafter, staying only a few days. At last
report the Pari of Lafon remained estranged from SPLA-Torit.

The Didinga of Chukudum

The Didinga are a small Equatorian tribe living on the Sudan side of the
Ugandan border, separated by high mountains from the Sudanese towns of Torit and
Kapoeta. In the 1983 census the Didinga numbered 68,000.126 In 1993, several
hundred Didinga families fled their homes because of SPLA-Torit abuses, including
summary executions, looting, and the burning of three villages. A refugee said they

125
The numbers are not consistent. RASS officials in Lafon say that 179 people were
killed in the January attack, and in the February attack fifty-nine were shot to death
and eighty-three were burned inside their huts.

126
The 1983 census for the largest Didinga town, Chukudum, was 58,550, without a
tribal breakdown.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 191

had fled "because we were chased by Arab bombs and by the people with us, the
SPLA. They fight the common man instead of the enemy."
In Eastern Equatoria, many small tribes nursed grievances against the
SPLA-Torit, which they saw as Dinka-dominated and heavy-handed in its relations
with the civilian population. Villagers noted that in 1993 the SPLA commander in
Chukudum was Salvator Achuel and in Lotukei was Salva Matong, both Dinka.127
Food Confiscation
When the SPLA first came to the fertile farming area, the Didinga
willingly gave food to the SPLA. "Civilians here contributed food and treated them
nicely. We contributed goats and cows in the beginning," a refugee told
HRW/Africa. "Suddenly, things changed. They wanted one tin of flour per day per
family. It was like a timetable."
Refugees complained that they were harassed by the SPLA when they were
trying to plant and that even children were forced to porter food to the SPLA bases.
A refugee told HRW/Africa about the relentlessness of the soldiers:

There was no time they failed to come. Some of the soldiers did
not follow orders and took two tins instead of one. They would
usually bring a container or basin and order each family, 'Fill this
with grain.' They came constantly, they never stopped. People
could not refuse them. If people told them they had nothing, the
soldiers would enter the house just to see if it was really empty.

In 1986, a village man was killed by the soldiers when he protested. After
this killing, the man's family and others moved to the mountains, where they could
watch the approach of SPLA patrols and have time to hide their grain and cows.
Little by little, more people fled SPLA harassment and moved to the mountains

127
Although government troops had been absent from the Didinga area after it was
occupied by the SPLA in 1985, the area hosted SPLA military bases in the two largest
Didinga towns, Chukudum and Lotukei. These bases were the targets of government
aerial bombardment at least three times in early 1993, with civilian casualties. See
Chapter III.
192 Civilian Devastation

from the villages. Many would sleep in the hills and return to their fields to
cultivate. The SPLA would go to the hills where the people had relocated, track
them down and ask for food.

Forced Recruitment
At first, many young men went to join the SPLA voluntarily, but in 1992,
the SPLA came and recruited the young men by force. "They did not even ask the
chief. They just surrounded the village and took all the young men they could find,"
a refugee said. As a result, many men hid from the SPLA patrols. When the men
refused to go, the SPLA took cows and goats from their families. The recruited men
were not deployed to fight in the area, but very far away.
A Didinga man said that the SPLA tried to recruit him in Lotukei because
he is a skilled worker. He told them he could not leave his wife and children.

Village Burnings and Summary Executions

The SPLA-Torit surrounded the cattle camp of the village of Lamoja near
Lotukei in July 1992 during the day, and started shooting. There was no resistance.
Two men and a boy guarding their cattle were shot dead. One man was wounded
and is now lame. The SPLA-Torit soldiers then stole the cattle.
Lothiathei, a village near the road to Lotukei, was known locally as a place
where people were held in detention by the SPLA-Torit. It was also the home of a
Didinga subchief who was working with the SPLA, and it was a source of food for
the SPLA.
An SPLA-Torit soldier formerly based there volunteered that he fought
"against the Didinga civilians" in Lotukei in July 1992. He said the civilians had
harassed and killed some SPLA-Torit troops that month. He confirmed that in
Lothiathei the SPLA-Torit looted and burned Didinga houses, killed some Didinga
men, and captured four of them, three of whom escaped and the last of whom was
released.128
In March, 1993, the SPLA-Torit attacked the village, injuring civilians and
looting and burning civilian property. One resident was awakened by shooting. The
villagers, who were unarmed (they had never been formed into a militia by the
SPLA-Torit) ran for their lives. Five were injured. The soldiers entered the village
and burned sixteen of the huts and the grain storehouses.129 Some of the grain was

128
He volunteered this information in the course of an interview on another topic and
prior to HRW/Africa interviews with the Didinga.

129
During this village burning, the home of the subchief who was collaborating with
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 193

looted and some was burned. About 715 goats were also looted. "People are now
very hungry," one refugee said.
The situation grew more tense when, also in April, 1993, four men were
arrested and summarily executed by the SPLA-Torit in Chukudum. Two of the
victims had gone to Chukudum to shop and were arrested there during the day.
Witnesses saw the SPLA-Torit tie them up and take them away. "You know you're
dead when they do that," said one.
The following day, the relatives and others searched for missing the and
found their bodies "beyond the airstrip" of Chukudum, in the direction where the
SPLA-Torit took them. A witness who saw the bodies said both were tied with their
elbows behind them and one had his head cut off. The second had his throat cut.
The witness did not know their names but he recognized them as men from the
village of Moneta.
At the end of the month, a man named Lokekono left Kikilei to cut wood
for his house. On his way to Chukudum he was arrested by SPLA-Torit soldiers, in
front of witnesses. He was killed and his body left on the road to Lotukei, where his
relatives and others found it the next morning. A member of this group said that the
victim had suffocated to death on cotton that had been placed in his mouth to muffle
his cries.
The fourth victim, a man named Popo, left Lorema to visit a friend in
Chukudum on April 29, 1993. He was arrested in Chukudum and brought to
Lotukei, forty kilometers away. He was charged falsely, "with no evidence,"
according to a woman relative. The chiefs, alerted to his arrest, went to the SPLA-
Torit commander and complained. The SPLA-Torit commander wanted to know
why they were helping the man. The same night, the soldiers of SPLA-Torit tied
him behind a truck in Chukudum and dragged him along the road to Lotukei. His
dead body was left near Lotukei, where his relatives found it the next morning and
buried it.
Buthi, in the outskirts of Chukudum, was burned on or about April 10,
1993. Witnesses, who saw the burning from a distance at night, were too afraid to
approach. They were later told that two women and four men had been killed by the
SPLA-Torit when it attacked the village.

the SPLA-Torit was not spared.

194 Civilian Devastation

Another village burning was in Kikilei, twelve miles east of Chukudum, in

May, 1993, and three women killed. The SPLA-Torit suspected villagers of "being
linked to the Arabs," according to one.
The soldiers surrounded the village at 4 A.M. and started shooting mortars
and rifles; the surprised residents fled. Two women were shot dead and one was
injured inside a hut that was burned; she died later of her injuries. A total of
seventy-five houses with their contents were burned. Only a very few houses were
left standing. "Thousands" of cows were stolen. A man in a village twenty
kilometers away saw the smoke from the burning village and heard the shooting
starting at 4 A.M. The SPLA-Torit said that they had "taken action against some
specific individuals" in the village because they were suspected of laying land mines
in the road for the SPLA-Torit.
The villagers reacted fiercely, especially to the deaths of the women. When
an Oxfam/USA team carrying meningitis vaccine and drugs to Chukudum came up
the road in an unmarked car a few days later, the villagers ambushed the car,
mistaking it for an SPLA-Torit vehicle. The driver was shot in the foot. The three
other occupants were uninjured but spent the day hiding in the bush until the
misunderstanding was sorted out.130 The car was completely vandalized and looted,
including the radio which was later returned. The villagers were deeply chagrined to
find they had mistakenly attacked the vehicle of an agency that had assisted the area
for years.

130
Telephone interview, Rob Buchanan, Oxfam/USA, June 11, 1993.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 195

FACTION FIGHTING IN 1993 IN THE UPPER NILE

The government did not launch its customary dry season offensive in early
1993, perhaps watching the U.S./U.N. troop movement into Somalia in late 1992.
The government undertook a diplomatic offensive at the same time, probably
another factor in deciding not to pursue a large military offensive.
Unfortunately the civilians of Upper Nile had no respite from the war.
Faction fighting of 1991-92 displaced hundreds of thousands and killed, through
hunger and disease, countless thousands more in the Upper Nile areas of Waat,
Ayod, and Kongor, earning that zone the name of the "Hunger Triangle." While
many other areas of southern Sudan also deserved that label in the past ten years of
war, events in this Hunger Triangle which encompasses the fought-over Duk Ridge
were better documented because the government ceased its usual obstruction of
relief, allowing the OLS and NGOs to step in. Southern Sudanese continued to die
at each other's hands in stepped-up faction fighting in early 1993, but during this
period there were outside witnesses.
What the outsiders saw when they arrived was the most dire situation of
hunger in the world. WFP Executive Director Catherine Bertini was among those
who sounded the alarm.

The needs for emergency assistance in southern Sudan should

have the highest priority because nowhere else in the world are
people in such dire straits. . . . The situation in some parts of
Sudan is absolutely bleak with starvation rampant in the south.131

The WFP was not receiving enough money from the international community to
"stop starvation on a massive scale," she said, despite the fact that the agency at last
had access to the victims.

131
WFP News Release, "WFP appeals for more food and funds for Southern Sudan,"
Nairobi, Kenya, April 6, 1993.
196 Civilian Devastation

The OLS summarized the situation of especially vulnerable groups at the

end of 1992 and the beginning of 1993.132 Many of those groups had been subjected
to indiscriminate attacks and had suffered hundreds of dead and wounded as well as
extensive property looting and damage during the faction fighting and the 1992
government attacks. This stepped-up fighting, conducted in violation of the rules of
war, seriously interfered with the civilians' self-help efforts and international
attempts to help them bridge the hunger gap.
The groups that the OLS designated especially vulnerable in late 1992,
and who suffered even more because of human rights abuses in 1993,
included:

$ the people of Bor, Kongor, Waat, and Ayod, totalling 165,000. In 1993,
Kongor was attacked twice (once by each faction) and Ayod burned to the
ground once by SPLA-Torit. The village of Yuai (population 15,000) in
the same area was attacked and burned down twice by SPLA-Torit;
$ the 25,000 people in Panaru district, western Upper Nile, stricken with a
Kala Azar epidemic. In 1993, planes bringing medicine to them were
looted, and those Dinka attempting to walk five days to a medical center
for help were attacked by SPLA-Nasir;
$ a total of 7,150 unaccompanied minors entirely dependent on outside
assistance and in camps at Nasir, Moli, Borongolei, and Palataka. The
minors at Moli and Borongolei were "evacuated" by SPLA-Torit for their
"safety" in early 1993, but it is believed that they were inducted into the
SPLA-Torit as soldiers; the minors in Palataka continued to scrape by in
an area of increasing combat between SPLA-Torit and William Nyuon
troops until they were evacuated in early 1994;
$ about 700,000 persons living in east bank Equatoria133 and those living
along the boundary of the Nasir/Torit faction split, where the faction
fighting continued to flare;
$ some 220,000 displaced persons at the Triple A camps (Ame, Aswa,
Atepi) and at other displaced camps in Yondu, Aguran, Mundri, and
Yambio. A government offensive in July-August 1993 resulted in the
displacement of Yondu; Mundri was bombed several times by the

132
OLS, "Situation Assessment 1992/93," p. 6.

133
This number includes about 250,000 people in Juba.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 197

government; and by mid-1994 the Triple A camps were deserted because

of the 1994 government offensive.
$ vulnerable groups in Bahr El Ghazal and western Upper Nile, numbering
about 380,000 persons. They were subjected in 1993 to government
scorched earth attacks from garrison towns such as Yirol and Rumbek, and
by 1994 the population had rapidly deteriorated.134

134
Medecins Sans Frontier press release, "Medical Aid Group Says the Stage is Set
for a New Humanitarian Disaster in Sudan," New York, May 24, 1994.
198 Civilian Devastation

The New Sudan Council of Churches issued a letter of appeal to the SPLA
leaders on February 4, 1993, highlighting the desperate situation of the civilian
population, which was brought about, in large part, by the faction fighting and
faction abuses against the civilian population. It asked that no SPLA soldier do any
"violence against any civilians. Commanders should move their soldiers out of
populated areas toward the front lines and maintain the soldiers under strict
discipline."135
The SPLA leadership ignored the appeal, and the factional violence
worsened. On March 27, 1993, the SPLA-Torit attacked a gathering of all dissident
leaders in Kongor and then pushed north into Nuer territory, burning and looting
and killing civilians.
In May 1993, the SPLA-Torit and the government unilaterally declared
cease-fires in preparation for their peace talks in Abuja, Nigeria. On May 28, 1993,
the factions agreed to a cease-fire and military pull-back forty-five kilometers from
the airstrips at Kongor, Waat, Yuai, and Ayod. This lasted no more than a few
weeks, however. In late July, as the government-SPLA-Torit cease-fire was broken
by a government attack around Yei in Equatoria, the SPLA-Nasir/United attacked
Kongor but did not hold it.
Although both factions continued to deny that the fighting was tribal in
nature, combatants and civilians on both sides increasingly viewed and expressed it
as such. For example, a journalist saw the following message on a blackboard in the
Hunger Triangle: "1993 is the year for the Dinka and Nuer to fight to
elimination."136

135
The Church Leaders of Southern Sudan, "Letter of Appeal to the SPLA Leaders,"
Nairobi, Kenya, February 4, 1993.

136
Newsweek (New York), July 19, 1993, p. 12.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 199

One mitigating factor, however, in a "Dinka versus all other southern

tribes" breakdown fostered by the Sudan government was the emergence in early
1993 of several SPLA Dinka leaders from long-term imprisonment by SPLA-Torit.
(See below in this Chapter) Having no love lost for Garang's leadership, these Dinka
leaders aligned themselves with SPLA-United,137 as it was called after the March
27, 1993, meeting of SPLA-Nasir and other dissidents in Kongor. They carried the
message to Dinka and non-Dinka areas alike that the struggle within the SPLA was
not tribal but one of the principles (independence of the south versus union with the
north) and/or personalities (John Garang).

Pariang 1993, Kala Azar Epidemic Worsened by Nuer and Government Raids
It is impossible to single out any area of south Sudan as the most pathetic,
but certainly western Upper Nile illustrates how human rights abuses can make a
bad situation--in this case, an epidemic--so much worse for civilian victims.
In western Upper Nile, the largely Dinka population was stricken by an
epidemic of Kala Azar disease (visceral Leishmaniasis) some years ago. The
disease is caused by a parasite and transmitted to humans by sandflies whose habitat
is the forest (red acacia seyal trees). Kala Azar was a growing problem in this
region in the early 1980s, even before the war.
The fighting contributed considerably to the spread of the disease. The
population of Pariang, in Panaru district, western Upper Nile,138 estimated in early
1993 at 25,000,139 fled to the forest for two reasons: food and security. Their cattle
were almost all raided by the Arab militia supported by elements in the government
or by Nuer raiders. Other cattle died of disease.
Losing their cattle wealth was compounded in some areas by a very poor
harvest, forcing people into the forest to search for wild fruits to eat. The forest was
also a place to hide from several serious threats: recurring attacks by the Arab
militia and Nuer raiders; continuous fighting between SPLA-Torit and the
government in the northern part of Panaru and in the southern Nuba mountains in
1992; government troops making incursions in 1992 from the main north-south

137
To avoid confusion, we refer in this report to the group formed after March 27,
1993 as SPLA-Nasir/United.

138
See Western Equatoria and Bahr El Ghazal map, facing Chapter III.

139
OLS "Situation Assessment 1992/93," p. 6.
200 Civilian Devastation

road140 eastward toward the airstrip at Nyarweng village; and continuous low-level
fighting between the two SPLA factions along the Bahr el Ghazal river south of
Nyarweng.141
There are no medical facilities in the area at all. The nearest treatment
center for Kala Azar is in Duar, a five-day walk south of the Panaru county airstrip
at Nyarweng, in a predominately Nuer area. The Dinka from Panaru county have
been unable to travel to the Duar medical center because Nuer have engaged in
looting of Dinka along the route. Some Dinka attempting the journey have been
shot.

140
Government convoys between Kadugli (in the Nuba mountains of South Kordofan)
to the north and Bentiu (in Upper Nile) to the south traveled this road, which runs along
the western side of Panaru district.

141
OLS, "Situation Assessment 1992/93," p. 16.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 201

As a result, according to a doctor, perhaps as much as 70 percent of the

population has died of Kala Azar in the four years from 1989-93. Several hundred
children in the area have been orphaned by the disease.142 The assessment team
concluded that the medical situation in Panaru County was critical, and that Kala
Azar would wipe out nearly the entire population in the next several years if there
were no intervention.143
In August 1993, a U.N. assessment team visited the Pariang area of Panaru
district, estimated population then 30,000. There was still no Kala Azar treatment

142
WFP, "Joint WFP/UNICEF Assessment Report," Pariang, January 16-18, 1993,
Nairobi, Kenya, p. 1-2.

143
Ibid., p. 5.
202 Civilian Devastation

available due to looting of medical supplies by Nuer, they were told.144 As of

February 1994, permission was denied for planes to land in Pariang.145
On January 21, 1994, a Kola Azar project in Niemne was evacuated after
an attack in which three were killed. Nevertheless, due to agency action, it
appeared that the epidemic was abating and the number of patients in the three
threatment centers decreased from 4,000 in 1992 to 1,500 in 1993.146

Kuac Deng Attacked by SPLA-Torit Twice in Early 1993

144
U.N. Situation Report, July 29 - August 25, 1993, Khartoum, Sudan (New York:
United Nations, 1993), p. 3. In October 1993 the World Health Organization launched
an appeal for Kala Azar in eastern and southern Sudan, and asked for $4.4 million to
treat the 30,000 cases in the area. U.S.AID/OFDA Situation Report for Sudan, No. 8
(Washington, D.C.: U.S. AID, January 14, 1994), p. 3. Other health problems reported
were AIDS (12.5 percent of southern Sudanese are reported to be HIV positive) and a
polio epidemic in Duar. Ibid.

145
OLS (Southern Sector) Situation Report No. 53, February 1-15, 1994, p. 5.

146
Medecins Sans Frontier Research Centre, "Sudan: Report on Humanitarian
Situation in Southern Sudan," New York, March 15, 1994, p. 7.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 203

Kuac Deng, the seat of a court and a six-hour walk south of Ayod, is well
into the Nuer-Dinka front line and therefore in the center of the "Hunger Triangle."
It is east of the Jonglei Canal and the Duk Ridge. Its mainly Nuer population moved
north to Ayod, Bie, and Canal court centers in 1992. It was estimated that the
population of Kuac Deng was once 14,000, but by the time of a food assessment in
late 1992, most residents had been displaced.147
As always, some civilians trickled back to what had been their homes. One
of the Kuac Deng chiefs was among them, and he was there when Kuac Deng was
attacked three times by SPLA-Torit forces in 1993: January, February, and April.
He said that during the January 1993 attack, Garang's forces opened fire with
machine guns, bazookas, and howitzers. The chief described the ferocity of the
attack as follows: "They burned every tukl in the village, and killed women and
children. My brother was killed in his tukl with his four children." The troops killed
some men after capture and interrogation and others when they were running away.
Some of the villagers set off for Malakal, but one of Garang's commanders
intercepted and killed them all, the chief claimed. The soldiers took at least sixty
women and children from Kuac Deng, including the chief's daughter and his
brother's wife. The chief said that Garang's forces stole everything, including the
chief's uniform and his 250 livestock. In all, the village lost nearly 6,000 head of
cattle. The troops also spoiled the water reserve of the village by putting a dead
body in it. They burned the grain and seeds.
People who escaped from the January 1993 attack returned to the village
and lived in camps "near the water places" with their remaining cattle. A month
later, an SPLA-Torit advance unit captured some boys and forced them to lead the
troops to the camps. The troops shot into the crowd and took all the cattle. They
also attacked the village of Deet and its cattle camp and looted all the property.
According to the chief, soldiers rounded up whomever they could, put grass on top
of them, and burned them alive. They killed forty women and children like this.

Panyakur and Kongor, Occupied by SPLA-Nasir in Late 1992

147
OLS, "Situation Assessment 1992/93," p. 27.
204 Civilian Devastation

As 1993 opened, Riek's forces occupied districts at least as far south as

Kongor in the Dinka territory of Upper Nile. The troops moved into the Upper Nile
vacuum,148 fanning out from Kongor to other Dinka areas such as Jonglei and
Paliau, south of Kongor, and Duk Faiwil, to the north. At the time that the OLS
airlifts began in early 1993, SPLA-Nasir/Unity controlled all three points on the
"Hunger Triangle" (Kongor, Ayod, and Waat) as well as Akobo to the east.
After the brutal raids by SPLA-Nasir, Anya-Nya II, and the Nuer White
Army of late 1991, many Dinka civilians who had returned home fled again when
they heard the Nuer forces were returning. They suspected that the Nuer were
returning in order to expel them from their lands. A chief from Jonglei village told
HRW/Africa that he believed that "Riek told them [the Nuer forces] to go to the
land of the Dinka, [which is] to be your land; I do not want any Dinka to be on this
side of the river [the east bank of the White Nile]." The chief took a small canoe,
crossed the White Nile, and hid on the west bank when he heard in February 1993
that the Nuer were coming back.149
Not all civilians could or would leave, but those who were still living in the
area were in very bad condition. The U.N. was aware of the high death rate there
and told the SPLA factions that if protection could be organized for the relief
workers, U.N. relief operations would begin.150
A relief assessment team visiting Kongor in December 1992, for the first
time in over a year, found a complete lack of foodstocks. Massive flooding from
April to October 1991 had prevented planting and subsequent harvests. The tribal
conflict with massive loss of life and looting of cattle in late 1991 had forced people
to flee. There was no trade in the area whatsoever nor had there been any since
before the floods in 1991. People were not fishing in the toic because it was too
difficult in the absence of cattle or mosquito nets; malaria is very common in the
toic. (Cattle dung is burned at night to keep off the mosquitos.)

148
The government had taken the towns of Bor and Yirol in 1992. The SPLA-Torit
was occupied in Equatoria with the fighting following the defection of Commander
William Nyuon after September 1992, and the main SPLA-Torit forces were still
engaged in the siege of Juba.

149
In December 1992, "Riek himself came" to Paliau south of Kongor, another man
said. He and his relatives fled to the toic before the Nasir forces arrived.

150
As of late 1992, there was still no resolution of the killing of the four expatriates in
Equatoria in September 1992, nor were any new ground rules worked out with the
SPLA-Torit faction.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 205

Jean Luc Siblot, the WFP emergency coordinator who visited the Kongor
area, said, "In my six years of work all over Southern Sudan, I have never seen
people survive for so long on what amounts to almost nothing."151 The relief team
concluded that Kongor was a disaster area:

151
WFP, News Release, "Assessment Mission to Southern Sudan Reveals Hunger
Within Ghost-Town Like Atmospheres," Nairobi, Kenya, December 18, 1992. The area
around the airstrip at Panyakur, ten kilometers southeast of Kongor, was assessed.
206 Civilian Devastation

Perhaps one third of the original population remains, some

30,000. The rest have either fled south or have died. An average
of four people in every household of seven died in 1992--there
are no infants left. There are no cows, there is no grain; the
people are living on fruit. Malnourishment is evident not just in
the children, but in adults of all ages.152

The area suffered also because of the deliberate blockage of relief by the
government. "Insecurity and lack of flight permission meant no humanitarian
assistance reached Kongor in 1992," the OLS noted.153
In late February 1993, a UNICEF field officer was stationed in Kongor.
Programs were expanded in March after 65 percent of the children in Kongor were
found by UNICEF to be severely malnourished. The survey also found many adults
were weak and frail; they began to receive therapeutic feeding at a feeding center
run by the Irish NGO, Concern. New arrivals, mainly from Pok Tap to the north,
were also weak.154 The Centers for Disease Control visited Kongor in March 1993,

152
OLS, "Assessment Report/Kongor," Nairobi, Kenya, December 22, 1992, p. 2.

153
OLS "Situation Assessment 1992/93," p. 10.

154
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 35, February 21 - March
24, 1993, p. 4.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 207

and concluded that the "prevalence rates of severe undernutrition...are among the
highest ever documented."155

155
CDC, "Nutrition and Mortality Assessment, Southern Sudan," p. 306. The CDC
surveyed three sites in southern Sudan. Unlike the surveys in Ame and Ayod, the survey
in Kongor was not done on a house to house basis but only from a sample of children
who gathered at the U.N. compound in response to messages from local relief officials
and therefore might not have been representative of all children in the area, as the CDC
pointed out. Ibid., p. 305.
208 Civilian Devastation

Duk Faiwil Attacked by SPLA-Nasir in February/March 1993

A Duk Faiwil chief was present in February 1993 when "the Nuer"
returned. "Even Riek came with them," he said. The chief fled to the toic,156 and
when he returned two months later he found that the houses, rebuilt after the last
raid, had been burned and some people had died inside them; a total of fifteen
civilians were killed. No cattle had been in the village since prior raids. The SPLA-
Nasir forces stayed only three days and burned the houses as they left.

SPLA-Nasir Occupation of Panyakur/Kongor in Early 1993

The SPLA-Nasir troops that passed through Duk Faiwil in February
continued south into Dinka territory to Panyakur and Kongor, where they stayed for
about two months. During that time, Dinka civilians in Panyakur and Kongor
complained, the SPLA-Nasir forces committed abuses, including killings,
kidnapping of women, beatings, and theft of food.
The U.N. began to deliver food at a time when SPLA-Nasir was in control
of the Kongor area. Their hunger overcoming their mistrust and fear of the "Nuer"
forces, many Dinka nevertheless walked from the toic, a two- or three-day journey,
to the airstrip in Panyakur for the food distribution.
A chief in Kongor district tried to keep track of civilian deaths during the
SPLA-Nasir occupation of Panyakur and Kongor in early 1993. "When Riek came

156
Right before the SPLA-Nasir forces arrived, about 200 people, mostly women and
children, were living in Duk Faiwil. The civilians fled into the toic, crossed the White
Nile or dispersed in various directions to hide before Riek came. When Rieks forces
were routed from Kongor, they pulled back north to Nuer territory in late March. Then
the civilians returned to Duk Faiwil.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 209

and stayed for two months in Panyakur, he killed so many people," he claimed.157
Some of the victims were killed during the attack, some captured later and then
killed. He found the bodies of some. The relatives of others reported the deaths to
him as chief.
The Riek forces reportedly captured many women and girls. They were
taken away and none had returned as of the time of the interview, several months
later. The captured women included three young unmarried girls.
A man from Duk Faiwil, Ruot Atem, was beaten by the SPLA-Nasir forces
and died three days later. He was beaten when these forces came her at night and
asked him why he had not "reported" the presence of his daughter, then took her
away. A friend of Ruot's commented on the message imparted in such beatings:
"This is why others fear to talk if their daughters are taken in their presence. They
say nothing."

Kongor Captured by SPLA-Torit on March 27, 1993

157
He listed twenty names: Boul Daw, Malwal Anyang, Gurec Kuot, Majak Mayen,
Lual Duot, Deng Adow, Majak Kuol, Kuany Ngot, Nyan Deng (a pregnant woman),
Adaw Pager (with a new infant), Kual Ater (with two small children), Apajok Mayom
(older woman), Achol Akodum, Mayang Ngan Kual (older), Daw Lual, Nuandeng Kual
(girl), Pajok Mayam (a woman in her twenties), Adut Deng, Adit Akui, Ngandeng
Anyang, Awak Deng.
210 Civilian Devastation

On March 27, 1993, the SPLA-Torit led by Commander Bior Ajang Duot
under the overall command of Kuol Manyang Juk158 attacked Kongor and
succeeded in driving out the SPLA-Nasir forces. Reportedly between sixty and
eighty-one people, the majority of them civilians, were killed during the fighting.159
A U.N. relief worker was brutalized and nearly killed by SPLA-Torit troops.
The SPLA-Nasir called a political meeting in Kongor for March 27, which
many SPLA dissidents, up to 5,000, attended. The purpose of the meeting was to
unify all factions in a new movement to be called "SPLA-United." The leadership of
the SPLA-Torit took umbrage at the choice of Kongor for this political meeting,
since it is a Dinka area close to John Garang's birthplace, and took advantage of the
publicized gathering of their enemies to attack.
Four relatives of Arok Thon Arok, a Dinka SPLA long-term political
prisoner who escaped in late 1992 and was in Kongor for the meeting, were taken
into a house used by Riek and deliberately shot.160 Joseph Oduho, an older,
respected Lotuko political leader of the SPLA who had been arrested by Garang in
1986 and imprisoned for over five years, also died in the attack.161

158
"Death in the Sudd," Africa Confidential, Vol. 34, No. 7 (London: April 2, 1993),
p. 2.

159
Mark Huband, "While the People Starve," Africa Report (May/June 1993), p. 36,
quotes an eyewitness that eighty-one were killed; another source said that the SPLA-
Torit attacking troops killed fifteen SPLA-Nasir forces and forty-five civilians. "Death
in the Sudd," Africa Confidential, p. 2.

160
Amnesty International, "Ravages of war," p. 24.

161
"Death in the Sudd," Africa Confidential, p.2.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 211

The WFP coordinator in Kongor, Jean Francois Darcq, a French national,

was brutalized by SPLA-Torit. Darcq, who was in the U.N. compound when the
center was attacked, took refuge in the storeroom behind a wall of maize sacks. He
emerged during a lull in the fighting and identified himself to the forces of SPLA-
Torit, then in control of the center. They accused the WFP of supplying the SPLA-
Nasir faction with arms and food and forced Darcq to open U.N. food stores. They
ordered him to strip naked and marched him at gunpoint through the bush for an
hour. According to Darcq's report:

My guard ordered me out and ordered me to come towards the

south as well, still at gunpoint. I was very tired, my bare feet
giving me great pain. I fell down several times. The guard was
still rushing me -- I could not run any more. I could hardly walk.
The guard was ahead of me. He stopped, aimed at me and fired a
number of times (I believe eight). While he was firing I hopped
left and right in a zig zag pattern shouting No No in French. I fell
down again -- hard -- with my face to the ground. I then turned
my head and could see the guard moving away. I was thinking,
"I'm still alive!"162
He took refuge in the bush where he was later rescued by the SPLA-Nasir forces
and evacuated by the U.N. on March 28.163
After the event, Garang retracted the accusation that the WFP was
knowingly supplying SPLA-Nasir with food. Garang apologized to the U.N. for the
mistreatment of Darcq and the violation of the agreement with the U.N.
guaranteeing safe access for relief staff to southern Sudan locations, including
Kongor.164

162
WFP, News Release, "WFP Executive Director Condemns Attack on Staff in
Southern Sudan," Nairobi, Kenya, April 2, 1993.

163
Ibid.

164
See Huband, "While the People Starve," p. 39.
212 Civilian Devastation

Accountability of SPLA-Torit for Deaths and Injuries in Kongor Attack

HRW/Africa concludes that the SPLA-Torit has inadequately investigated
and has avoided taking responsibility for the deaths that occurred in the attack on
Kongor, in violation of the rules of war and of its duties to maintain the discipline of
its troops and to enforce adherence to the rules of war.
We had the opportunity to ask SPLA-Torit Commander Bior Ajang Duot,
commander of the attack on Kongor, about the abuses committed during the attack
and the steps the SPLA-Torit had taken to punish those responsible.165 Commander
Bior claimed that Oduho was killed in cross-fire, and that, since all the commanders
knew him, no one would deliberately kill him. However, from the descriptions of
the events that day, it appears that the elderly Oduho, too tired to run, was left
behind under a tree by the retreating Nasir troops, and it is a fair inference that
when the SPLA-Torit troops came upon him, there was no combat taking place in
that area.
Commander Bior even admitted that there was only one real military
exchange that day. "Riek and the NGOs fled north together from Panyakur in
Toyota trucks. There was heavy firing from Riek, so our ambushers, who were on
the road, did not lift their heads up, and the Riek forces escaped the ambush. Riek's
forces fled at the beginning of the attack. They did not put up any resistance."
The death of Joseph Oduho in all likelihood was the result of a killing hors
de combat of an unarmed person, a violation of the rules of war.166 The same could
be said for the deaths of those relatives of Arok Thon Arok who were burned to
death inside a house, and probably for most of the civilians killed that day.
Regarding the brutal treatment of the U.N. relief worker, Commander Bior
offered first one excuse, then another. First, he said "Some soldiers are not
conscientious. They assumed that everyone was an enemy." Then he offered another
excuse: "The intent was to rob him. The one who mistreated Jean François was not
caught." Then he claimed not to know which side was responsible for the
mistreatment: "We do not know if he was mistreated by Riek or Garang forces."
Despite his supposed ignorance, he then said, "They shot at him but not to kill him.
He was caught and then shot at. They did not want to kill him but to terrorize him."
Finally, he said, "This was an isolated incident."

165
Interview of Commander Bior Ajang Duot, Upper Nile, Sudan, July 9, 1993.

166
See Appendix A.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 213

Having virtually conceded responsibility, he said, "Someone was assigned

by commander Kol Manyang to investigate [the incident]. All attempts to find out
what happened failed. The field commanders were asked which unit [it could have
been]. They said that others were responsible for the ambush."
This confusion of responses only confirms our conclusion that the SPLA-
Torit was responsible for this violation of the rules of war, and that they did not
seriously investigate or punish anyone for it, even after extensive public demands
for an accounting.

Effects of Fighting in Kongor

The fighting resulted in more lives lost indirectly than in actual shooting or
burning. The OLS estimated that 200-300 severely malnourished children died as a
direct result of the March 27 attack on Kongor because the intensive feeding
programs were disrupted. In a written statement, Acting U.S. AID Administrator
James Michel strongly criticized the attack:

Launching offensive military operations in this environment of human

suffering indicates a callous disregard for human life . . . . Military actions
by any faction or group in this area of extreme need deserve the world's
utter condemnation and contempt . . . and calls [sic] into question the
motives and basic humanity of the participants.167

One of the first outside visitors to Kongor after the fighting subsided, on
April 16, 1993, observed a visible population of 4-5,000 and an estimated 30,000
people in the area, with new arrivals from Dinka areas of Bor, Shambe, and the
Duks.168 A headcount on May 3, 1993, showed there were 7,000 people in Kongor,
despite a warning of an impending counterattack by SPLA-Nasir.169
After the fighting subsided, the relief operations resumed, some by the
OLS and some by Lutheran World Federation operating outside the OLS. A chief
from Jonglei who was in Kongor in July 1993 said, "This is why you see me

167
Hubard, "While the People Starve," p. 39, quoting Michel.

168
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 36, March 24 - April 23,
1993, p. 3.

169
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 37, April 24 - May 31,
1993, p. 4.
214 Civilian Devastation

healthy. I have been here one month eating normally. Few remain now in Jonglei.
They are eating leaves only." He came to secure and bring back rations for the
village, which had not received U.N. food.

SPLA-Nasir Abducts Women in Duk Faiwil in April 1993

During their passage through Duk Faiwil for a day in late March 1993 on
the way north, Riek's forces killed a woman and captured several children and
thirty-seven young women from among the remaining inhabitants, who were
subsisting on leaves. The captives were taken back to the Nuer area. The huts in
Duk Faiwil were burned.
The son of the woman who was killed said that she was shot while
searching for leaves to eat. He found her body in the bush. Another resident of Duk
Faiwil said that the twenty-year-old wife of his uncle was one of those taken, along
with her baby. Four other children of this uncle, by another wife, also were taken,
three girls and a boy, all under nine years old. Three children, ages one, two and
four, named by the chief, were also taken; none of them had returned months later.
The chief's group returned to Duk right after SPLA-Nasir's departure to find their
huts burned.

Kuac Deng Attacked by SPLA-Torit in April 1993

The third 1993 SPLA-Torit attack on Kuac Deng came on April 1, in the
wake of their capture of Kongor. Residents claim that the SPLA-Torit killed five
civilians.
After the February SPLA-Torit attack, the residents of Kuac Deng
scattered; some went to the toic and some to Waat for relief food. The group in the
toic was surviving with difficulty on wild fruits and fishing, so many returned to
Kuac Deng and were there when two battles took place on April 1 between SPLA-
Torit and SPLA-Nasir/United forces.
Most of the civilians ran away, but a fifteen-year-old boy was captured by
SPLA-Torit forces at the water reservoir and held at gunpoint along with ten other
boys. He said they managed to escape during the counterattack by SPLA-
Nasir/United troops. The chief reported that five people who did not escape were
shot and killed at the water reservoir by the SPLA-Torit.

Ayod Attacked by SPLA-Torit on April 2, 1993

In April 1993, SPLA-Torit forces razed and burned to the ground Ayod
and Yuai, two population centers in northern Upper Nile where SPLA-Nasir/United
had stationed troops. Possibly hundreds of Nuer civilians were killed in
indiscriminate shooting and deliberate killings by the SPLA-Torit. Many were
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 215

elderly, weak, sick or for other reasons could not run fast enough; they were among
those who burned to death inside huts the soldiers knowingly set on fire.
Surrounding areas were also attacked and looted.
The SPLA-Torit was in pursuit of Riek Machar himself; they pursued him
from Kongor on March 27 to Kuac Deng and then to Ayod. SPLA-Torit
Commander Bior, in charge of that incursion into Nuer territory, said that Garang's
forces believed that if they could capture Riek, the SPLA-Nasir would collapse and
they could win over the Nuer population. Their treatment of the Nuer living in the
area, however, belies any strategy of winning them over. Those who could not
escape the sudden attacks often were killed.
In Ayod, the SPLA-Torit attacked a weak population, in part because it
was supporting an SPLA-Nasir garrison; in December 1992, a visitor noted that the
SPLA-Nasir troops in Ayod were "living entirely off the population who are
manifestly unable to provide,"170 an abuse of the civilian population. The
malnutrition rate of children under five was 40 percent by late January, 1993. The
situation in Ayod was "critical, with daily arrivals of more displaced in search of
food. Families in the area have little or no food, except for Lalob (a wild fruit),
which contains little carbohydrates and no proteins."171 Of the 12,000 in Ayod,
10,000 had come from surrounding areas.
The situation worsened in March, when a head count estimated "20,200
people, the worst affected of whom are Dinka and Nuer refugees from the south.
Deaths continue at a rate of between ten and thirteen people per day, mainly
amongst the elderly."172
The Centers for Disease Control and U.S. AID assessed mortality in Ayod
in March 1993. The CDC concluded that "the prevalence rates of severe
undernutrition in Ayod were among the highest ever documented, and that the
average daily crude mortality rate during February-March 1993 was similar to that
in Baidoa, Somalia, during November-December 1992."173 The CDC attributed the

170
The garrison had reportedly been eating "nothing but meat," for months,
referring to slaughter of the partial civilian herds that remained. The people said that
"since fighting began cattle have had to breed with sick stock and the major portion of
livestock have died."

171
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 33, February 1993, p. 4.

172
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 35, February 21-March
24, 1993, pp. 2-3.

173
CDC, "Nutrition and Mortality Assessment, Southern Sudan," pp. 306-07.
216 Civilian Devastation

recent increase in the crude mortality rate in part to the suspension of food airlifts
during an eighteen-day period in February.174 That the death rate could increase so
much due to a short gap in food deliveries underlines how precariously life hung in
the balance.
Only a few weeks after the CDC assessment, on April 2, 1993, the SPLA-
Torit forces attacked Ayod, causing another suspension in food deliveries and
greatly compounding the disaster by outright killing, burning and looting as well as
by disrupting the flow of relief food. The SPLA-Torit occupied Ayod for eight or
nine days, then withdrew.

174
Ibid. The airlift was suspended for mechanical reasons.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 217

Many of the killings, committed as the troops entered Ayod, appeared to

have been motivated by tribal hatred; some Dinka who had fled to Ayod to join
Nuer relatives were excoriated by the SPLA-Torit forces because they had aligned
themselves with the Nuer. A twenty-five-year-old Dinka woman, displaced from
Duk Fadiat in 1991, said Garang's forces burned her house, with four sick female
relatives inside who were unable to run away and burned to death.175 The soldiers
knew that the women victims were Dinka; they shouted at them that they had "sided
with the Nuer." Four children, two boys and two girls, were taken captive. She saw
women being raped and afterwards killed. She fled to Wau village.
A thirty-year-old Dinka man, displaced from Duk Fadiat in early 1992,
said the Garang soldiers trapped his uncle and the husband of his sister inside their
Ayod hut and burned them to death. They also burned his house, clothes, cooking
utensils, and other personal possessions. As this witness was running away, he saw
Garang's soldiers push approximately twenty Dinka inside one tukl and set fire to it
while shouting at the people inside that they were "Nuer now," and they would have
to die.176
A church official in Ayod witnessed soldiers looting people inside the
Presbyterian church and then setting it on fire. An estimated thirty-eight people died
in the blaze. It was also reported that the Catholic church was burned with people
inside.
A Nuer woman from Bentiu lost her thirty-eight-year-old husband, who
was "sick with malaria and could not run" when the fighters reached them; she fled
with their six children. Garang's soldiers lit her house on fire, and her husband was
consumed by the flames. "Many others died this way," she said.
She fled with her children to Wau village, which was attacked shortly
thereafter by Garang's forces. Her husband's brother was among those shot and
killed in Wau. The cattle this woman and her children had managed to bring with

175
Also burned inside the house were her family's food stocks and clothes.

176
Commander Thomas Duoth of SPLA-Nasir and others were claiming that the
border Dinka were "really Nuer" as early as October-December, 1991. Perhaps SPLA-
Torit accepted this claim.
218 Civilian Devastation

them from Bentiu and Ayod were seized in Wau by the soldiers, who looted all the
cattle in Wau. Her family fled again, this time to Rakyen village, where they were
safe but destitute.
SPLA-Torit remained in Ayod for nine days and withdrew. Rory Nugent, a
journalist traveling with SPLA-Nasir/United, entered Ayod after SPLA-Torit
departed. He wrote the following account of the devastation:

Ayod no longer exists. Every home has been burned. Circles and
rectangles of charred earth are all that remain. There is no
thatched church there any more.

The feeding centre run by the Irish group Concern turned into a
crematorium when troops loyal to rebel leader John Garang
stormed the area. A total of 122 skulls were found in heaps of
ashes and bones when troops backing the rival Christian faction
of Riek Machar regained control.177

The U.N. stopped flights on April 2 and only resumed them a few weeks
later. Outside relief workers returning to Ayod saw that Ayod has been razed and
everything looted and burned to the ground, including the U.N. compound. About
twenty-five bodies were found near the airstrip, and some inside the burnt tukls.
They found only 200 civilians and 200 SPLA-Nasir/United soldiers in Ayod. They
estimated there were another 10,000 people at a distance of one or two hours' walk.
Anti-personnel mines had been planted around the remains of the U.N. compound.
An OLS headcount on May 30 revealed that civilians had returned to
Ayod; there were an estimated 4,500 people there, compared to 20,000 before the
fighting, and 25,000 still in the surrounding county.178

177
Rory Nugent, "Feeding center destroyed in Sudan massacre," The Observer
London), May 16, 1993, p. 15.

178
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 37, April 24 - May 31,
1993, p. 4.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 219

Yuai, Created by SPLA-Nasir, Attacked by SPLA-Torit on April 16, 1993

The SPLA-Torit bears the responsibility for indiscriminately attacking
Yuai and then deliberately killing civilians found still inside the village, all in
violation of the rules of war. The SPLA-Nasir/United, however, bears some
responsibility for the deaths, since it directed displaced persons to move there,
knowing it was a frontline area, and then placed its headquarters there, thus
exposing the civilians to the likelihood of attack.179 This does not in any fashion
excuse, however, the SPLA-Torit's brutal attack on the civilians of Yuai.
SPLA-Torit forces swept on from Ayod to attack Yuai on April 16, 1993,
continuing their pursuit of Commander Riek. An observer noted that a rocket hit the
U.N. compound in Yuai five minutes before Riek was to be interviewed there.
Right before the attack, Yuai's population was estimated at 15,000; over
7,000 people had just arrived, mainly from the south.180 They were drawn to Yuai
by the availability of relief food.
From a height, journalist Rory Nugent watched the attack on Yuai:

I hurriedly climbed aboard a truck at Yuai as a series of rocket-

propelled grenades exploded inside a U.N. feeding centre. . . .

For the next 28 hours, I watched the entire surviving population

of Yuai, more than 22,000 people, walk by me in single file.181

He saw the SPLA-Torit troops in action inside Yuai:

Most of the enemy troops head directly for the U.N. complex. A
series of mortar rounds and grenades land squarely inside the
feeding center and clinic, which, being built of straw, go up in
flames within seconds. We're downwind, and it's not long before
the fetor of burning flesh and hair engulfs us. Earlier in the day, I

179
See below in this Chapter.

180
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 35, February 21-March
24, 1993, p. 4.

181
Rory Nugent, "Feeding centre destroyed," p. 15.
220 Civilian Devastation

visited the compound. . . . More than 100 people were laid out in
the medical compound, and another 1600 were living in the
feeding center. Horror-struck, I stare at the aid station now as
war transforms it into a crematorium.182

A thirty-two-year-old Dinka woman was carrying water from a well when

Garang's forces attacked. She ran after seeing soldiers in vehicles and on foot
shooting. They killed "many people" including her husband's sister and uncle, with
guns. Her tukl was burned along with the rest of the town. All of her clothes,
cooking utensils, and a little meat were all burned inside her tukl.
A fifty-year-old Nuer man said that during the attack Garang's forces began
shooting randomly, killing four female relatives: his twenty-eight-year-old daughter,
shot in the stomach when she was tukl carrying her infant daughter, who was also
killed, another daughter of the witness, and the daughter of his brother. "The sick
and old of Yuai were brought into the center of town and slaughtered; many had
their heads cut off with pangas," he said. His disabled sister was beheaded. The
witness said that the villagers later found the bones of 110 people who were burned
alive inside their tukls. All the livestock was looted.
His family (he had five wives and twenty children) and other families had
been preparing to plant. He had received seeds from UNICEF and grain from the
U.N. was stored inside his tukls. The seeds were looted and loaded on lorries. Some
Yuai people were captured and forced to porter supplies to Pathai, between Waat
and Yuai. He had heard that after carrying goods to Pathai, the porters were killed;
they never returned.
A fifteen-year-old Nuer said Garang's forces surrounded Yuai the night
before and attacked in the early morning. The boy heard the sound of gunfire and
ran outside his tukl. A soldier shot and killed his father from behind. His twenty-
five-year-old brother was shot and killed also. The witness and his friend lost 105
cattle, a few sheep, and fishing nets. The soldiers took all these possessions.
Rory Nugent, the journalist traveling with SPLA-Nasir/United, entered
Yuai after the SPLA-Torit withdrew and wrote the following account of the attack:

182
Rory Nugent, "Sudan: Rebels of the Apocalypse," Men's Journal, September
1993, p. 12.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 221

At Yuai . . . where the two rebel factions did most of their

fighting, I gave up my inspection after viewing dozens of bodies
uncovered from their shallow graves. The old, the weak and the
young, all those unable to flee, were butchered.183

183
Rory Nugent, "Feeding centre destroyed," p. 15.
222 Civilian Devastation

Three German journalists also reported that Yuai had been overrun on
April 16 and the U.N. compound destroyed in the first round of fire, and
subsequently torched. A U.N. overflight on April 20 near Yuai confirmed it was
burned out and that about 25,000 people were heading east.184
For safety reasons, the U.N. closed its operations in Ayod, Yuai, and Waat
for more than two weeks. Nugent commented on the humanitarian aspects of this
series of attacks:

It was a dire period for more than 70,000 people left to fend for
themselves by eating leaves and roots. No one had shelter, few
wore clothes, and the wet season was about to begin.

It was impossible to move without stumbling on corpses and

skeletons. I can only guess at the number of people who died in
this 17-day period, but one in seven strikes me as a conservative
estimate.185

Unfortunately, such attacks had become the rule in south Sudan. These particular
ones were exceptional only because so many foreigners saw the aftermath.

Pagau and Pathai Attacked by SPLA-Torit from April-May 1993

In April, 1993, the forces of Garang retreating from the Yuai attack passed
through Pagau, indiscriminately and deliberately attacking the civilian population
and looting their possessions. Nugent, the journalist traveling with the SPLA-
Nasir/United forces, took pictures after the departure of SPLA-Torit:

Walking from Waat to Ayod, I took pictures of what was left of

massacre victims, most of them women split in half by a machete,

184
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 36, March 24-April 23,
1993, p. 3.

185
Rory Nugent, "Feeding centre destroyed," p. 15.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 223

their legs spread apart and sticks from the baskets they used to
carry on their heads shoved up their vaginas.

In the village of Pathai, not a building was left standing.

Foxholes dug by the troops had been filled with bodies and
covered with dirt by Riek's men on cleaning up after Garang's
troops had fled. There were scores of these mounds....

Fifteen miles from Pathai, in the village of Paguea, the bodies of

32 women were laid out in line, each shot in the head at close
range. In nearby Parvai, I photographed 19 bodies that had been
bludgeoned to death.

As we kept walking, more and more bodies littered the way.

Famine victims were usually found singly under a tree; war
casualties were grouped together, their bones picked clean and
then bleached by an unblinking equatorial sun.186

A Nuer man, whose cattle survived the SPLA-Torit attack of February

1992, because they were grazing in another area, lost the livestock in Pagau where
the Garang soldiers finally looted it in the April 1993, attack. It seemed to this
witness that the attackers' sole intention was to raid cattle.
After retreating with the cattle, according to another resident of Pagau,
Garang's forces returned to Pagau on May 1, 1993. They came in vehicles, and
reportedly captured many women and raped and killed them. Many children in the
village were killed. Garang's soldiers burned the village down again; they also
burned the crops.

Mogogh Area Attacked by SPLA-Torit in April 1993

Commander George Asar of the SPLA-Torit left his Atar base and passed
from north to south to reinforce Garang in Ayod in April 1993. On the way to Ayod,
passing through Mogogh, the forces reportedly shot civilians, looted cattle, and
abducted women.
When the Garang forces left Ayod in April 1993, some of Commander
George Asar's forces returned north to the Atar base, passing through Timerial and

186
Ibid.
224 Civilian Devastation

Manial, burning these villages again and killing more people, according to civilians.

The SPLA-Torit forces reached Timerial early in the morning. Villagers

were not yet fully resettled in Timerial; many were still in the toic. However, the
elderly had returned early to prepare the farms for cultivation. The attackers stayed
only a few hours, took the cattle from Timerial, and proceeded through the forest.
The Timerial residents returned immediately after the raid and found bodies of the
elderly in the fields where they were farming and others inside houses. They found
the grain looted and the contents of the huts burned.

Gar and Surrounding Villages Attacked by SPLA-Torit in April 1993

SPLA-Torit burned and looted villages north of Ayod in April and also
killed many civilians. An elderly chief of Gar, a village about twenty kilometers
north of Ayod, said that the villagers fled after seeing other villages burning.187 The
chief saw the attackers, who rode in trucks and were wearing dark-colored
uniforms. They were "Dinka from Bahr El Ghazal," he said. Twelve of his family
were killed along with many others from other families. He escaped and spent ten
hours away from the village. Upon his return, he found that some of his family
members had been killed with bullets, and others with pangas (spears). Five of his
dead relatives were civilian men; three were children aged ten years to infancy; and
the other four were women. Two of the children were killed with bullets and one
with a panga.
The attackers spent four days in other villages roaming around and killing
people. They destroyed the borehole at Wau village from which Gar village
previously drew its water. No buildings in Gar were left standing. The SPLA-Torit
soldiers burned the small quantities of grain and seeds that had been stored.
Twenty cattle were taken from the witness, which he had received when his
daughter married subsequent to a 1991 raid in which he lost his prior herd. He again
had nothing left. "That is why we go to the U.N.," he said.

Accountability for SPLA-Torit Attacks on Ayod and Yuai in April 1993

187
The villages that were burning were Bol, Tem, Gung, Jiak Guar, Wai, Maluang,
and Juglei.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 225

Evasion is the method used by both the SPLA-Torit and SPLA-

Nasir/United when confronted with serious human rights abuses by their own
troops. The SPLA-Torit has not investigated or punished any of the extremely
abusive behavior of its troops set forth above, including deliberate killings of
hundreds of civilians, destruction of their homes, and widespread looting, even
though evidence of it was, for once, witnessed and reported by foreigners soon after
the events.
SPLA-Torit Commander Bior denied killing civilians. He claimed that
there was a forty-five-minute fight in the evening in Ayod, after which his forces
entered Ayod and stayed for nine days. When asked how Ayod was burned to the
ground, he claimed that Commander Riek "was using tracer bullets at night to attack
us. The houses caught fire. The Riek forces came up to the airport, to the trenches."
It is implausible that every hut in the village where 12,000 had lived would be
burned to the ground as a result of tracer bullets. The huts were too widely
dispersed for a fire to have spread in such a manner. Furthermore, the SPLA-Torit
admits it remained in Ayod nine days after the attack. It is not likely it would have
remained in a destroyed outpost. It appears that the SPLA-Torit set fire to the huts
and left Ayod when they heard that SPLA-Nasir/United Commander Riek could be
found in nearby Yuai. Commander Bior said that Ayod is strategic to the
SPLA-Torit from a military point of view because the Khartoum regime forces pass
through Ayod to conduct dry season offenses, as in 1992. That Ayod's garrison
might at certain times be a legitimate military target does not confer license to kill
civilians and loot and burn their property after capturing the garrison.
226 Civilian Devastation

Cease-fire Agreement on May 28, 1993

The U.S. ambassador to Sudan in Khartoum, Donald Petterson, made his
second visit to south Sudan in April, 1993. He later called a press conference in
Nairobi, and said,
"Washington will continue to condemn the military operations in the
Kongor, Ayod, Yuai, and Waat area, which manifest a contemptuous disregard for
the relief programme and a callous disregard for lives of starving people."188
He said that a promise from Garang not to initiate further military action beyond
Kongor had turned out to be "meaningless." As a result, the ambassador added, the
severely malnourished women and children he saw on his previous trip to Kongor
weeks earlier were "gone and most likely dead."189
Under this pressure, the two SPLA factions agreed to withdraw all their
military personnel from an area delineated by a forty-five-mile radius from the
airstrips at Ayod, Kongor, Waat and Yuai, by June 5, 1993. They also agreed not to
hinder the humanitarian relief efforts in the area, and to guarantee the continued
safety of the relief workers and their property there. This agreement was signed in
the presence of Amb. Petterson.190 It was broken only a few weeks later, apparently
by the SPLA-Torit.
It seems that neither side withdrew their military personnel from the area
as promised. Commander Riek said that the subject of the militias did not come up
in the negotiations on the demilitarized zone and that they did not consider that the

188
UNICEF, "Emergency Programme Status, Sudan, April 1993," (New York:
UNICEF 1993), p. 2.

189
Ibid.

190
Agreement signed by Commander Simmon Mori Didumo for SPLA-Nasir and
Commander John Kong Nyuon for SPLA-Torit in the presence of Donald Petterson,
U.S. Ambassador to Sudan, on May 28, 1993.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 227

agreement covered the militia forces. "The militia is for the defense of the
population. They live in their own homes with arms. They are subject to discipline,"
he said. Militias are not police; SPLA-Nasir/United has a small police force
deployed in the Waat, Ayod, and U.N. areas, he added, commenting that he was
rather surprised that the subject of the militias did not come up in the negotiations.
SPLA-Torit claimed that the SPLA-Nasir/United did not pull its troops
back and was advancing south along the Duk Ridge when the SPLA-Torit troops
attacked. The SPLA-Nasir/United claims that it moved down to meet SPLA-Torit
when the latter advanced towards Ayod. The SPLA-Torit accused the other faction
of always trying to "stab us in the back" when SPLA-Torit is engaged around Juba.

Pagau Attacked Again by SPLA-Torit in June 1993

On or about June 8, 1993, Garang's forces attacked Pagau yet again. This
time they shot and killed a number of civilians, not only in Pagau but also in
surrounding villages. For example, twenty-five people reportedly were killed in
Pading village, twenty in Lek village, and ninety-five in Pagau village, for a total of
140 deaths. No livestock remained.

Second Attack on Yuai by SPLA-Torit on June 16, 1993

Garang's forces attacked Yuai again in June, causing many casualties
among the civilians who had moved back when the U.N. resumed food deliveries to
Yuai. A witness reported that the entire family of a friend was wiped out. The
friend, his wife, two daughters, one son, and father were all asleep when soldiers
entered their tukl, split their heads open with pangas, and then burned the tukl.
Another man's uncle was shot and killed. Most people ran to the bush, and
many drowned in the river. "After the second attack, many people died of hunger,"
the man said. Many others were shot. The bones of forty-five people were found
after this attack. Yuai was "burned to ashes."
A woman who had been burned out of her tukl in April returned to Yuai
with her family in May. In the June attack she tried to run but was captured along
with her two sons. She was forced to lie down on her stomach and was beaten
repeatedly on the legs and back with sticks. She and her older son then were made
porters; the boy carried looted cooking utensils for Garang's troops. Over thirty
others were taken captive with them. In a village called Mut, they were asked, "Who
wants to return to Yuai?" Those who raised their hands were executed. Five
children and five women were beheaded there, including a woman and her three
children known to this witness.
The group of captives and Garang's forces encountered Riek's forces in
Keij village, northwest of Waat. Riek's forces attacked, but Garang's troops escaped
228 Civilian Devastation

with some cattle and captives. Three women were killed in the crossfire. The
witness escaped with her children and four other women, and were rescued by
Riek's forces.
Yuai was then deserted. A relief assessment team reported in September
1993, "The situation in Yuai remains unchanged since the village was burned down
during fighting. Only about 100 people remain in town; most have moved to rural
areas."191

Tip Village Attacked by SPLA-Torit in June 1993

Tip village, a two-hour walk north of Ayod, was not attacked until June
1993, after the second attack on Yuai. A Nuer man was in his tukl when Garang's
forces surrounded Tip, taking eight men and women captive. Seven people were
tortured, including a man who was shot in the leg, left on the ground, and died three
days later.
Garang's forces burned the village, including the witness's house, and took
all of the cattle. The residents were left only with the desire for revenge. "If there is
fighting against Garang again, we will go if we get guns. I cannot go anywhere
because I have lost everything," said one villager.

Kongor/Panyakur Attacked Again by SPLA-Nasir/United in July 1993

After a lull in the fighting, Kongor was attacked in late July 1993 by the
SPLA-Nasir/United forces. This was the sixth time in two years that the town had
come under attack. The population fled and has never returned. A U.N. assessment
team in late August 1993 that noted that the population was "small, predominantly
male and armed. Assessment teams view roughly 20 women and children."192 Some
2,000 people reportedly appeared for food distributions and then returned to live

191
U.S. AID/OFDA Sudan Situation Report no. 6 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. AID,
September 10, 1993), p. 6.

192
U.N. Situation Report, Khartoum, July 29-August 25, 1993, p. 3.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 229

outside of the town. Many, perhaps some 15,000, migrated to Paliau for a food
distribution there in mid-August.193

193
Ibid.
230 Civilian Devastation

Because the rainy season was hampering food airlifts, relief agencies were
having trouble maintaining a continuous supply of food,194 but a large influx of
displaced continued to move toward Waat, the only area in Upper Nile receiving
food on a regular basis. The population in Waat tripled in the three months of June,
July, and August, 1993, with 2,500 new arrivals during the first week of August,
1993. The total population of Waat in August reached 53,600.195

SPLA FOOD POLICIES

ABUSIVE OF THE CIVILIAN POPULATION

Many southern Sudanese complained to HRW/Africa about the SPLA

taking food from them. The SPLA obtains food from a variety of sources, including
voluntary contributions from civilians. The SPLA also obtains food through
legitimate commerce. Some local garrisons produce food, as one observer saw in
Pok Tap.
HRW/Africa found, however, the following abuses by the SPLA factions
in connection with food supply:

1. SPLA soldiers stealing food from civilians under their jurisdiction, either
independently of any orders or with the tacit approval of a local
commander;
2. looting cattle and stealing grain from civilians under the jurisdiction of the
other side, usually accompanied by violence-- often considered "war
booty," it is no more than pillage;
3. forced unpaid farm labor on SPLA-organized farms;
4. requisitioning or "taxing" of produce and/or animals from productive
farmers by force, sometimes according to a quota system and sometimes
arbitrarily;

194
U.S. AID/OFDA Sudan Situation Report no. 5, May 26, 1993, p. 4.

195
U.S. AID/OFDA Sudan Situation Report No. 6, September 10, 1993, p. 6.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 231

5. requisitioning or "taxing" food from individual emergency relief

recipients, including women and children, often under compulsion;
6. diverting relief supplies at their source;
7. displacing the civilian population for reasons related to the conflict, that is,
to locate civilians in dangerous but militarily significant areas in order to
draw relief supplies there.

HRW/Africa was unable to determine the extent and duration of the food-
related abuses, but the complaints from southern Sudanese civilians and the
observations of food monitors suggest that the abuses persist. HRW/Africa was also
unable to quantify the amounts of food involved, but from a human rights
perspective, any forcible taking of food from civilians by a party to the conflict is
illegitimate.
The government itself is guilty of food-related violations, including
frequent arbitrary refusal to grant access by relief agencies to needy populations.
The government is also guilty of diverting or permitting its army officers to engage
in large-scale diversion of relief food.196 The SPLA's violations by no means justify
the government in denying access to relief food, which in south Sudan has kept
alive hundreds of thousands of people, despite some diversion.

Background
The Maoist doctrine that has conferred a mythical status on guerrilla
armies has obscured, to outsiders at least, some of the practices of predatory
guerrilla armies.197 The SPLA factions do not act as if they are bound by Mao's rule,
"Do not steal from the people."198 Indeed, the SPLA was brought into existence by
political factors which were largely independent of the Cold War.

196
Food manipulation by the government continues to follow the patterns described
in the prior Africa Watch report, Denying the Honor of Living, and in de Waal,
"Starving out the South."

197
"Although some parties to conflict in Africa frequently use the rhetoric of national
liberation, their practice on the ground often challenges the conventional (Maoist)
wisdom that, in order to operate, a guerilla movement needs the support of local people.
An extreme case is represented by RENAMO in Mozambique . . . ". Duffield, "The
emergence of two-tier welfare in Africa," p. 143.

198
Mao Tse-Tung, On Guerrilla Warfare (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1961), p.
92.
232 Civilian Devastation

The second Sudanese civil war, unlike the first, began as a military revolt
whereby a Sudanese army battalion defected to Ethiopia where, with some guerrilla
groups, the SPLA was formed. Under Mengistu's supervision, it created base camps
and received military training for a large army, which was supplied with arms,
including artillery and vehicles, by Ethiopia's Soviet sponsors. For the most part,
this SPLA did not grow up inside Sudan in small groups dependent on the help of
local civilians.199
Feeding an army as large as the SPLA, which numbered at least several
tens of thousands, presents tremendous difficulties. In southern Sudan's subsistence
economy, food takes on particular importance.
One scholar noted the structural connection between war and famine:

199
"During the first war, Anya-Nya I forces would go to the chief and ask for food.
SPLA forces, by contrast, split up into twos and threes and go around directly to village
tukls demanding food to be cooked for them," said an Equatorian man. Although other
observers note that civilians were looted by Any-Nya I in the first civil war, many
Equatorian civilians today perceive a sharp difference in the practices of the two
guerrilla armies.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 233

Internal war in Africa is fought through groups whose existence

is largely based upon different forms of semi-subsistence.
Modern conflict arises not as a process of regulation and
adaptation but from the growing crises within governance and
semi-subsistence. This instability has increased since the 1970s.
Modern warfare, moreover, proceeds not by resolving tensions
but by massively increasing imbalances and disparities between
groups. It does so because the political economy of internal war
dictates that systems of semi-subsistence are both targets and
points of defence. . . . Conflict in Africa should not, therefore, be
seen as a secondary or separate issue. It is an emergent trend
which is increasingly influencing the growth of food
insecurity.200

In part, the SPLA's food problem was solved in Ethiopia while Mengistu
was in power. He gave the SPLA, rather than relief agencies, the ultimate authority
in the Sudanese refugee camps, and there was considerable overestimation of the
numbers of refugees and diversion of food aid.201 The Ethiopian camps, particularly
Itang, became commercial centers for some areas of southern Sudan along the
border and Sobat basin. They played a role in replacing the Arab traders who were
the backbone of the south Sudan commercial economy but who pulled out of the
smaller towns when the second civil war broke out.202 Elsewhere in the south,
commercial networks were also established near border areas (Kordofan, Uganda,
Kenya, for instance).
This Itang network collapsed after the fall of Mengistu, the evaporation of
the refugee camps, and the flight of the refugees back to Sudan. Getting food to the

200
Duffield, "The emergence of two-tier welfare in Africa," p. 144.

201
Jean, Life, Death and Aid, p. 20.

202
See Scott-Villiers, Repatriation of Sudanese Refugees," p. 204.
234 Civilian Devastation

repatriatees, displaced in their own country, became a much more difficult task for
the U.N. and NGOs. Each shipment had to be tortuously negotiated with the
government, which apparently took as its principal military strategy blocking all
relief supplies to civilians living in the vast SPLA areas of southern Sudan.

Stealing Food from Civilians

Stealing from civilians has been a persistent abuse committed by the SPLA
factions. The abuse appears to occur more frequently in areas where there is a tribal
difference between the troops and the civilian population, making it is a particular
problem in Equatoria. A Kuku (Equatorian) man complained that the SPLA policy
"had always been to acquire everything the soldier needs through his gun."
For instance, an SPLA-Torit recruit from southern Blue Nile province
admitted that in 1992 he and his SPLA-Torit unit would loot food and livestock,
especially in the Equatorian villages around Magwe, Parajok, and Nimule. On June
2, 1992, his unit, led by Capt. Manyang, reached Magwe. Maj. Paul Kop ordered
troops to look for food in Magwe. They looted grain from people, including an old
man who argued that he had nothing else left. The soldiers beat the old man and
took three hens from him.
An Acholi man from Magwe said that people try to cultivate, but "Garang's
forces constantly steal food and crops."203 Another Equatorian reported that when
the SPLA soldiers were traveling in groups, they would force villagers to cook for
them, usually meat, and threaten the villagers if they refused. The Sudan People's
Revolutionary Laws, SPLM/ SPLA Punitive Provisions 1983, ("Sudan Code") at
section 34 (2), provides up to the death penalty for any SPLA soldier or related
organization "who compels citizens to surrender food material, money, domestic
animals, articles of dress, or articles for sleeping on, or in." Theft is also punished
by up to a death sentence if the value of the property is more than one million
Sudanese pounds, in SPLA Code, Section 40 (1). It is not clear that these provisions
have been enforced.

Looting from Civilians Under Enemy Control

203
This practice was stopped in one area near Kajo Kaji in 1992 when the chiefs
threatened to go into exile if the local commander allowed it to go on.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 235

Both SPLA factions are guilty of looting or pillaging civilian property. As

already set forth elsewhere in the report, looting or pillaging is a particularly severe
problem for civilians living in areas of military conflict. The looting or pillaging
occurs during or immediately after an armed engagement and is inflicted on
civilians living in "enemy" territory, distinguishing the abuse from stealing food in
territory that is controlled by the troops who do the stealing.
All too often, as is illustrated in this report, looting or pillaging occurs
during a raid on a village or a cattle camp in which there is no military engagement
and no legitimate military target. The looting often is not a collateral effect of
military activities, but the main military objective.
The factions attempt to justify this as a form of "war booty" for those full-
or part-time combatants who participate in the raid. Indeed, the SPLA Code,
Section 25 (4), treats as SPLM revenue property "captured from the enemy or
enemy's agents." The rules of war do not permit looting or pillaging.204

204
See Appendix A.
236 Civilian Devastation

Forced Farm Labor

Under humanitarian law, the SPLA's practice of using force or the threat of
force to compel civilians to serve as unpaid farm labor is illegal. The practice has a
precedent in Sudanese history, but this fact does not excuse its continuation in
modern times in the face of changed international law.
The SPLA tried to devise agricultural schemes that would permit its army a
degree of self-sufficiency closer to the front lines. Such schemes are not abuses in
and of themselves, but the use of forced, unpaid labor on such farms is.205 For
example, one man told HRW/Africa that it was the SPLA practice around Kajo Kaji
to require civilians to work on the SPLA farms without pay. "If you didn't
voluntarily participate, the SPLA would bring you by force and give you a large
area to clear. You would have to work every day until you were finished. Goats and
chickens would be taken also if you resisted."
The SPLA also used its own soldiers as farm workers. Although this does
not seem to rise to the level of forced labor where the soldiers were volunteers to
the SPLA, it nevertheless took on the appearance of forced labor because in at least
one farm the police manned the gate, the farm was surrounded by high mountains,
and there was only one road out, making escape difficult. An SPLA soldier from
Bentiu told HRW/Africa that he ended up working on this "state farm" after joining
the General Intelligence Section of the SPLA with an expectation of advanced
training. He was sent to this farm near Torit in January 1990. In the farm there were
1,560 "students," young and old. They were all men, no women, from all ethnic
groups, "even including Arabs." They spent only a few hours a day in class and the
rest of the day working on an SPLA farm, where work started at 6 A.M. and
continued to 12:45 P.M. They received limited food. "Prisoners got more food," he
claimed.
After six months, the students stopped studying and started cultivating full
time. Although assured by Commander Kol Manyang that the food would be
exported and the profits returned to the students, these men never saw any of the

205
Apparently there were some farms on which the original intention was to pay
laborers, but the farms were not successful. One witness said the SPLA recruited people
to work on SPLA farms in his region of Equatoria, but payments to laborers were
irregular and laborers were abused.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 237

profits from this enterprise. A clerk said they produced 298 sacks of onions and
never received any benefit from it. "We were there naked. We had no uniforms, no
clothes." The men were released from the farm to fight around Juba in April 1992.

Ugandans Used for Farm Labor in Khor Shum (Pakok)

A group of about 500-600 Ugandan army officers and soldiers fled across
the border to Sudan in 1985 as refugees, after a coup in Uganda. That border was
controlled by the SPLA. According to them, the SPLA gave them the choice of
joining a Ugandan rebel force based in SPLA territory, or being returned to
Uganda, where they feared persecution.206 Almost all these Ugandans accepted
joining the Ugandan rebel force and were sent to SPLA bases in Ethiopia for
training, along with other Ugandan men of military age who later fled to the SPLA-
controlled areas of Sudan as refugees. They never saw action in Uganda but were
used by the SPLA as forced labor that benefitted the SPLA.207
In February 1988 these Ugandan rebels were escorted by the SPLA on foot
from Ethiopia to the SPLA base in Khor Shum (renamed Pakok when thousands of
Sudanese repatriating refugees arrived in 1991), Upper Nile, Sudan, on the border
with Ethiopia. The Ugandan rebels built a camp where they stayed from February
1988 until November 1992. All Ugandans, prisoners and non-prisoners alike, were
assigned by the SPLA to plant crops and build the huts for a nearby SPLA base.

206
Below in this chapter, we condemn as illegal the choice presented by the SPLA to
the Ugandan refugees.

207
Some of these Ugandans were arrested by the SPLA and Ugandan rebel officers
and held in SPLA jails in Ethiopia and Sudan. (See below in this Chapter.)
238 Civilian Devastation

After Mengistu's overthrow, many of the Ugandans' crops were destroyed

when the first 40,000 Sudanese repatriated,208 but they managed to harvest some
crops in 1991. A U.N. worker observed that some of the root crops were harvested
and given to the repatriatees, but that most crops were taken away by the SPLA.209
The Ugandan area was off-limits to expatriates working in the relief effort,
and the Ugandans were not allowed to approach the foreigners. The Ugandans were,
however, required to build the airfield used for international food deliveries.

208
By the end of 1991 in Pakok the U.N. registered just under 10,000 repatriatees, of
whom 2,548 were unaccompanied minors.

209
That worker was unaware that the farmers were Ugandans.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 239

In 1992, the Ugandans planted a 300-acre SPLA-Torit farm near Khor

Shum (Pakok) for SPLA military use. SPLA-Torit soldiers also participated in the
planting, some soldiers standing guard while others planted sorghum, groundnuts,
cassava, potatoes, maize, and peas. The Ugandans were forbidden to eat this
"government" SPLA-Torit food, which was sent to the fronts.210

Taxation or Requisition of Food from Farmers

In the case of southern Sudan, the SPLA Code, section 25 (2), claims as
revenue of SPLM "[l]ocal taxation, the rate and value of which shall have regard to
the conditions of the people as approved by the Chairman." With few exceptions,
the factions have not provided governmental services to civilians living in areas of
rebel control.211 The taxation, which is in the form of grain or animals, is invariably
destined for the use of combatants. Under these circumstances, and especially
considering the extremely deprived conditions in which most southern Sudanese
live, HRW/Africa does not recognize the right of either faction to levy taxes on or

210
In mid-November 1992, the Ugandans were ordered to move because a
government attack on nearby Boma was anticipated. They were evacuated by an SPLA-
Torit task force of 300 soldiers.

211
Both factions have formed relief associations to administer internationally donated
funds, i.e., Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Association (SRRA, formed by SPLA-Torit)
and Relief Association of South Sudan (RASS, formed by SPLA-Nasir/United). When
the SPLA controlled more urban centers, before loosing them to the government in
1992, it attempted greater administration, including a rudimentary justice system.
240 Civilian Devastation

requisition food from those considered to have no surplus or to be in need by

objective criteria. When such taxation or requisition is accompanied by force or
threat of force, HRW/Africa considers those practices to be a violation of the rules
of war.
Taxation in food occurred in colonial times when tribute was collected by
chiefs in grain or cattle, and the SPLA used these earlier patterns of taxation as a
model. A former U.N. official told HRW/Africa that he had seen SPLA tax lists for
Ayod in Upper Nile in 1989-90 and 1990-91, levied by the court center, for both
grain and cattle; the chiefs were responsible for collecting both.212

212
On these lists, levies in cattle were 100 head per court centre. The tax in grain
varied from 240 to 435 sacks of grain, according to the size of the court center. One sack
weighed 90 kilos. It worked out to be about forty-eight sacks (4,320 kilos) per subchief.
At this time, very little relief food was reaching Ayod.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 241

The system or method of taxation seems to vary in its specifics from area
to area. Some if not all of the taxation system is at the discretion of the area's
military commander. For instance, as area commander of Western Upper Nile, Riek
introduced a tax in grain, ostensibly to protect the herds by making no demands for
cattle.213
In many areas, civilians take for granted the need to pay taxes in produce
or else to suffer some kind of punishment, usually confiscation of goods. For
instance, in one area of Equatoria, every family head had to provide to the SPLA
one tin of grain or cassava per month. If the family skipped a month, its required
contribution would be doubled the next month. If it failed to contribute for two
consecutive months, the SPLA would come and "loot everything they wanted from
the household."
As an SPLA-Nasir/United spokesman said in attempted justification of
taxation, "These people want the war fought against the northern government. They
cannot have their cake and eat it too. They must know the implications of their
politics. They say the north is oppressive, but you cannot fight the Arabs without
sacrifices of lives. In spite of the clumsiness of the SPLA, the war has the support of
the people. The alternative is submission to the Arabs." Nevertheless, HRW/Africa
considers the asserted right of taxation of such a deprived population to be
unconscionable.

213
A consistent complaint against all governments has been the levying of tribute or
fines in cattle.
242 Civilian Devastation

Requisition of Food from Emergency Relief Recipients

Taxation or requisitioning is even more objectionable when it is levied on
the recipients of emergency food and other relief. A relief official described a
situation in Nasir in which relief food was diverted by SPLA-Nasir soldiers going
house to house, taking food, medicine, and fishing materials, despite the presence of
twenty food monitors.
SPLA-Nasir/United officials say that their soldiers are men of the area who
are married and go home at night to eat from the relief rations given to the family.
As for food consumed on operations, they claimed that each soldier takes food
from home and finds food along the way: "People on the way contribute bulls,
goods, etc. For long operations, such as from Upper Nile to Equatoria or Bahr El
Ghazal, they pass through villages. They send word ahead that they need food and
people will contribute. In the past this food was taken by force, but that was
counterproductive."
As in all parts of the world, even starving civilians asked for
"contributions" by a large group of armed men know better than to refuse. It is
abusive for the factions to seek food contributions from those whose principal
source of food is emergency relief.
It is also an abuse of international good will for any party to divert food
from the intended civilian beneficiaries of international relief. In 1994 the projected
emergency relief needs for the Sudan are $279 million,214 no small sum.215 Most of

214
OLS (Southern Sector), "UNICEF and WFP Request Urgent Funding for War-
Torn Southern Sudan," press release, Nairobi, Kenya, February 14, 1994.

215
The U.S. government has supplied humanitarian assistance to Sudan, and mostly
to southern Sudan, in the amounts of $60.2 million in fiscal 1992, $99.6 million in fiscal
1993, and $70.8 million so far in fiscal 1994 (October 1993 through May 1994, eight
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 243

that money is required for the southern population, where an estimated two million
people are extremely vulnerable because of recent crop failures and the long-term
breakdown of the economy and social services caused by ten years of war.216

Diversion and Stealing of Relief Supplies

Diversion of international emergency food relief before it reaches its
intended beneficiaries is another form of theft and an abuse of the civilian
population.
One medical relief organization bluntly described the practice:

months). U.S. AID/Bureau for Humanitarian Response/OFDA, Situation Report No. 11:
Sudan (Washington, D.C.: U.S.AID, May 24, 1994), p. 7. Some of this assistance is
destined for Sudanese refugees.

216
OLS (Southern Sector), "UNICEF and WFP Request Urgent Funding."
244 Civilian Devastation

The SPLA also plays a sinister game with relief food. For many
years it has fed its troops from international aid. UN food simply
disappeared into vast refugee camps in western Ethiopia, with no
accountability. In the south iteself, some NGOs argued that if the
SPLA soldiers were not fed, they would just plunder the local
population.217

The SPLA created a relief arm, the SRRA, and when the SPLA-Nasir was
formed it also created a relief arm, RASS. Their duties were to act as local
authorities and liaise with the U.N. and NGOs to carry out the delivery of relief
donations to needy civilians. Neither of these relief structures has any perceptible
independence from the local military commander, although many competent
individuals are associated with these efforts.
The OFDA concluded in 1993 about the government army and rebel
factions:

Although no hard figures are available, there continues to be

concern about food leakages and diversions. During certain
security incidents, some NGOs estimate that up to 80% of food
has been stolen by the militaries. While the U.N. contests these
figures, there are clearly cases of inadequate monitoring and
diversions. This is particularly the case when U.N./NGO staff
cannot remain in an area overnight.218

There was much anecdotal evidence of diversion by the SPLA parties and
even more such evidence of Sudan army diversion; it is impossible to quantify the
numbers involved. A Blue Nile SPLA soldier, later jailed for allegedly
sympathizing with Riek, said that in early 1992, before the displaced persons camp

217
Jean, Life, Death and Aid, p. 20.

218
OFDA "Humanitarian Relief Operations in Sudan, Trip Report, July 1993
(Washington, D.C.: U.S. AID), p. 18.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 245

was established in Atepi, relief food was brought to Opari. The SPLA soldiers
would come at night and take what they needed from the storehouse--food,
medicine, and cooking oil--back to Palataka or to the Juba front line. He claimed
that in June 1992, when 2,000 sacks of sorghum were stored under the trees, the
SPLA arrived the same night with orders to take the food to the front. When the
foreign relief agency arrived for the distribution to civilians the next morning, they
found only 150 sacks of sorghum. They were told that the SRRA "did the
distribution the night before."
On January 17, 1993, a commander from SPLA-Nasir held up a U.N.
convoy at Lake Jur and the following day seized three relief barges and their
emergency relief cargo on Lake Jur.219 This was by no means the only incident.
A relief worker in another area saw a list from the SPLA-Nasir to RASS
itemizing its needs, which RASS was directed to supply from relief goods. Another
relief worker who entered Bor in December 1991 found in one of the offices a radio
message from SPLA-Torit Commander Kuol Manyang to the SRRA doctor in
charge of the Bor hospital (dated just before the SPLA-Nasir attack on Bor),
ordering him to provide 20 percent of his medicines for a new military training
camp which had just been set up outside Torit.

Displacement of the Civilian Population for Reasons Related to the Conflict:

Yuai
The SPLA factions have sought to direct or encourage the movement of
displaced populations under their control to locations that are of military interest to

219
"Barge Convoy Seizure," Sudan Update, vol. 4, no. 10, (London: February 28,
1993), p. 4.
246 Civilian Devastation

them, in order to maintain U.N. food supplies--which they can then "tax"--coming
in to convenient locations near the front lines, thus saving days of portering by
soldiers or press-ganged civilians. Such practices violate the important rule that
civilians shall not be displaced for reasons connected with the conflict, as set forth
in Protocol II, article 17.220
A French medical organization working in Sudan observed:

220
Protocol II, article 17 (1):

The displacement of the civilian population shall not be ordered for

reasons related to the conflict unless the security of the civilians
involved or imperative military reasons so demand. Should such
displacements have to be carried out, all possible measures shall be
taken in order that the civilian population may be received under
satisfactory conditions of shelter, hygiene, health, safety and
nutrition.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 247

After the SPLA split in August 1991, the contending factions

have used relief suplies to attract civilians to the areas they
control, and to keep them there, while denying relief to the other
side.221

An egregious example of this violation is the SPLA-Nasir/United's

manipulation of the civilian population and the international relief program to create
a forward garrison in Yuai in 1993. The rebels accomplished their goal by ordering
civilians living in Waat to move to Yuai, some forty kilometers southwest, creating
a town of 15,000 where none existed before, right on the Nuer/Dinka border east of
the Duk Ridge, in a region where faction fighting had raged up and down. This was
a dangerous place for civilians. The SPLA-Nasir/United undertook to create this
mass migration of civilians knowing that concerned relief officials, aware of the
desperate plight of these displaced, would attempt to have food flown in to them,
and that other civilians would arrive, drawn by the magnet of relief food.222
Said one displaced person who went to Yuai in January 1993 at the urging
of the SPLA-Nasir commanders, "Now we are like flies. Wherever there is food
that is where we go."

221
Jean, Life, Death and Aid, p. 22.

222
South Sudanese who do not have food will walk for days to a place where they can
get food. People go where the food is, whether to trade in a market, to find work, to live
with relatives and, now, to receive relief food at landing strips where the U.N. or
nongovernmental organizations are said to be delivering it. The Nilotic population in
particular is quite mobile historically because of the environment. They are used to
moving with their cattle.
248 Civilian Devastation

As early as October 1992, Commander Riek urged the U.N. to deliver food
to Yuai, which he said was ideal for relocation from overcrowded Waat, because
Yuai had fishing and a dry season river. By January 1993, people were organized by
SPLA-Nasir/United and RASS to move south from Waat to Yuai, before any relief
had been provided to Yuai. UNICEF reported that RASS was planning for many
displaced in Waat, where the situation had actually improved, to move to Yuai. It
was expected that some 16,000 people would leave Waat to go to Yuai, where the
WFP plane was able to land.223 At the time, SPLA-Nasir/United controlled all three
points on the "Hunger Triangle" (Kongor, Ayod, and Waat) as well as Akobo to the
east. Riek moved his headquarters to Yuai during the first quarter of 1993.224

223
U.N. Special Coordinator, "Situation Report for Period 7 January - 10 February
1993" (Khartoum, Sudan: U.N., Office of the Special Coordinator of the U.N. Secretary
General for Emergency and Relief Operations in the Sudan), p. 6.

224
While the location of a military base near a population center is common enough
and not in itself a violation of the rules of war, placing Nasir faction headquarters in
this newly-created population center in a front line zone foreseeably exposed the
civilians to the likelihood of an SPLA-Torit attack on the headquarters.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 249

The WFP started airlift operations to Yuai on January 26, 1993, for a local
population of 3,564 that had sprung up, subsisting mainly on a diet of fruit and fish.
The officials set up a base in preparation for the expected further inflow.225
The displaced, as ordered or attracted by word of food arriving in Yuai,
poured in. A headcount on February 18, 1993, revealed a total of 7,048 people
living in and around Yuai. In March, the population increased to about 15,000 on
account of an influx mainly from the south.226 There is no doubt that the airlift of
food and medicine to the area created a draw for civilians. Many said they came to
this and other food delivery locations to "pick seeds from the airstrip." This refers
to scavenging by women of grains of maize that scatter when fifty-kilo bags are
airdropped and a small percentage of them split open on the ground.227 This has
become a common survival strategy.

225
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 33, January 22 -
February 5, 1993, pp. 3-4.

226
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 35, February 21 - March
24, 1993, pp. 4-5 .

227
Despite this loss, it is still more economical to air drop supplies than expend
expensive fuel landing and taking off. WFP or other food monitors on the ground watch
the airdrop and supervise movement of the bags of grain into a storage area. Obviously
the spilled food does not go to waste.
250 Civilian Devastation

SPLA-Torit forces made a surprise sweep into Yuai on April 16, 1993.
Right before the attack, Yuai's population was estimated at 15,000; over 7,000
people had just arrived, mainly from the food-deprived areas to the south.228
Probably hundreds of civilians died in the attack, their huts burned, and their cattle
looted. Their deaths are the direct responsibility of the SPLA-Torit attackers.
Nevertheless, SPLA-Nasir/United was also in violation of the rules of war.
Under international diplomatic pressure, the two SPLA factions agreed to
withdraw all their military personnel from an area encompassed by a forty-five-mile
radius from the aircraft landing fields at Ayod, Kongor, Waat and Yuai, by June 5,
1993. This was done to create safe areas for delivery of food. This strategy did not
work.
Civilians began to return to and rebuild Yuai. A Nuer man who fled Yuai
after the April attack returned in May because relief was going in. "I feel safe when
the U.N. is here," he reported, "because of the presence of expatriates."
On June 16, 1993, Garang's forces attacked Yuai again, despite the
pullback agreement. Again, many civilians perished; some fled to the bush, and
others ran to the river where they drowned, according to a witness. "After the
second attack, many people died of hunger." Yuai was "burned to ashes."
Yuai was then deserted. A relief assessment team reported in September
1993, that "[t]he situation in Yuai remains unchanged since the village was burned
down during fighting. Only about 100 people remain in town; most have moved to
rural areas."229

FORCED RECRUITMENT

The SPLA has conducted forcible recruitment campaigns (kashas, or

forcible rounding up) since at least the mid-1980s. Because many soldiers go home

228
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 35, February 21 - March
24, 1993, p. 4.

229
OFDA Sudan Situation Report No. 6, September 10, 1993, p. 6.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 251

when there is little or no fighting, kashas have coincided with military events and
often occur before major battles. Hence, kashas often involve rounding up
"deserters." There is little authority in international humanitarian law whereby
a rebel army may engage in forcible recruitment. Rebel roundups of deserters are
equally offensive.
Forced recruitment has long historical roots in Sudan and its practice by
the SPLA has changed over time and varies from region to region. In Bahr El
Ghazal and Upper Nile, where there has been a higher number of volunteers to fight
the Sudan government, there have been fewer complaints of forced recruitment. In
Equatoria, forced recruitment has been a more serious problem.
After the August 1991 split in the movement, the SPLA-Torit's
reintroduction of forced conscription in some parts of Equatoria further alienated an
already disgruntled population. SPLA-Torit recruitment occurred in Equatoria in
late 1991 to early 1992, perhaps for the dry season counteroffensive against the
SPLA-Nasir faction in Upper Nile and the expected government dry season
campaign. Some "deserters" were rounded back up in August 1992 after the major
SPLA-Torit thrusts into Juba. When Commander Willian Nyuon deserted from the
SPLA-Torit in Pageri in September, 1992, and took his troops east through southern
Torit, the SPLA-Torit rounded up men to chase him and perhaps to keep the locals
from joining his band as well.
For example, in September 1991, SPLA Commander Abraham Akoye and
the local chiefs held meetings in markets and other gathering places, encouraging
people to join the SPLA. Later that month, further meetings took place with the
SPLA and the chiefs to organize the kasha. A week later, groups of SPLA soldiers
went into the villages and deceived some of the young men by asking them for
"assistance with some work." When the young men complied, they were locked up
in the chiefs' headquarters in Kinyiba, Mondikolok, and Jalimo villages.
Thirty men were taken in the first sweep, but the soldiers found fewer as
time went on, as more people learned about the sweeps and hid in the forest. A
witness told HRW/Africa that he hid in the forest by himself during the day and
went home in the evening. Other men stayed full-time in the forest, and women
brought food to them. Many young men fled to Uganda.
In all, ninety young men from Kinyiba were picked up, held together, and
taken to a training camp at Pabanga, twenty-two miles from Kaya. Some escaped by
breaking the door to one of the cells.
Also in September 1991, the village headmen from Mere, four miles from
Kajo Kaji, were instructed to recruit five people each for the SPLA. When the
SPLA saw that the headmen were not succeeding, they publicly stated that there
would be no more recruiting, so "the people relaxed." Then, on November 5, 1991,
252 Civilian Devastation

SPLA soldiers went to the markets to arrest the young men. Some escaped, but
seventy-two others were taken, the youngest fourteen years old. Ten of the people
were from Mere; five escaped, but the other five have not been seen since.
A forty-year-old Kuku man from the Wudu area of Kajo Kaji described a
major kasha from December 1991 to January 1992, at about the time of the SPLA-
Torit counteroffensive into Upper Nile. The kasha was conducted within a three-
mile radius of Kajo Kaji; the SPLA-Torit cordoned off the area and rounded up the
young men. The forces took the property of some families to force them to produce
their men.
In January 1992, SPLA-Torit Commander James Wanni Igga called a
meeting in Kajo Kaji to end this kasha and apologize for the SPLA's actions. But, as
a Kuku man told HRW/Africa, "The damage was done. They had continuously
insulted the Kuku population, saying there is no room for anyone but soldiers in the
'New Sudan.' All of the professionals were told they were not valued or needed."230
Many Juba students fled to Uganda in January 1992 because of a school
boycott. Some of the students were intercepted outside Juba by the SPLA-Torit and
forcibly conscripted. The SPLA-Torit sent a group of them to Isoke, an SPLA-Torit
military training camp south of Torit. The SPLA tried to convince the boys to
undergo military training. Some who refused were "punished or beaten," according
to one of them. The rest, in fear, did not refuse. The boys were told that they would
be trained and that after they completed the training they would be "free to go."
A training group which numbered 141 started training on February 26,
1992. After two-and-a-half months in training, the Catholic church interceded and
fifty-seven seminarians in the group were freed.
In August 1992 after the battle for Juba, the SPLA-Torit initiated another
kasha in Magwe in which they targeted a list of deserters. The soldiers beat people
to force them to disclose the whereabouts of the alleged deserters. They also took
belongings from people, which they would not return until the alleged deserters
turned themselves in.
In early 1993 during the SPLA-Torit offensive into Upper Nile more
recruits were sought in Equatoria.
In February 1993, the SPLA also came to Kansuk in the Kajo Kaji area
looking for a list of deserters. If the deserter was not found, they would hold his
wife or grown-up child until he reported. Also in February 1993, relief officials on a
site visit to the Atepi camp were told that there were few people there because many

230
In other areas and at other times, the SPLA has specifically attempted to recruit or
draft skilled workers.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 253

young men fled to the bush after the SPLA-Torit began "rounding up" recruits for
the eastern front.
In March 1993, the SPLA went looking for deserters in Kinyiba village
near Kajo Kaji, located one deserter, looted two of his goats and five of his
chickens, and took him, along with his gun, to be re-trained. After a month he
escaped to his village.
Sensing (correctly) that a government offensive was imminent on the West
Bank in July 1993, the SPLA-Torit faction undertook a kasha in the Nimule area
and the Ame/Aswa/Atepi (Triple A) displaced persons camps. People reported
seeing hundreds of "deserters" rounded up and held in Nimule before being moved
to the front. A twenty-eight-year-old Ugandan refugee said that twenty-one
Ugandans and a U.N. employee from a UNHCR refugee camp for Ugandans in the
Nimule area were rounded up in this five-day kasha, during which hundreds of
Sudanese men were similarly captured. The SPLA reportedly walked into the
UNHCR camp and took the twenty-one Ugandans, and brought them to Kurki near
Juba to identify whether they were deserters. The SPLA released those that were not
deserters, but some were kept.
At midnight on July 3, 1993, SPLA-Torit forces broke into the U.N.
compound in Nimule, beat up the guard, woke up and pointed their guns at U.N.
relief workers (in violation of the agreed-upon on U.N./SPLA-Torit guidelines for
relief worker protection), and searched the compound for deserters. The
International Rescue Committee compound in Nimule was similarly invaded, as was
the nearby compound of the New Sudan Council of Churches, where a catechist was
beaten up.
After receiving a prompt complaint about this breach of U.N. agreements
by a visiting U.S. Congressional delegation led by Rep. Harry Johnston, SPLA-
Torit local Commander Salva Kiir told OLS officials that the officer responsible for
entering the U.N. and NGO compounds had been detained and would be punished.
Finally, according to Ugandan witnesses, the SPLA in 1985 and later gave
some Ugandan refugees, primarily Ugandan army soldiers and officers, a choice:
either join a Ugandan rebel force the SPLA was sponsoring, or be forcibly sent back
to Uganda. This choice, if presented to refugees by a government adhering to the
Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and other refugee instruments or to
the African Charter on Human and People's Rights, would be completely illegal.
A person with a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race,
religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion
has a right to asylum under international law, and such a right may not be made
contingent upon military service in a rebel army. Furthermore, under the African
Charter, a person enjoying the right of asylum shall not engage in subversive
254 Civilian Devastation

activites against his country of origin, and the territory of a state adhering to the
African Charter may not be used as a base for subversive activities against the
people of any other State party to the African Charter.231

231
African Charter on Human and People's Rights, art. 23 (2) (a) and (b).
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 255

Therefore, there is no legal authority whatsoever permitting the SPLA to

require would-be Ugandan refugees to serve in a rebel Ugandan army, on pain of
refoulment.232

Forced Portering
Forcing civilians to porter supplies for the SPLA is a chronic abuse. A
thirty-one-year-old man from Mere village was trading at the Kansuk market when
the SPLA arrived and forced him and twenty-four others to carry sorghum for the
SPLA to a distant location. This happened to him on four occasions. Once, he and
about one hundred others were forced to carry heavy artillery from the Nile to
Kansuk. The terrain was very hilly, and it took a night and a day to reach their
destination.
In October 1991, the SPLA forced a thirty-three-year-old man from
Kinyiba village near Kajo Kaji to be a porter. He was traveling away from Kinyiba
village when he was spotted by SPLA soldiers along the road. They ordered him to
carry their luggage and threatened to beat him if he did not comply. Others traveling
along the road were ordered to carry supplies, such as ammunition and food. On an
evening in April 1993, the same man was riding a bicycle to Kinyiba, and again met
SPLA soldiers, who were carrying bags of maize. They asked him why he did not
get off his bike as a sign of respect when he saw them, and then ordered him to
carry their three tins of maize for a distance of about three kilometers.
From 1988 until the overthrow of Mengistu in May 1991, several hundred
Ugandan men originally trained by the SPLA in Ethiopia to be a Ugandan guerrilla
force lived in Khor Shum (Pakok), Upper Nile, Sudan. There they were used by the
SPLA to porter food from the refugee camp at Dima, Ethiopia, to Khor Shum
because, as they put it, "there was little food in Sudan." The Ugandans said that they
walked three days each way, traveling from 3 P.M. to 1 A.M., sleeping one to two
hours, and then walking again until noon each day. The forced portering came to an

232
Refoulement means return of a refugee back to the country of origin where his life
or freedom would be threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality,
membership in a particular social group or political opinion. Convention Relating to the
Status of Refugees, art. 33.
256 Civilian Devastation

end for the Ugandans when the government of Mengistu fell and the flow of food
originating in the Sudanese refugee camps was cut off.

Historical Background
Almost all governments and many guerrilla organizations rely on
involuntary recruitment or conscription. In northeast Africa, however, a history of
military slavery underlies this practice.

Military slavery in the Sudan is a product of state activity, and it

predates the imperial ventures of either Egypt or Britain. States
created and used slave armies; they defined, through the use of
such armies, their relations with certain groups or categories of
peoples. But those people continued to exist even after the state
which first produced them had disappeared. Both the Egyptian
and British empires made use of military slavery, and both
changed it as they used it. But it cannot be said they completely
controlled it.233

The Islamic institution of slave armies involved those who were alien to the polity
in which they served. "Military slavery involved systematic acquisition of slaves
who were trained and employed as soldiers."234 These slaves, captured in military
campaigns scouring the hinterlands of newly conquered Sudanic states, fought for
the Turco-Egyptian army throughout the world, sometimes on both sides of a
conflict.235

233
Johnson, "Military Slavery in Northeast Africa," p. 85.

234
Ibid., p. 76.

235
Ibid., p. 79.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 257

The inherent weakness of the military slave system was recruitment; the
southern Sudan and the Nuba hills were seen by Anglo Egyptian officials as the
main reservoirs of recruitment of new slave soldiers. In these areas, which remained
largely unpacified until after the First World War,"236 slaves soldiers were captured
in large well-organized military campaigns and by requiring nomadic subjects to
pay their tribute in slaves.237

236
Ibid., p. 81.

237
Ibid., p. 77.
258 Civilian Devastation

The status of a soldier was that of a slave. "He was not a soldier because he
was a slave; rather he was a slave because he was a soldier."238
In addition to state military slavery, there was also private military slavery.
The zara'ib or armed camps in southern Sudan were created by the independent
commercial companies using private armies from the 1850s to 1870s. These
commercial companies, prospecting for ivory, gold and other valuables, had two or
three sources of soldiers: recruited contractual soldiers239 who often fell into debt
bondage which they might escape by trading in slaves they captured on company
raids; slaves captured by commercial companies to serve as soldiers;240 and slaves
recruited into the companies' armies from the "gun-boys."241
The zara'ib camps and often their armies were taken over by the Turco-
Egyptian administration in the 1870s and later the Anglo-Egyptian government,
which gradually extended itself out of these military/commercial centers, using an

238
Ibid., p. 76.

239
The contractual soldiers (Nubians displaced from their own agricultural lands in
the north) often were bound to the commercial companies by contract and debt. Douglas
H. Johnson, "Recruitment and Entrapment in Private Slave Armies: The Structure of
the Zara'ib in the Southern Sudan," Slavery & Abolition 13 (London: April 1992): p.
168.

240
Johnson, "Military Slavery in Northeast Africa," p. 77.

241
Ibid., pp. 78-79.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 259

army founded on the old slave armies of the previous century. Very often they
incorporated old zara'ib sites as new administrative posts, including present-day
Nasir, Bor, Rejjaf, Rumbek, Shambe, Wau, and others242 that have been fought over
in the second civil war.
The current military practices of forced recruitment by the parties may be
understood in this historical context, but violations of the rules of war are not
justified or excused by history.

UNACCOMPANIED MINORS
AND RECRUITMENT OF CHILD SOLDIERS

242
Ibid.
260 Civilian Devastation

Under the rules of war, recruitment, voluntary or involuntary, of soldiers

under the age of fifteen is illegal;243 under the Convention on the Rights of the
Child, those who recruit soldiers between the ages of fifteen and eighteen must
endeavor to give priority to those who are oldest.244 Although it is not yet in effect,
the African Convention on the Rights of the Child prohibits recruitment of anyone
under the age of eighteen.
The SPLA has engaged in recruitment of underage soldiers. It has
maintained large camps of boys separate from their families and tribes, given them
some education and military training, and from these camps has drawn fresh
recruits.
Initially the SPLA encouraged many male minors to leave their parents and
go to refugee camps in Ethiopia for education purposes starting in the mid-1980s;
others went for safety reasons, many with their families as whole villages took flight
from government army abuses.
In Ethiopia, the "SPLA was allowed to administer the 'minors' camps',
where unaccompanied boys were kept separated from the main camp."245 There

243
Protocol II, article 4 (3) (c): "children who have not attained the age of fifteen
years shall neither be recruited in the armed forces or groups nor allowed to take part
in hostilities."

244
Convention on the Rights of the Child, article 38 (3). This Convention applies to
States Parties, and makes no mention of rebel groups, but does provide authoritative
guidance for interpreting customary international humanitarian law applicable to
rebels. Sudan has ratified the Convention.

245
UNICEF, Children of War: Wandering alone in southern Sudan (New York:
UNICEF, 1994), p. 15.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 261

were some 17,000 boys. In these camps, according to SPLA officers and the minors
themselves, they were given military training. They were removed from the camps
for military service when the needs of the SPLA demanded, including to fight with
the Ethiopian army against the Ethiopian rebels; many who fought were under
fifteen years of age. Other under fifteens were given military duties such as
guarding checkpoints and prisoners.
When the Sudanese refugees fled Ethiopia, the unaccompanied boys were
escorted back in large groups, still separated from their families, by the SPLA. In
Sudan, more were trained and sent to the front. Others were held back in
unaccompanied minors' camps, and from there were recruited into full time military
participation.
Some 10,000 unaccompanied minors with adults fled the government
capture of Kapoeta into Kenya, where they live in a refugee camp administered by
the UNHCR and are no longer segregated. The rest of the boys have been absorbed
into the SPLA but in 1994 there are remnants of the original groupings in Laboni,
Nasir, and perhaps elsewhere.
The presence of several thousand unaccompanied male Sudanese minors in
segregated locations Sudan and over 10,000 such minors in a Kenyan refugee camp
is the result of the SPLA's illegal policy of recruiting under-age soldiers.
All civilians in a region ravaged by war are at risk, but minors are among
the most disadvantaged and need additional protection. In the second civil war in
Sudan, even the adults are hard pressed to survive. Children separated from their
families, where they might find a modicum of adult protection, supervision and
concern, are at even greater risk than adults separated from their kin.246
Family reunification, an obvious solution, will not be indicated in each
case; some boys have grown to adolescence and young manhood apart from their
families and indeed from all adult discipline. Others have already been combatants
and lived independently for too long. In these circumstances neither parents nor
children may be able to make the adjustment to living together.
Family reunification, however, is the solution indicated for many by
custom and well as law and expediency. The care and supervision the SPLA
factions have provided have been much less than that which most family networks,
even those displaced by war, could have provided.

SPLA-Torit Position on Recruitment of Minors

246
UNICEF, Children of War, p. 29.
262 Civilian Devastation

SPLA-Torit denied recruiting or arming young soldiers. John Garang

stated, "Our cut-off age is eighteen and above."247 When challenged on the use of
boys as soldiers after the Nasir faction split in late 1991, Commander Garang
denied that they even had enough guns to give to recruits above age eighteen, much
less those under age.248
Others in the SPLA and its allies have advanced a variety of arguments to
justify or explain away the practice of recruitment of minors, and of the continued
existence of large encampments of thousands of unaccompanied male minors that
appeared first in Ethiopian refugee camps. Analizing these arguments throws light
on the manner in which the phenomenon developed.

Rationale for Segregation of Unaccompanied Minors

These male minors first became "unaccompanied" when they undertook to
go as refugees to Ethiopia in the mid-1980s. They usually left their homes in
groups, together with adults. Some were orphaned by the war, but many were not.

247
Emma Sharp, "Child Soldiers in Southern Sudan," Sudan Monitor, vol. 2, issue 6
(London: December 1991), p. 4. John Garang made this statement on December 1, 1991.

248
Ibid.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 263

While some started out their journey to Ethiopia enthusiastically, others

were taken against their will, according to interviews. In late 1991, a journalist
interviewed a chief of a village in the Sobat basin who said that in 1989, twenty-
nine twelve-year-old boys had been taken from that village by force by the SPLA.
Since then, none of their parents had heard from them.249
Some of the village women walked to the Itang refugee camp in Ethiopia
on their own to find their boys but were told that the children had been taken to
another place. The villagers found out that some of the larger children were sent to
Kapoeta, for what they feared was military training.250
As to those who went voluntarily to Ethiopia, some SPLA supporters said
that the unaccompanied boys were separated from their families when their cattle
camps were raided by the government and government-aligned militias, and that
they fled separate from their families. This might explain the fact that the
unaccompanied minors were all boys, since girls' work did not include tending
cattle in cattle camps away from the villages.251
Spontaneous flight across a nearby border certainly accounted for some of
the unaccompanied minors, but it is not the only reason for the appearance of over
17,000 unaccompanied Sudanese boys in Ethiopia, most of whom came from areas
hundreds of kilometers from the Ethiopian border.

249
Ibid., pp. 2-4.

250
Ibid.

251
Some report, however, that girls may be found in cattle camps because children go
there to be near a source of milk, or because girls go to prepare the food, traditionally
female work, for their brothers and other male relatives.
264 Civilian Devastation

The avenues of escape to Ethiopia developed over time. The safest route to
Ethiopia, the only neighboring country that received refugees at the beginning of the
war, through the SPLA networks, and the SPLA took increasing responsibility for
organizing this flight, which then became routine. By 1988, large numbers of boys
were being marched to Ethiopia, and in 1990 were observed by outsiders being
transported by vehicle with adult supervisors.252
Often the boys left Sudan upon hearing from SPLA commanders of the
educational opportunities available in the refugee camps in Ethiopia. Commander
Riek described what he considered to be the initiation of the recruitment program:

In 1988, five years after the start of the SPLA, I began to realize
that we had no schools in the liberated areas. I was the
commander of Upper Nile.[253] Garang sent a message that there
were good schools in the refugee camps, if the children wanted to
go there for school. This was a very noble idea.

I started a campaign for them to go to school in the refugee

camps. I vigorously pushed this in western and northern Upper
Nile, my command, and also in areas bordering these zones.

Kuol Manyang also sent children to the refugee camps from

Bahr. We were competing with lost time, five years, 1983-88. It
would affect our manpower in the future.

252
Some, according to various reports, were even sent to Cuba for training. A
journalist in Nasir as late as 1992 heard some of the minors speak proficient Spanish
and sing songs in Spanish in praise of Fidel Castro. Sharp, "Child Soldiers in Southern
Sudan," p. 3.

253
In 1988, he was area commander of Western Upper Nile. He was appointed zonal
commander of Upper Nile in late 1989.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 265

As a Dinka leader close to the SPLA explained it, each chief was asked by
the SPLA to send some children from his village for the schools in Ethiopia. Those
had to be boys whose parents were prepared to release them. This leader's own
brother and three nephews went to Ethiopia in this fashion. Often they were
escorted in large groups. A Nuer commander from Bentiu told HRW/Africa that he
had accompanied over one hundred boys from Bentiu region to Fugnido, Ethiopia,
for education in 1986.
It was true that educational opportunities in southern Sudan were
extremely limited, especially in the rural areas, even before the conflict broke out.254
After SPLA advances in the mid-1980s the government cut off its services to the
SPLA-controlled territory, which came to include all of southern Sudan except for a
handful of garrison towns.
Most often, boys interviewed by social and relief workers routinely
volunteered "education" as their reason for going to Ethiopia. Education continues
to be a magnet. Today, Sudanese youth migrate to the Kenyan refugee camp at
Kakuma for schooling. Equatorian youth, including those in besieged Juba, go to
refugee camps in Uganda with the dream of education. They learn of these refugee
schools by word of mouth, however, rather than from the SPLA.
While education may be a partial reason motivating the boys and the
SPLA, it does not appear to be the sole reason.
Many explain the apparently anomalous and continuing segregation of
male minors by pointing to two Sudanese precedents: boarding schools and the
cattle camps.
In Sudan, southern youths who continued their schooling beyond a certain
grade often lived in boarding schools distant from their family's rural homes. These
young people, however, usually returned home on vacations and continued to

254
Schools, even those built by community donations, were not staffed or supplied.
One anthropologist who visited the Nasir area in 1983 remarked that most of the
buildings (brick and zinc schools, medical dispensaries and veterinary offices) built to
attract government services remained vacant. There were only fourteen primary schools
and two junior secondary schools operating in the immediate Sobat region in 1983;
Nasir had one of the intermediate schools. Throughout the 1970s and early 1980s,
however, many of these schools were closed for weeks or months at a time due to
shortages of textbooks, teachers, and other essentials. Sharon Hutchinson, "Potential
Development Projects for the Sobat Valley Region; A set of Proposals Prepared for Save
the Children Fund (U.K.)" (London: June 1993).
266 Civilian Devastation

maintain ties with their families and to be brought up in the culture through
initiation and marriage rites.
Others cited the cattle camp culture as an explanation for segregation of
the boys. It is said that in the pastoral Nilotic culture, boys are sent to cattle camps
at a young age, and there learn to fend for themselves and live apart from the
family. The anthropologist Wendy James wrote that in some

Nilotic communities, it was normal and traditional for boys and

young men to form well-organized and independent groups,
based upon age, which functioned as cattle-herding units and
normally lived together in cattle camps for the dry season, on
their own and away from their families. In the cattle camps they
would depend largely on milk and other cattle products for
subsistence. These bands of young men also had the duty of
protecting herds from raids, and provided the framework for
traditional forms of hostility and peacemaking. In some of the
Nilotic groups, there is a formal and sophisticated system of age
classes and grades, giving a coherent structure to the groupings
and activities of boys and young men, and leading to their
ceremonial initiation into the adult world. This is one factor in
the social background against which the large groupings of
unaccompanied boys found particularly in the former refugee
camp of Fugnyido should be understood.255

This background is evoked, less subtly, by others to justify segregation of

the unaccompanied minors as consistent with the culture. The cattle camp, however,
was not a function of the war but a pre-existing economic phenomenon. In the cattle
camp, boys performed a seasonal economic function for the family and were
accompanied by other family members, sometimes uncles, brothers, or
grandfathers.256

255
Wendy James, "Background Report and Guidelines for Future Planning: Nor
Deng Centre for Sudanese Returnees, Nasir," WFP/Operation Lifeline Sudan, Southern
Sector, Nairobi, Kenya, August 1991, p. 13.

256
The war probably affected the movement of males to cattle camps; there is a good
deal of testimony that men and boys tried to protect their cattle, their most valuable
asset, from the raiders when it appeared a raid was on the way. Thus they would go to
the cattle camp to move their cattle to a different location; many were killed trying to
fend off cattle raiders who were either combatants or others taking advantage of the
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 267

Neither the boarding schools nor the cattle camps were intended to serve as
the means of permanent separation of the boys from their families, such as has
occurred for unaccompanied minors in the context of the conflict. Other, more
directly military and war-related reasons provide a more plausible explanation for
this modern phenomenon.

Historical Background for Boy Soldiers in Southern Sudan

situation. In other cases the men and boys were safer from attacks away from the
villages. Thus the existence of armed conflict and raiding done by organized military
expeditions could have changed the rather temporary basis on which boys were sent to
cattle camps.
268 Civilian Devastation

Boy soldiers are part of a cultural pattern that is not offered as a

justification for these unaccompanied minors. However, there is a history in
northeast Africa of military slavery,257 in which "gun-boys" were a source of
soldiers.
Whereas the slaves captured for the Turco-Egyptian army before the
twentieth century were mostly full-grown men, the commercial companies/armies
formed to exploit the ivory and slave potential of the White Nile made use of young
boys as well.258
These "gun-boys" were slave boys who, starting at the ages of about seven
or ten, worked as gun bearers for individual soldiers. Every contractual soldier had
at least one, some had two or more, and many slave-soldiers themselves had "gun-
boys." The boys' service to the soldiers was part of their training, and when they
grew older they became soldiers themselves. They were the most regular though not
the most numerous source of military slaves.259

The gun-boys were observed as early as 1870, but they are a

consistent feature of slave armies in the Nile Valley, and gun-
boys turn up not only in the Uganda Rifles at the end of the last
century, but in the King's African Rifles, the Sudanese army, and
even the National Resistance Army and the Sudan People's
Liberation Army of this century.260

257
See above in this chapter.

258
Johnson, "Military Slavery in Northeast Africa," p. 79.

259
Johnson, "Recruitment and Entrapment in Private Slave Armies," p. 168.

260
Ibid., p. 168.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 269

This is not to say that the system that the SPLA follows today is a direct continuity
from these earlier military slavery practices, but that conditions similar to those
which fostered the expansion of military slavery in the nineteenth century now exist
in the late twentieth century.
Colonial armies which grew out of the institution of military slavery in
northeast Africa retained the legacy of having a reserve of boy soldiers who were
regularly channeled into the army, whether as sons of soldiers or as hangers-on of
soldiers, a regular feature even of the British army into the twentieth century. Both
the Sudanese and Ugandan post-independence armies retained some form of boy
soldiers, and in both countries the percentage of teenaged, and even younger,
soldiers rose during the dislocation of prolonged civil wars, particularly in guerrilla
armies.
At the start of the first civil war, 1,146 soldiers mutinied in Torit and later
fled in August 1955. Among them were 380 boy soldiers.261

Change in Age at which Boys Become Adults

Historian Douglas H. Johnson suggests that the phenomenon of boy
soldiers among the southern Sudanese today also is linked to another war-related
phenomenon, a change in the age at which boys become adults.
Among the Nuer and those Dinka who practice facial scarification,262 boys
became adults when they are initiated into age-sets which are composed of groups
of boys of roughly comparable ages. Earlier in this century initiation took place
between the ages of fifteen and eighteen. Starting in the 1950s the age-sets have
been initiated more frequently, and the age of initiatees has declined to ages thirteen
and fourteen in the 1970s and 1980s, largely due to fears on the part of fathers that
scarification would be banned.263
Once so marked, the boys are regarded as adults and are expected to take
up adult duties, such as carrying spears and defending herds and homes from attack,
and getting married. This applies to those societies which practice scarification at

261
Johnson, "Military Slavery in Northeast Africa," p. 86, n. 6.

262
See above in this Chapter.

263
Commander Riek tried to ban scarification by decree in the late 1980s in his
jurisdiction of Western Upper Nile on medical grounds (lack of health service to treat
infections resulting from scarification).
270 Civilian Devastation

initiation for boys, most Nuer and many Dinka, which together make up perhaps
half the population of south Sudan.
Although by international law standards these thirteen- and fourteen-year-
olds remain underage for military recruitment purposes, many are considered by
their own societies, and consider themselves to be, "adults" and thus old enough to
serve in the military.
The historical and cultural background explains but does not excuse the
recruitment of underage minors. The modern rules of war and Convention on the
Rights of the Child were written to change just such practices in all societies.

Conditions in the Ethiopian Refugee Camps

When one international NGO first visited the Fugnido camp in Ethiopia in
1987, one staffer recalled they found "only naked bodies, very thin, of boys, as far
as the eye could see. They did not even have tukls to live in." Later the boys built
their own large sleeping quarters and schools, and NGOs helped recruit caretakers
and teachers for them.
As the war progressed and flight into Ethiopia became more organized, a
system of receiving refugees developed. After the boys reached Ethiopia, they were
segregated into minors' sleeping and living quarters and there subjected to political
and military training by the SPLA. The SPLA says that the boys were given military
training in order to prepare them to defend their country in the event that the war
lasted a long time, but denies that the boys were sent into combat. As explained
below, that assertion is not true.
The SPLA instructed the minors in the camps in what to tell expatriate
relief workers and other outsiders about their relations with the SPLA. Interviewers
over the years remarked on the singular uniformity of answers to questions, such as
why the minors went to Sudan ("education"). After the split in the SPLA in August
1991, a fuller picture began to emerge. HRW/Africa concludes that the SPLA
recruited the boys for both education and military purposes, but attempted to
conceal the military purpose.
Furthermore, many of the minors were not "unaccompanied." Surveys
conducted in Ethiopian camps indicate that one-fifth of the unaccompanied boys in
the Ethiopian camps had relatives in the camps. Many of these boys were required
by the SPLA to live in segregated buildings with the other boys. This was possible
because the SPLA, not international agencies, was delegated management authority
in the camps by the Ethiopian government hosts.
Unfortunately, the schooling the boys received in Ethiopia was minimal,
no doubt due to the difficult conditions under which they lived and the fact that they
had to perform the whole range of feeding and housekeeping chores normally split
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 271

up among family members according to age and sex. One 1989 survey of the
unaccompanied minors in the camps in Ethiopia found that 90 percent of the
unaccompanied minors were illiterate or in grade one.
One boy, a member of a small non-Nilotic tribe, told HRW/Africa that he
left his family and village in 1989 to go to Ethiopia with his cousin. The reason he
left was "because of the harassment of the system." Based on estimates of an adult
who knew him in his village, he was about twelve or thirteen when he left for
Ethiopia in 1989. The cousins traveled with a mixed group of 900 members of their
tribe. Upon their arrival in the Itang refugee camp, the SPLA separated the boys
among the 900 refugees by age. Those over sixteen or seventeen were sent for full-
time military training, and his age group was sent to the housing for the other
unaccompanied minors. He lived at the school at Tarpaam, in Itang, created in early
1990, where 5,000 unaccompanied male minors were registered.264 He attended
school in Tarpaam, where he estimated there were six schools. In his home village,
he had gone to school up to grade four where the language of instruction was
Arabic, which was not the language used in Tarpaam.
The Ethiopian refugee camps continued to receive refugees as the war in
Sudan drove civilians out. By June 1990, there were three main Sudanese refugee
camps in Ethiopia, Fugnido, Itang and Dima.265 Not uncommonly, there is some
dispute about the overall numbers of refugees and the numbers of minors.
Conservative estimates were that Fugnido, with 76,204 refugees,266 mostly Dinka,
had the largest unaccompanied minor population: 10,000. Itang, the largest refugee
camp with 150,000 mostly Nuer refugees,267 had an unaccompanied minor

264
UNICEF OLS, "The Return to Southern Sudan of the Sudanese Refugees from
Itang Camp, Gambela, Ethiopia," Nasir, Southern Sudan, August 31, 1991, p. 4.

265
A survey done in March 1988 indicated that in Itang camp 75.2 percent of the
population was male, in Fugnido, 94.6 percent male, and in Dima, 97.8 percent male. de
Waal, "Starving out the South," p. 161, n. 25.

266
Office of UNHCR, "UNHCR activities financed by voluntary funds: Report for
1989-90 and proposed programmes and budget for 1991," Part I. Africa, A/AC.96/751
(Geneva: UNHCR), p. 33. Another source set the population of Fugnido (also written
Panyido) at its height in 1991 at 86,000. Scott-Villiers, "Repatriation of Sudanese
Refugees," p. 204.

267
UNHCR, "Report for 1989-90," p. 33, gives a figure of 247,143 for Itang, but later
studies concluded that the number was probably no more than 150,000. Scott-Villiers,
"Repatriation of Sudanese Refugees," p. 204.
272 Civilian Devastation

population of 5,300. Dima, with a mixed population of 20,000,268 had 2,000

unaccompanied minors.
The boys built the huts in which they lived. In Fugnido, they had access to
the Gilo River, where they fished and bathed. They prepared their own food. They
were assisted by caretakers and teachers, although the ratio of adults to children and
adolescents was very small, much smaller than in the average Nilotic village.
The minors were assisted by international NGOs, although at no time were
Ethiopian or expatriate relief workers allowed to live in or spend the night in the
camps. The camp administration, which was in the hands of the SPLA and its
designees, required relief workers to depart daily at 3 P.M. or 6 P.M., supposedly on
safety grounds.

268
UNHCR, "Report for 1989-90," p. 33, sets the number at 35,075 for Dima. Scott-
Villiers estimates, based on later data, that the figure was closer to 20,000. Scott-
Villiers, "Repatriation of Sudanese Refugees," p. 204.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 273

By 1989, the Sudanese refugee camp in Fugnido had exploded in size, far
outstripping the nearby Anuak village of 5,000. In an armed incident in June 1989
sparked by conflicts between the unaccompanied Sudanese minors and Anuak
youth, between fifty and one hundred Anuaks were killed by Sudanese refugees and
SPLA cadre.269

Military Training for the "Red Army"

Some form of military training was admittedly given to all unaccompanied
minors, regardless of age. A former SPLA commander told HRW/Africa that of the
minors in Ethiopia the older boys (a relative term) received a full-time military
training course of three or four months. The younger starting at age seven, received
training during school holidays.
Minors were organized into separate military units which made up the
"Red Army," according to another SPLA former commander. After he was
wounded, this commander was transferred to a job as a teacher of the
unaccompanied minors in a refugee camp with the rank of commander of the "Red
Army."
Another former SPLA officer described the "Red Army" to HRW/Africa:

The "Red Army" means the young people, ages fourteen through
sixteen. They were organized as a separate army; the adults were
in the SPLA. The Red Army was in battalions. Wherever SPLA
had a stronghold, they had contingents of the Red Army.

In the first few years, the Red Army fought and was always
massacred. Then they were taken off the front line. They were
not good soldiers because they were too young. They were then
assigned to menial jobs. In the last stage, they were in school in
Itang and Fugnido, which was organized for them.

269
Commander Simon Mori was part of an investigation commission sent by John
Garang to look into this incident. Its report was never published. Simon Mori is now
affiliated with SPLA-Nasir/United.
274 Civilian Devastation

Others, not affiliated with the SPLA, observed that the Red Army boy
soldiers were used as bodyguards for army officers and defense of "liberated"
towns, which explains their armed presence in 1991 in Mongalla and Torit.270 Some
long-term prisoners of the SPLA said that their guards included these under age
soldiers.

Military Deployment of Minors in Ethiopia

When the Ethiopian army began to collapse in late 1990 and early 1991,
the Mengistu regime turned to the SPLA for reinforcements, and the SPLA
provided troops to fight alongside its benefactor's army. Two former SPLA officers
separately told HRW/Africa that at that time between 900 and 2,000
unaccompanied minors aged eleven and over were sent from the Ethiopian refugee
camps for training and then sent into battle against the Ethiopian rebels in
Dembidolo (February 1991) and in Gore (April-May 1991). Many died there.
HRW/Africa talked to one boy sent for military training at an SPLA base
in early 1991. His group then was deployed to fight in SPLA units under SPLA
command in Dembidolo, Ethiopia, against Ethiopian rebels. The boy was a private,
he was armed, and he fired his rifle in the engagement. At the time he was probably
fourteen.

Emergency Evacuation of Unaccompanied Minors Along With Sudanese

Refugees from Ethiopia
When the Mengistu regime collapsed in May 1991, the SPLA prepared to
move its troops and hundreds of thousands of civilian Sudanese refugees from
Ethiopia. Although in some cases the minors were able to reunite with their families
during the exodus, in most cases they were not.
A task force of minors, after their defeat in Dembidolo, Ethiopia, withdrew
to Pochalla, on the Sudan side of the border. They stayed two weeks, then went to
Boma, where they stayed for nine days. From there they went to Kapoeta, a fifteen-
day walk. There may have been 1,000 boys on this march, according to one
participant.
A former SPLA commander said that in May/June 1991, he was instructed
by his SPLA commander to accompany another group of several thousand minors to
Kapoeta for education "by the Kenyan government and NGOs." He took the boys

270
Sharp, "Child Soldiers in Southern Sudan," p. 4.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 275

from Tarpaam in Itang to Fugnido to join the larger group of unaccompanied

minors, which he estimated then totaled 4,000. Once in Kapoeta, those who had
already received military training were deployed to SPLA bases. Some 2,500 who
had not been trained (ages eleven to sixteen) were trained less than three months in
Kapoeta and then deployed.
The boy who had fought in Ethiopia and his 1,000 companions stayed one
night in Kapoeta, then proceeded to Torit for twenty days, where they were idle. His
account of his movements as part of the SPLA-Torit force was corroborated by
others familiar with the period.271

Conditions for Unaccompanied Minors Repatriated to Sudan from Ethiopia

Those unaccompanied minors fleeing Ethiopia who were not yet
incorporated into the SPLA appeared in large groups in the Sudanese towns of
Nasir, Pochalla, and Pakok, all near the Ethiopian border. It was agreed by the
agencies concerned that the ICRC would register and organize protection and
assistance for the repatriated unaccompanied minors in Sudan. The ICRC registered
10,000 unaccompanied minors at Pochalla, 2,000 at Nasir and 2,000 at Pakok by
the end of 1991.272 This arrangement held until March 1992 when the ICRC was

271
After Torit, the boy soldiers were taken to Magwe and stayed there for two
months where they built their own huts. When the government's 1992 dry season
offensive commenced this unit of boy soldiers moved to Ngangala where they fought
with the Sudan government in April, 1992, and were defeated. The young witness' task
force retreated to Lirya, north of Torit, and remained for forty days until they were
ejected by the government. His company retreated south to the SPLA base in Lotukei,
in Didinga territory. The rest of the task force left for the siege of Juba.

272
ICRC Annual Report 1991, p. 39.
276 Civilian Devastation

denied permission to continue operations in Sudan by the government, partly

because of this very protection rule. UNICEF took over the job then.
Meanwhile, in August 1991, while the returning refugees were stalled in
the three camps along the Ethiopian border, the Nasir faction broke from the SPLA.
The rebel Nasir faction raised several human rights complaints against Garang--one
was that the SPLA under Garang's leadership had recruited boys for its army. Riek
later tried to explain how, even though he was a commander in that army, he
disapproved of the practice:

In 1990, after being in the field for five years, I decided to visit
Itang. I found the children's camp there. They were receiving
military training. It was the same in Fugnido.

On April 1, 1990, I met Garang en route to operations. "Why are

the children being militarily trained?" I asked him. "Those who
succeed will go to school. This is our reservoir for the army," he
said.

I did not like it. I took a stand against the military training of
children. I told Taban Deng Gai (the administrator of Itang) to
stop the military training of the children. He was an ardent
Garang supporter, but he stopped their training in Itang. The
children left a few months later to Sudan. But there were actually
more children being trained in Fugnido than in Itang.

Conditions in Nasir
The Nasir population of unaccompanied minors, which came from Itang
and some from Dima, was originally estimated at 4,000-5,000. There were actually
3,500 boys in Nasir in June 1991 at a site called Pandanyang. Some 1,500 left
Nasir in June and July, probably walking to their accessible home areas.273 The
minors in Nasir were mostly Nuer, with some Dinka, Nubans, and others.
Due to government intransigience, relief flights were not able to land in
Nasir, and because the returned refugees were not able to cultivate, a severe food
shortage developed. The minors set up a separate camp. A nutritional survey in

273
UNICEF OLS, "Return to Southern Sudan of the Sudanese Refugees," p. 4.
Pandanyang had been an Anya-Nya II base prior to the fall of Nasir to SPLA siege in
January 1989. Ibid., p. 19.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 277

August 1991 by relief agencies found 60 percent moderate malnourishment among

these boys.
A study of the repatriation and the international relief efforts in Nasir in
1991 found that the SPLA-Nasir manipulated the remaining 1,500-2,000
unaccompanied minors and other repatriatees to secure more aid for themselves.
This study found that significant relief was required for the refugees returning to
Nasir from Ethiopia, that the Sudan government was doing everything in its power
to block the needed relief, and that the international community was not responding
to the need. The SPLA-Nasir "directed the focus of relief on to the severely
malnourished unaccompanied minors,"274 and this focus helped to generate what
little assistance was brought, although in the end, the minors did not receive the
needed assistance. The study concluded:

274
Scott-Villiers, "Repatriation of Sudanese Refugees," p. 209.
278 Civilian Devastation

A fair proportion of the special food distributed to the

unaccompanied minors never reached their mouths, but instead
went to feed other more powerful individuals. The minors
therefore remained, for a long time, in a state of near starvation,
and this helped ensure the continuation of relief assistance.275

Those Passing Through Pochalla and Their Flight from Pochalla to

Avoid Government Attack
One study found one in three of the 2,000 unaccompanied minors in Nasir
suffered from severe malnutrition.276 Some 10,000 unaccompanied minors in
Fugnido fled to Pochalla, where they set up a separate camp apart from the large
displaced persons' camps for families fleeing Ethiopia. Crossing the Gilo River in
Ethiopia, many drowned. Other minors went to Khor Shum (Pakok), where in
November 1991 a nutritional survey showed 66 percent moderate malnourishment.
After unsuccessful militia attacks on Pochalla, the Sudan government
launched a cross-border attack on Pochalla from Ethiopian soil in early 1992 as part
of its 1992 dry season offensive. The offensive had been expected, and tens of
thousands of the former refugees, including the minors, were evacuated before the
government reached Pochalla.
The ICRC assisted the minors and others in evacuating Pochalla and
traveling south, providing food and medical assistance at stations along the long
route. The ICRC was expelled from Sudan in March 1992 by the government, in
part because of this humanitarian assistance. Some relief workers suspected that part

275
Ibid. The other group manipulated and prevented from leaving Nasir in order to
attract more relief was the Uduk. Ibid., p. 210. See generally, Wendy James, "Uduk
Asylum Seekers in Gambela, 1992," Report for UNHCR (Addis Ababa: October 31,
1992).

276
OFDA, "Sudan - Drought/Civil Strife, Situation Report no. 52," December 5, 1991
(Washington, D.C.: U.S.AID), cited in Burr, Genocide, p.45, n. 190.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 279

of the government motivation for the Pochalla attack was to kill or capture large
groups of the minors whom the Sudan government viewed as combatants or at least
a military reserve force.
The minors' journey, from February to the end of April 1992, led them
across very difficult marshy and desert terrain as well as an area controlled by the
hostile Toposa militia. The OLS reported an attack by Toposa bandits at Magos,
northeast of Kapoeta, on March 19, 1992 that killed five minors.277
SPLA-Torit Commander Salva Kiir, Garang's chief of military operations,
accompanied the minors. Interviewed with them before they arrived in Kapoeta, he
said that the plan was to settle the boys in a new camp at Narus near the Kenyan
border, for which large-scale international assistance would be required.278
A headcount of unaccompanied minors in Narus completed on April 22,
1992279 showed 12,241 minors and 6,600 "teachers and dependents." Narus was to
be a temporary place for the minors. Some 850, the OLS noted, could have been
reunited with their families immediately if there were government flight clearance to
Ler.280

277
SEPHA Bi-Monthly Report no. 14 on OLS Emergency and Relief Operations in
the Southern Sector for the period March 21 to April 5, 1992, p. 2.

278
"Long March," Sudan Update, vol. 3, no. 15 (London: March 30, 1992), p.1,
quoting Peter Biles in The Guardian (London).

279
The headcount was conducted jointly by the U.N., NGOs, and the SRRA, the relief
wing of the SPLA-Torit.

280
SEPHA Bi-Monthly Report no. 16 on OLS Emergency and Relief Operations in
the Southern Sector for the period April 19 to May 5, 1992, p.6.
280 Civilian Devastation

The Flight from Sudan to Refuge in Kenya

A month later, on May 28, 1992, the nearby town of Kapoeta unexpectedly
fell to the government. Many fled from Kapoeta south to Narus, and those in Narus
quickly fled to Kenya. The hasty exodus was not coordinated or directed by the
SPLA, according to relief officials directly across the border in Lokichokio, Kenya
at the time.
After the minors arrived in Lokichokio in late May 1992, their numbers
were estimated at 12,000. A later, more leisurely headcount of the minors at the
Kakuma refugee camp just set up one hundred kilometers south of Lokichokio
found only 10,500 minors, prompting the accusation that the SPLA-Torit had
kidnapped some 1,500 to 3,000 of the minors and sent them back to fight or receive
military training in Sudan. At the time, a UNHCR spokesperson said that at least
1,000 unaccompanied minors apparently had left the Lokochokio camp in Kenya in
one night, and that a U.S.-based relief organization, World Vision, had reported
seeing a sudden increase in the number of boys mainly in their late teens back in
Narus.281 Some believed that these boys were deployed in the major SPLA-Torit
assaults on Juba that occurred in June and July 1992.282 The discrepancy in numbers
was never fully explained,283 and the SPLA-Torit denied the charges.
The minors who remained in Kenya were moved to a newly created
refugee camp at Kakuma, Kenya, which, as of late June, 1993, had 28,000 Sudanese
refugees, 10,500 of them unaccompanied minors, a disproportionate share of that
population. Some 95 percent of the Sudanese were Dinka.284
At Kakuma, the UNHCR established a foster care family program for
approximately 2,500 unaccompanied minors, who live in groups of four or five with
refugee families who are given incentives to take them in.

281
Jane Perlez, "1,000 Boys Return to Camp in Sudan," The New York Times, August
19, 1992.

282
Ibid.

283
Relief workers in this region tend to view all numbers with skepticism and regard
most as educated estimates, at best.

284
The total refugee population in Kakuma camp was 35,000. UNHCR Camp Profile
-- Kakuma, Kenya (updated June 28, 1993).
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 281

The refugee camp operated eighteen schools with 318 headmasters for
12,500 students.285 Further evidence of the difficulty Sudanese children have faced
over the war years in receiving an education is the fact that, in the camp in Kakuma,
where the average age of all Sudanese students was fourteen to fifteen, only fifty or
sixty Sudanese attended secondary school, according to camp administrators.
The school itself may attract unaccompanied minors from the Sudan. In
one week in June 1993, one hundred Dinka minors, average age fourteen, arrived
from Lotukei, a Didinga (Equatorian tribe) border area where an SPLA base is
located.

Unaccompanied Minors Remaining in SPLA-Torit Areas, Including

Palataka
There were unaccompanied minors in several locations inside Sudan even
before the fall of Mengistu and the evacuation of the Sudanese refugee camps in
May 1991.

285
Ibid.
282 Civilian Devastation

In 1989-1990 the SPLA proposed creation of schools that also would

function as self-sustaining economic enterprises, to be run by its Friends of African
Children Educational (FACE) Foundation. Industrial and agricultural enterprises
would draw their labor from schoolchildren working in shifts who would thereby
generate enough income to make the educational system self-supporting. Funding
agencies did not find the FACE proposal attractive because it would have directed
too many resources to a small group, would not serve all children in the population,
and seemed more like an agricultural project for children than an educational
project.286 Nevertheless, the SPLA established a FACE school along these lines on
the grounds of a large Catholic mission and farm at Palataka, south of Torit. Other
schools were set up north of Nimule, in Molitokuro and Borongolei.
A visitor to the Palataka school in late 1991 observed that the "situation is
shocking, but not because military training is going on. It is shocking because the
boys are dying of starvation and easily preventable diseases, such as malaria and
diarrhoea . . . . Observers say that military training has gone on in the past, but most
of the children are too weak and small to make effective soldiers."287 Other visitors
agreed that the conditions were deplorable.288
In 1992 an estimated 4,100 boys from seven to fourteen years were in
Palataka; most were ten and eleven years old.289 A Norwegian journalist who visited

286
"Boys starve to death in F.A.C.E. Foundation schools," Sudan Monitor, vol. 2, no.
7 (London: January 1992), p. 3.

287
Sharp, "Child Soldiers in Southern Sudan," p. 4.

288
"Boys starve to death in F.A.C.E. Foundation schools," Sudan Monitor, pp. 1, 3.

289
UNICEF, Children of War, p. 25.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 283

Palataka in February 1992 saw these very young boys with weapons; one, fully
armed and in uniform, told her that he was thirteen and had been a soldier for three
years. She observed that the children were "undernourished, some are losing their
hair, others can hardly stand." The boys "often have no other food than the leaves
from the trees."290

290
Tove Gravdal, "They Don't Cry, but Their Eyes are Full of Tears," translation
from Norwegian supplied by author to HRW/Africa (London, 1992).
284 Civilian Devastation

She observed that the principal was an officer in the SPLA, and she
received eyewitness accounts of daily military drills, tough discipline including
beatings and exposure to the sun for some who tried to escape, and reports that
many were taken by force from their families.291 Other foreigners in the area also
received complaints from Acholi villages that SPLA cadre recruited boys for these
boarding schools from the surrounding area and that some were taken against the
will of their parents.
An OLS report for the March/April 1992 period noted, "The health,
nutritional and educational situation of 6,000 boys who are in 3 boarding schools in
Palataka, Molitokuro, and Borongolei is said to be deplorable."292 Evacuees from
Torit to Palataka in May 1992 saw 3,000 boys, some as young as five to eight years
old, living there in terrible conditions, with no latrines. The minors were entering
into conflicts with the Acholi who lived in the area because the boys raided the
fields around Palataka in a desperate search for food.
By July of 1992, health workers were in each of the three FACE "boarding
schools" and feeding centers had been opened there as well. The total population of
three schools was 7,750, with fifty-three health workers, some 602 children were in
the feeding centers.293
The WFP determined a monthly food distribution schedule for the three
FACE schools, population then grown to 9,000, in September 1992.294 This

291
Ibid.

292
SEPHA Bi-Monthly Report no. 14 on OLS Emergency and Relief Operations in
the Southern Sector for the period March 21 to April 5, 1992, p. 4.

293
OLS (Southern Sector), Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 21, July 4-20, 1992, p. 8.

294
OLS (Southern Sector), Bi-Montly Situation Report No. 25, September 5-22, 1992,
p. 6.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 285

schedule was interrupted, however, by the killing of three relief workers in the area
that same month, causing the U.N. to pull out of this south Torit region. The
provision of food to these schools fell to Catholic Relief Services, which in
December 1992 began operations in the area unprotected by the U.N. umbrella.
Bringing relief to Palataka involved two problems: Palataka is twenty-two
kilometers over a bad mountain road from Magwe, and the Magwe area was the
scene of several clashes between SPLA-Torit and the breakaway William Nyuon
faction in late 1992.
Conditions did not improve in 1993. A visitor to Palataka in July 1993
reported about 2,500 to 3,000 boys in the facility. He reported a serious food
shortage there, due in part to the transportation and coordination difficulties. The
children were cared for by eighty caretakers and thirty teachers. The boys in the
school were aged five to fourteen. They lived in the thirty to forty unrepaired brick
buildings of the Catholic Mission, in poor health and deplorable hygenic conditions.
In short, Palataka remained a scandal.
Security in the area due to factional fighting continued to be poor in
August and September 1993, causing the parish at Palataka to relocate to Nimule.
Not all security problems were attributable to the combatants: some land mines, for
example, were believed to have been laid by the local Acholi people, who were
hostile to the mainly Dinka minors.
Increasing military clashes in the area led to the evacuation in early 1994
of the boys from Palataka to Laboni, an almost inaccessible site to which tens of
thousands of displaced from the Triple A camps were also moved.
In Molitokuro school in early 1991, there were only 800 boys, all from the
area around Torit and Kapoeta. In mid-1991, some 2,300 arrived from Ethiopian
refugee camps and later from the Bor Massacre. Education was provided up to
seventh and eighth grades.295 By late 1992 there were about 3,100 boys from seven
to seventeen years old, most in the fourteen- to fifteen-year-old group.
The 1,250 boys in Borongolei came almost entirely from the Dima refugee
camp in Ethiopia. In Borongolei school, classes went up to fifth or sixth grades.
As described below, most of the boys from both Molokoturo and
Borongolei schools, who were slightly older than the Palataka boys, were
"evacuated" and disappeared in mid-1992.

295
SEPHA Bi-Monthly Report no. 19 on OLS Emergency Operations in Southern
Sudan for the period June 7-22, 1992, p. 3. An assessment done in June 1992 noted 150
malnourished minors at this school. Ibid.
286 Civilian Devastation

Other reported locations of unaccompanied minors include Chukudum in

Didinga territory south of Torit. There, in 1991, U.S. AID personnel observed an
Oxfam/U.S. agricultural project for 6,000 displaced, including some 500-800
unaccompanied minors who were being given military training by the SPLA.296

Military Training and Forced Recruitment of Boys Inside Sudan

296
Burr, Food Aid, p. 20.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 287

One location where boys were trained by the SPLA inside Sudan was a
training camp in Kapoeta that was marked with a sign "Jesh Amer" (Red Army)
until August 1991, according to a journalist who wrote: "Eyewitnesses saw boys as
young as 11 years old being trained there. It was quite an open practice until all the
adverse publicity in July, after which time the sign was removed."297 Many relief
workers in southern Sudan at that time reported seeing very young boys armed with
Kalashnikovs, en route to battle with the SPLA-Nasir faction after the split
occurred.298
Several thousand boys are believed to have been recruited into the SPLA-
Torit from the two FACE boarding schools established for them in Borongele and
Molitoko in the vicinity of the "Triple A" displaced persons camps on the east bank
of the White Nile. In late 1992 or early 1993, the SPLA closed the Borongolei and
Molitokuro schools and evacuated the minors, on the pretext that the area was under
military threat from the government. Nevertheless, only the unaccompanied minors
were moved, not the over 100,000 displaced persons in the nearby "Triple A"
camps. The estimated 4,350 boys from these two camps were walked first to
Palataka, about 200 kilometers away; they arrived tired and weak. Some 700 stayed
in Palataka and the rest, about 3,650, were taken to the Narus area, where, it is

297
Sharp, "Child Soldiers in Southern Sudan," p. 4.

298
Ibid. Sharp saw dozens of twelve-year-old boys on the night of November 25, 1991,
being transported towards the front line on the road from Torit to Ngangala. Another
witness told this reporter of seeing 150 trucks of SPLA-Torit troops passing the Juba
turn-off on the Ngangala-Mongalla road on November 19, 1991; one-third of the
soldiers in those trucks were children under fifteen, and some as young as eleven.
288 Civilian Devastation

suspected, they were given military training and were deployed in the SPLA-Torit
offensive against the Nasir faction in Kongor in March 1993.299
No family reunification efforts have been undertaken by the SPLA-Torit
through any agencies.

Conditions in Nasir and Status of Family Reunification Program and

Schooling
Efforts at family reunification for the minors were part of the ICRC's work
in Sudan in 1992. The ICRC picked up from Radda Barnen's work in Ethiopia,
attempting to document the social history of each individual minor who returned to
Sudan. The Radda Barnen personal history files in Addis Ababa, however, were
destroyed during the uprising that overthrew Mengistu.

299
One report said that these boys were sent to Natinga, just north of the Kenyan
border. UNICEF, Children of War, p. 27.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 289

In an agreement signed in Nairobi on June 19, 1992, between the two

SPLA factions, point number 3 (c) states that the two factions shall "Promote the
voluntary reunion of divided families and shall take measures to resolve other
humanitarian issues."300 The SPLA-Torit faction has apparently done nothing to
promote such voluntary reunion, and the SPLA-Nasir/United faction, while making
a start on such efforts, backtracked in 1993.
The SPLA-Nasir group was cooperative with early attempts at family
reunification for the minors settled in Nasir. Agencies administered a questionnaire
to the boys, including the question, "Do you want to see your mother?" The minors
routinely answered no, or said that they did not care. Commander Riek, made aware
of this response, announced that the minors should be free to talk. The answers to
this question, and others, were then reversed: the minors replied that indeed they did
want to see their mothers and fathers.
In February 1992, 150 Nuer minors were reunified with their families in
Ler, Upper Nile, after interviews to locate the families and assure the voluntary
nature of the reunification. After that, the Sudan government, as part of its dry
season offensive in 1992, refused further flight permission and the reunification
program was suspended.
UNICEF registered some 1,456 unaccompanied minors in Nasir in May
1992, of whom about 800 were considered appropriate for reunification with their
Upper Nile families. Some had been rejoining their families without assistance;
some seventy walked hundreds of kilometers to Ler, arriving in October 1992.301

300
Signed by Commander William Nyuon Bany for SPLA-Torit and Commander
Lam Akol Ajawin for SPLA-Nasir/United.

301
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 29, November 6-21, 1992,
p. 4.
290 Civilian Devastation

In June 1992, those minors who stayed behind in Nasir were observed in
poor condition. The grass houses the minors had constructed for themselves could
not possibly withstand a series of heavy rains and were already on the verge of
collapse. The school had not yet been opened, allegedly because promised school
supplies had not been delivered;302 the tent intended to serve as the school was
severely ripped and leaking. The boys, to ensure their own survival, were walking
three hours each way to a fishing pool, but had no proper fishing nets or materials,
nor mosquito nets. When food aid became erratic, due to Sudan government
obstructionism, their situation visibly deteriorated.303
The reunification program in Nasir recommenced in December 1992, after
flight permission was reinstated by the government, and another 300 minors were
reunited with their families in Ler.304 UNICEF took over the effort when the ICRC
was expelled by the Sudan government in March 1992. Although the reunification
was largely successful, a small percentage of the older boys did not want to stay
with their families and returned on their own to Nasir.
In early 1993, the reunification program operating out of Nasir had to be
suspended due to an outbreak of relapsing fever in the boys' living area in Nasir.
Before it could be diagnosed and treated with tetracycline, some seventeen children
died, according to officials. A medical officer noted that the disease is transmitted
through lice, and because of their poor hygiene the minors were the first to be
affected.
By the time the outbreak was controlled, SPLA-Nasir was having second
thoughts. It refused permission for further reunification, on the grounds that there
were no schools in the areas to which the boys were being taken, while the school at
Nasir went up to grade six. Commander Riek told HRW/Africa that this measure
was taken in part to bring pressure on UNICEF to open up schools in south Sudan.
"Some of the boys who were taken to Ler walked back to Nasir since there was no
school for them in Ler. I am telling the U.N. to provide schools for them in their
home areas and in Nasir," he added.

302
School materials such as blackboards and a mimeograph machine were provided
in 1991 but were diverted for use in Riek's headquarters, according to one former U.N.
representative with personal knowledge.

303
OLS (Southern Sector) Bi-Monthly Situation Report No. 22, July 21 to August 5,
1992, p. 3.

304
OLS (Southern Sector) "Situation Assessment 1992/93," February 1993, p. 23.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 291

The agency questionnaire administered to the minors in Nasir in January

1992 asked if they wanted to go home if there was no school at home. Fifty percent
responded that they did, indicating that lack of schools in the home areas is not an
adequate reason for suspending the entire reunification program.
In the schools in the two Nasir minors locations, most of the children were
in grades one through three in June, 1993.305 At Ketbek minors' camp, there were
only fifty students in grade four, thirty in grade five, and thirty in grade six, of a
total of 1,100 students.

305
The two locations were Ketbak (1,273 minors of whom 1,100 were enrolled in
school) and Brjoc (114 minors in their own farming community) in June 1993.
292 Civilian Devastation

It is not accurate to say that there were no schools outside of Nasir.

UNICEF's education program reached 930 schools throughout southern Sudan in
1993 with 730 education kits benefiting 1,940,000 pupils. An NGO trained 112
teachers in southern Sudan in 1993, and forty teachers attended a basic course in
trauma treatment in Nasir organized by UNICEF.306
In early 1994, twenty minors walked from Nasir to Ler, which took one
month, to rejoin their families. UNICEF prepared a new reunification program for
about 3,000 boys from Nasir to Ler,307 the SPLA-Nasir/United having withdrawn its
objections to the reunification program. Several hundred youth were reunified with
their families before fighting between Nuer tribes in early 1994 led to the burning of
all huts in Nasir and the population scattering. About 600 unaccompanied minors
settled temporarily in a displaced persons camp in Malual village.308

Minority Minors
The segregation of students in the refugee camps in Ethiopia and the
evacuation the unaccompanied minors separately from the rest of the refugee
community had an inevitable result: many minors have since lost touch with family
members. Family reunification has become all but impossible.
This is especially hard on ethnic and tribal groups that are not in the
majority in the Dinka or Nuer areas where the concentrations of unaccompanied
minors are located, because they may be subject to different treatment and even
discrimination when they have Arabic names or are Muslims. They also tend to lose
their culture since they grow up away from the adults who could teach them tribal
customs and traditions.

306
OLS (Southern Sector) Situation Report No. 52, January 16-31, 1994, p. 3.

307
OLS (Southern Sudan) Situation Report No. 53, February 1-15, 1994, p. 2.

308
OLS (Southern Sector), "Weekly Update, May 31, 1994," Nairobi, Kenya, p. 2.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 293

Although most of the minors in Nasir are Nuer, there are several hundred
minors from other groups, such as Dinka (perhaps eighty) and Nuba. The Dinka
minors' families have been traced mostly to the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya.
Although it is against UNHCR policy to transport people out of their country and
make them refugees, the interests of child welfare and family reunification
expressed in the Convention on the Rights of the Child309 should override that
policy in this case.
The Nuba boys speak Arabic310 and have Arabic names, and some of them
are Muslims. They have been the object of jokes or comments by others and are in
need of family reunification, which is difficult because the Nuba Mountains are too
militarily conflicted to permit such an effort. Should their families or even fellow
villagers be located in refugee camps or elsewhere, the minors' relocation should be
permitted if desired, regardless of borders.
In SPLA-Torit territory, HRW/Africa interviewed an eighteen-year-old
boy, born in Blue Nile province, a member of a small non-Nilotic tribe. As of July
1993, he had been separated from his family for over three years.
The boy originally attended school in Blue Nile province, where the
classes were in Arabic, his second language. He managed to complete grade three at
age eleven, before the war reached his village.
Government forces burned the village to the ground in 1986, and villagers
scattered to various places. He, his family, and others walked eight days to Ethiopia,

309
The Convention on the Rights of the Child, art. 10 (1) states, "applications by a
child or his or her parents to enter or leave a State Party for the purpose of family
reunification shall be dealt with by State Parties in a positive, humane and expeditious
manner."

310
Nuba often speak Arabic to each other, since there are many different dialects in
the Nuba Mountains.
294 Civilian Devastation

to a camp near Asosa town. He had to start in grade one at the refugee school
because the instruction was in English, not a language he understood. The Sudanese
government attacked this refugee camp inside Ethiopia on January 4, 1990. The
refugees fled to Itang, but in Itang, he "had no time to go to school." He and a male
cousin were separated from their parents and sent to live with the unaccompanied
minors. In May 1991, when Mengistu fell, and he and the other unaccompanied
minors were taken to Fugnido, where they stayed a week. With a group of sixty-
three boys from his tribe and other minors with whom he had been living in Itang,
he was taken from Fugnido to Pochalla, a four-day walk. In Pochalla they remained
from July 1991 to March 1992, and left when the Sudan government launched an
attack.311
They arrived in Kapoeta, and his ethnic group of sixty-three was divided.
He remained with thirty-three who stayed in the Catholic Mission compound; there
was no other room. After a series of evacuations the thirty-three boys were moved
in July 1992 to the "Triple A" camps where they were split up among the three
camps. He and what remained of his group settled near a few elders and women
from their tribe who had fled to the "Triple A" displaced persons camps from
Ethiopian camps.
The boys spoke their own language to each other but instruction in the
"triple A" school was in English, a language none of them spoke. A teacher who
spoke Arabic apparently interpreted the classes for them. They studied math,
English, geography, and science, but had no books. The boys expressed a desire to
see their parents, but "there is no chance." They lost all contact with their parents
when they were separated in Itang, and now do not know where the parents are.

SUMMARY EXECUTIONS, DISAPPEARANCES, AND TORTURE

Both SPLA factions have committed abuses such as summary executions,

disappearances, and torture and mistreatment of prisoners. The SPLA-Torit has held
prisoners in long-term arbitrary detention. These abuses have persisted over several
years.

311
From Pochalla he, his ethnic group of sixty-three, and other minors proceeded to
Kapoeta, a journey of sixteen days.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 295

Summary Executions
Executions without due process are no more than murder, which is
prohibited by common article 3. Examples of summary executions appear
throughout this report. Amnesty International also has gathered many examples of
summary executions; for instance it found that in May 1992 the SPLA-Torit
instituted a policy of "deliberate and arbitrary killing of civilians of Toposa
ethnicity in villages around Kapoeta . . . in retaliation for the involvement of Toposa
pro-government militia in the capture of Kapoeta and subsequent attacks on
refugees fleeing the town."312

Disappearances
Disappearance of a person while in the custody of a government or rebel
group a particularly distressing phenomenon. It often involves unacknowledged
detention, which provides the detaining authority with deniability should that
authority later decide to summarily execute the detainee. Thus the detainee may be
tortured or subjected to other abuse and/or executed during the time of
unacknowledged detention.
In Sudan, many have disappeared after they have been openly detained, but
they do not reappear and the authorities seem to feel under no obligation to account
for the disappearance of a detainee while in their custody. Often, in the case of the
SPLA factions, they deny that the prisoner has been summarily executed and claim
that he has escaped and is in Europe or the U.S. In these cases, the detaining
authorities never acknowledge the deaths of which they are the cause, nor are the
bodies turned over to the families.
Some prisoners have escaped. Often they reappear in refugee camps and
reestablish contact with their friends, political allies, and fellow tribesmen. Others
have been killed while escaping. Since many escapes are made in groups because of
the rough terrain, there are often witnesses to those killed during the course of an
escape (by ambush, wild animals, or thirst). Others have been summarily executed
secretly, without ever having made an escape attempt.
If a person remains missing, despite family and other efforts to locate him
while others who have "disappeared" turn up in exile or elsewhere, the presumption
that the missing person has died at the hands of the detaining authorities in whose

312
Amnesty International, "Patterns of repression," pp. 9-10.
296 Civilian Devastation

custody he was last seen alive is almost irrebuttable. The burden is on the detaining
authority to show otherwise. Therefore, HRW/Africa cannot accept the simple claim
that the person has "escaped" and is no longer the responsibility of the authorities.
The burden is on the authorities to establish the fact of escape alive.
In one case, the circumstances point to summary execution but not
conclusively. Three long-term political prisoners were held by SPLA-Torit in
Morobo:313 Martin Majier Gai, Martin Makur Aleu, and Martin Kajiboro. They
reportedly had been released by SPLA-Torit after several other prisoners escaped in
September 1992314 from their prison near Morobo, but were rearrested and jailed in
Morobo two months later. When the government started its offensive in this area in
late July 1993, they were in jail. The government bombed the area and witnesses
reportedly saw the three alive, fleeing with their guards towards the Zaire border.
They were not seen again.
Another case is that of a Nuer doctor who had attended medical school in
Ethiopia and was an SPLA officer performing medical duties in Kapoeta until it fell
in May 1992, when he fled with others to Narus. In June or July 1992, he was
accused of being a follower of a Nuer commander who defected. The doctor was
captured in the presence of many witnesses in the officers' mess, where a senior
officer announced to everyone that the doctor was under arrest. Two days later, a
witness to the arrest heard one bullet fired. He was later told, unofficially, that the
doctor had been shot by the SPLA-Torit. He did not see the body, but the man never
reappeared, in exile or otherwise. There was no court martial; the ordinary
procedure in a court martial followed by a death sentence is to publicize the
investigation, court martial, and sentence among the troops, and to conduct the
execution by a firing squad before the troops. The lack of any such procedure led
the witness to conclude this was a summary execution.

Torture

313
Morobo is close to the Uganda border, in a hilly area in which Anya-Nya I had a
guerrilla camp.

314
See accounts of Commanders Faustino and Kerubino, below.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 297

The right to humane treatment while in custody is one of the core human
rights; common article 3 to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 forbids "at any
time and in any place whatsoever mutilation, cruel treatment, and torture."315 In
addition, "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading
treatment" are prohibited.
"Torture became the norm," according to one assigned to judicial duties in
Eastern Equatoria in the late 1980s and early 1990s. "It was not possible to control
torture," he claimed. He learned of many cases in his jurisdiction where people died
under military torture, usually those accused of political or security offenses.
Some, usually the a security or spying detainees, were kept in a hole in the
ground for many days on end. The hole in the ground was two or three by one or
one-and-a-half meters, surrounded by thorns. "People left there would die from heat
and diseases." This pit was used for serious political crimes, before a hearing, to
bring pressure on the captive.
People were also tied very tightly by the arms and wrists. He saw one
prisoner who thereafter lost the ability to move his arm. People accused of spying
sometimes had their fingernails removed; the same judicial officer saw many in this
condition, with no fingernails on several fingers.

315
See Appendix A.
298 Civilian Devastation

Although this officer tried to intervene with senior officers316 on behalf of

these tortured men, he was brushed off with the excuse that "we were in war and
things will change gradually over time." Even when the accused were not tortured, it
became the custom to administer twenty lashes when anyone was detained, even
before any questions were asked. The conditions of detention were sometimes very
harsh. The place of custody sometimes was inside garrisons. More often people
were held outdoors, fenced in with thorns like cattle, exposed to the elements, with
no roof or cover.
The abusive treatment occurred also in Ethiopia. An officer detained in
1989 saw and heard the sounds of other SPLA prisoners being very badly treated by
SPLA guards under the eyes and ears of the Ethiopian state security in Gambela.
Some prisoners were in a hole, under the rain and sun. When they were allowed to
climb out of the hole to go to the toilet, an armed guard followed them. They were
beaten daily, including beatings with a rifle butt. The officer heard their cries as
they received between fifty to a hundred lashes, until they were unconscious. They
were beaten more if they made any noise. Cold water was poured over them to
revive them; their underwear was red with blood. They were tied with their hands
behind with a rope from the wrists up the back to the mouth to hold a gag.
As to the SPLA-Nasir/United, HRW/Africa received several credible
testimonies of similar types of torture and conditions of detention that occurred in
1992 at the hands of that faction's security police.
One displaced man reported that in 1992 he was held by SPLA-Nasir in
terrible conditions of detention (in the open, behind a thorn fence, "like cattle," with
little food and water) for weeks near Nasir, without any charges brought against
him, along with forty other men.
The SPLA-Nasir/United's only prison is said to be in Fangak, in the middle
of a malarial swamp. Other SPLA-Nasir/United prisons may exist, even though
Commander Riek did not mention them to HRW/Africa. Relief workers in the area
said that prisons similar to Fangak existed on islands in the rivers when Riek was
Area Commander of Western Upper Nile.
In mid-1993, four persons were said to be jailed in Fanjak. Two civilians
were jailed after being convicted by the General Court Martial of homicide and

316
Almost all persons serving in the civil administration of the SPLA are or have been
SPLA officers or soldiers assigned to civilian duties.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 299

sentenced to three years and payment of compensation. A third Fangak prisoner, an

SPLA-Nasir/United soldier, was tried in 1993 in Nasir for "security" offenses,
indisicipline, and disobedience. He was found guilty, dismissed from the SPLA-
Nasir/United army, and sentenced to two years in Fangak prison. A fourth man was
convicted in Nasir for security offenses, dismissed, and is serving a two year
sentence in Fangak.
The ICRC was able to visit 190 detainees held by the SPLA in southern
Sudan in January 1992. Sixty-seven of them had been registered by the ICRC before
and 123 were seen for the first time. Follow-up visits were carried out in March,
1992 before the suspension of ICRC work in Sudan.317 It appears that these
detainees were Sudan army soldiers held by SPLA-Torit. It does not appear that
SPLA-Nasir/United conducts operations against the government or holds any Sudan
army prisoners.

Prolonged Arbitrary Detention and Torture of Long-Term Prisoners

The SPLA has, over the years, detained SPLA officers alleged to be
plotting coups against or challenging the leadership of Chairman and Commander-
in-Chief John Garang. Few have been charged formally with violations of the SPLA
Code or given an opportunity to defend themselves or have their day in court. At
least forty SPLA officers have been in this situation; they have rotted in jail, until
negotiations led to their release, or until they died or escaped. Some are still in jail.
HRW/Africa interviewed two former long-term prisoners, Commanders
Kerubino Kuanyin Bol and Faustino Atem Gualdit, whose testimony is consistent
with written testimony of other former long-term prisoners.318 Their treatment by
the SPLA-Torit violated the absolute ban in common article 3 on "cruel treatment
and torture" as well as "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating
and degrading treatment." The fact that they were never tried violated the ban on
prolonged arbitrary detention.319

317
ICRC, 1992 Annual Report, p. 51.

318
"For a Strong SPLM/A: What Is To Be Done? By a Group of Former Political
Detainees," Amon Mon Wantok, Chol Deng Alak, Ater Benjamin, Deng Bior Deng,
Ajiing Adiang, Nairobi, Kenya, June 11, 1992.

319
See Theodor Meron, Human Rights and Humanitarian Norms as Customary Law
(Oxford, England: Clarendon Press, 1989), pp. 49-50.
300 Civilian Devastation

The SPLA attempted to justify this denial of due process by calling it a less
severe penalty than execution, which is required for such crimes under the SPLA
Code. Not trying persons who were clearly guilty meant sparing their lives, Garang
supporters maintained. They also claimed that the SPLA deserves credit for not
summarily executing coup plotters, a practice followed in numerous other liberation
movements and by the government of Sudan.
These justifications are not to the point. The long-term detention without
trial of political opponents represents a serious deviation from the rule of law,
especially for a movement whose political agenda is democracy. Keeping prisoners
four to eight years in jail without any charges or trial violates the prohibition on
prolonged arbitrary detention. The assumption that they would have been found
guilty after trial makes a travesty of the presumption of innocence.
These detainees are not prisoners of war, that is, captured enemy
combatants. They are officers of the rebel army taken into custody by their own
commander. Rebels in an internal armed conflict have no authority to jail anyone
indefinitely, without trial, as would be permitted in an international armed conflict
for states capturing foreign enemy combatants and treating them as prisoners of war
whereby they may be held without trial until the end of the hostilities. While the
rebels and the government in an internal armed conflict may elect to treat captured
enemy combatants as prisoners of war, and not try them, these rebel officers, jailed
by their own army, do not fall into the category of captured enemy combatants.
Their capture was inspired by their political, not military, activities.
Commander Kerubino, at the time the second in command of the SPLA,
was arrested in mid-September 1987 by Ethiopian President Mengistu Haile
Mariam, who summoned Kerubino from his command in the South Blue Nile front
to the palace in Addis Ababa. Kerubino was accused of being a "reactionary," but
the main allegation was that he was plotting a coup against Garang.320 After
Kerubino's arrest, his forces based in Assosa, Ethiopia, near the Sudan border, were
disarmed by the Ethiopian army and the SPLA, which besieged them at the SPLA

320
"I met with Mengistu for six hours. He accused me of wanting to spoil the SPLA
movement. The Ethiopians had their own experience of faction fighting," Kerubino
said. Kerubino also had disagreements with Garang over whether the SPLA should
participate in the civil war in Ethiopia; the Ethiopian government wanted the SPLA to
fight Ethiopian secessionist movements, which had in turn been aided by the Sudanese
government. "I refused to fight against the Oromo [the largest Ethiopian tribe] with the
Ethiopian army. They asked me to do this in early 1986," Kerubino said. "Garang said
we were all one team and we should fight the Oromo."
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 301

base in Assosa with artillery. Three days later, some forty of Kerubino's supporters,
all officers, were arrested there, including Faustino.321
When Faustino was arrested, he was told that the investigation would only
take a few days. He and the others were tied up and taken to an open area at the
SPLA base. In front of the assembled SPLA soldiers, Garang denounced the
captives, calling them "reactionaries" and declaring them "enemies of the people."
There was never any hearing or trial.
In jail, Faustino was tortured and accused of instigating the coup plot.
During the first seven days his hands and legs were tied behind him. For four days,
he was held naked in a pit filled to his neck with cold water. Only when he was near
death was he brought out of the pit. He was tied up again when he recovered.
Faustino and the others were in jail at the SPLA base in Assosa for seven
months. Kerubino was held separately. For six months he was in Walega, Ethiopia,
in a military barracks prison. He was not questioned or tried. An Ethiopian army
officer told him he was held on orders of Garang "for security reasons." While in
Ethiopian custody, Kerubino was not beaten or tortured, and he was fed.
After six months, Kerubino was sent to Gambela for three days and then to
another SPLA Ethiopian base he called Aman. Commander Arok Thon Arok,
another one of the SPLA high command, had been arrested in the meantime and
brought to the same place. Kerubino and Arok were kept in isolation in separate
tukls and not allowed to talk to each other. Here Kerubino was badly mistreated.

I could not leave the hut except to go to the toilet and sometimes
not even for that. They gave me a bucket. I was tortured by

321
Later, many of these soldiers were released "with orders to fight the Oromo with
the Ethiopian government." The Oromo Liberation Front eventually won. In
Kerubino's account, "the Oromo and the Sudan government conducted a joint attack on
South Blue Nile and forced us out in 1990, capturing Assosa in October, 1990. They
captured Walega and their forces came to Addis and they were the end of Mengistu" in
May 1991.
302 Civilian Devastation

soldiers, young soldiers, ages fourteen, seventeen, eighteen, who

were given orders to torture us.

I was tied with rope on my wrists and legs. I was flogged with a
leather whip for a long time, on my back. They also tied my eyes,
so I could not see who was lashing me. They did not ask
questions, they just lashed.
They have orders not to talk to you.

He was given little food and was denied medical treatment for a preexisting
condition.
Kerubino and Arok Thon Arok were in that prison for more than two
years, from 1988 until mid-1991. Arok noted that there were other Sudanese
prisoners at this facility who were subjected to worse torture, such as mock
executions.322

322
The SPLA apparently gave blankets to Commanders Kerubino and Arok, the
highest-ranking detainees, but not to the others.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 303

At about the same time in 1988 that Kerubino and Arok Thon Arok were
moved to this prison at an SPLA base in Ethiopia, Faustino and seven other SPLA
officer-prisoners were transferred to Boma, Sudan.323 One prisoner calculated the
date as May 26, 1988.324 A total of forty-three Sudanese SPLA officer prisoners
from different areas were held there.325 Some had been freshly beaten. Among them
were very senior SPLA officers. All the prisoners were kept in a small room, some
five by seven meters. All remaining possessions were removed from them, leaving
them with only a shirt and a pair of pants each. They were each given a ground
sheet and a blanket. The guards brought a bucket for everyone, saying, "If you want
to urinate, defecate, wash your face, use this bucket." The guards only removed the
bucket when it was overflowing (one prisoner estimates this was every seven days).
For four months they did not move outside the room. "This was the worst period of

323
First they were moved in an Ethiopian army helicopter to Gambela, Ethiopia, tied
hand and foot and blindfolded for the journey. After one night in Gambela, they were
sent by plane to south Ethiopia, almost at the Sudan border, where they were put into
grain sacks (two sacks to cover each man) and tossed into vehicles. They were taken on
a rough road across the border to Boma.

324
"For a Strong SPLM/A, By a Group of Former Detainees," p. 13.

325
Others say all the detainees from Bilpam, Blue Nile and Bonga were taken to
Gambela, helicoptered to Raad, and driven to Boma. They list twenty-four officers who
were so transferred. "For a Strong SPLM/A, By a Group of Former Detainees, p. 12.
304 Civilian Devastation

my detention," Faustino said. Another prisoner said they did not bathe for ninety-
seven days.326 Maggots and lice were everywhere, and the smell was very bad.
The prison roof was of corrugated iron, and the walls were of the same
material. The building held the heat of the equatorial sun. Some of the prisoners
became ill from insects at a location where they were taken to dig a well. They
received very little food, mostly just maize in water. They survived by organizing
themselves; most were educated men so they gave lectures to each other to pass the
time, each in his field of study.

326
Ibid., p. 13.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 305

After several months in Boma (perhaps in January 1989), the prisoners

were removed to a hut about six hours on foot from Boma. They believed they were
moved in order to prevent anyone from discovering their detention place.327 In the
new location, prisoners lived in a hut, under guard at all times. The conditions were
terrible--the grass roof did not protect them from rain, and they sat close to their
belongings to try to keep them dry. They were locked inside the hut for one year,
after which their shelter improved but their minimal food rations did not. They
remained there until 1991. Another fifteen prisoners were brought to the area but
kept in a separate hut.328
They were videotaped by security men while in this jail; they were in very
bad condition. "If you had seen me, you would not have believed I was human,"
Faustino said, adding

You could count all my ribs, you could see every artery in my
legs. We lost weight. We had no medicine, no treatment. Three
or four of the prisoners died. When they died, we did not see
where they were buried. We could only put the body outside the
hut.

They had little food and lived on the leaves from the cassava plant. Later
on, they had no food and remained that way "for a long time." Faustino continued:

327
Cars from Torit passed by Boma. The prisoners' friends and relatives were trying
to find them and there was a chance they might discover the Boma prison.

328
They believed that "Garang arrived one or twice in an Ethiopian helicopter with
the Cuban and East German ambassadors in another helicopter, and hovered over the
place." When they were arrested, other officers told them that the Cubans and East
Germans were cooperating with Garang.
306 Civilian Devastation

Once we did not eat, in protest. They decided if we were not

going to eat, we would not drink, either. We protested to make
them try and sentence us or free us. We asked for our wives to be
given to us. We heard that our wives were given to others on the
orders of Garang.

After the hunger strike started the guards withheld the water, usually
brought in cans, leaving the prisoners all day without water. When they were taken
out to get water, they were taken to dirty water. Faustino described beatings:

How we survived is a miracle. They even had a graveyard set up.

They expected us to die. Sometimes when we wanted to call a
guard they would reply by shooting at us. Many times we were
lashed with a whip made from the hide of a hippopotamus, very
hard leather. It was ordinary to be given a hundred lashes. I
protested the lashing of an older man, a pilot and my teacher,
Manyar. They told me I was talking only because I had a high
rank; they tied me up and took me to a senior officer and he gave
me a hundred lashes, no questions asked.

They continued to lash him to make him run, but "I lay down and refused
to move. They only stopped lashing me when I was about to die. Then I got up and
fell down two times."
When Mengistu's government was overthrown by the Ethiopian rebels in
May 1991, the prisoners Kerubino and Arok Thon Arok were removed from
Ethiopia to Boma, Sudan, where they were kept in isolation.
When Riek defected from the SPLA three months later, the SPLA-Torit
feared that the Riek forces would try to release these prisoners, so they removed
them in November 1991 to a place between Torit and Kapoeta, where Kerubino and
Arok were no longer in isolation. At this time there were negotiations between the
two SPLA factions on a possible reconciliation. An agreement was reached through
church mediation and signed on December 17, 1991. Forty prisoners were to be
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 307

released as a step toward reuniting the factions, and many were released in early
1992 in Torit.329
At least four long-term prisoners, however, were not to be released:
Kerubino, Arok, John Kulang Puot, and Martin Makur Aleu, who were all left in
detention pending further negotiations.

329
Some of those who were released as a result of the late 1991 agreement between
the factions feared rearrest and, when Kapoeta fell, fled with others to Kenya, where
they sought UNHCR and Kenyan protection. "For a Strong SPLM/A, By a Group of
Former Detainees," p. 28.
308 Civilian Devastation

Several of the released prisoners were jailed again twenty-four hours later.
Faustino was among those jailed again, on the grounds that Garang had wanted to
talk to them before they were released. They were taken to Kidepo, sixty miles from
Torit, near Garang's headquarters. The others detained again with him were Malath
Joseph Luath, Martin Kajiboro, Thomas Kerou Tong, Atem Zacharia Dut, and
Mabior Marier. While still in Kidepo, the prisoner Thomas Kerou Tong330 was
removed from the cell. The guards told them that Thomas escaped to the U.S. or
Europe. They later heard that Thomas's body was found with his hands tied and a
bullet in his temple. He has never reappeared.331
After Kapoeta fell to the government in late May, 1992, the prisoners were
moved several times before being taken to Morobo, described as a former Anya
Nya I camp in Western Equatoria, west of Kaya near the Ugandan border. On
September 5, 1992, a group of seven guards and five prisoners escaped from that
prison to Uganda. The prisoners were Mabior Marier, Malath Joseph Luath, Arok
Thon Arok, Faustino Atem Gualdit, and Kerubino Kuanyin Bol. One, Malath
Joseph Luath, was shot dead in a SPLA-Torit ambush during the flight to Uganda.
Word of the escape leaked out, and international appeals prevailed upon
the Ugandan government not to return the prisoners to the SPLA-Torit, pursuant to
refugee law.332 The Sudan government sent a representative to visit them in
Ugandan detention. The Ugandans kept them in almost complete incommunicado
detention for about five months before turning them over to the UNHCR, effectively
freeing them.

330
He was a captain and an SPLA pilot, a graduate of the flying school at Kidlington,
England.

331
Ibid., p. 27.

332
On September 18, 1992, the SPLA-Nasir issued a press release regarding the
escape, which it said occurred on September 7. "Escape of SPLA Detainees," Sudan
Update, vol. 4, no. 1, (London: September 22, 1992), p.3.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 309

Prolonged Arbitrary Detention and Torture of Ugandan Prisoners by SPLA-

Torit
Perhaps as many as fifty Ugandans have been held in prolonged arbitrary
detention for some years in Ethiopia and Sudan by the SPLA acting in coordination
with a Ugandan guerrilla movement sponsored by the SPLA. Their imprisonment
illustrates the enormous powers delegated to the SPLA by the Mengistu government
of Ethiopia, and the complexity of cross-border tribal and insurgent relations.
HRW/Africa considers the detentions to be highly illegal since these persons were
refugees. Treatment meted out to them also violated the ban on torture.
In 1985, a group of about 600 Ugandan army officers and soldiers fled
Uganda across the border into SPLA territory.333 Led by Peter Otai,334 the men were
on the wrong side of a recent Ugandan coup that brought Tito Okello to power,
prior to current President Museveni's January 1989 takeover.335 The SPLA told the
would-be refugees that they could join a nascent Ugandan guerrilla organization to
fight against the Ugandan government. The Ugandans felt they had no other option
and went to Ethiopia for military training. None ever returned to Uganda as a
guerrilla.336
The 600 Ugandans were first held at Dima, an SPLA base fifteen minutes
from the Dima refugee camp in Ethiopia. They lived at the SPLA base but were not
registered as refugees since they were "not supposed to be" in Ethiopia. They were
told they had to pass as Sudanese if they encountered any expatriates at the refugee
camp. Conditions at the base were bad: of the 600 Ugandans there, one quarter to
one half died of sickness and lack of food, one of the Ugandans said.

333
"Sudan/Uganda: Border control," Africa Confidential, vol. 34, no. 16 (London:
August 13, 1993), p. 4.

334
Otai was Minister of State for Defense in Uganda under President Milton Obote.
Ibid.

335
Ibid.

336
The motivation for training such an army was never stated by the SPLA but its
opponents and observers believed that Garang wished to have a Ugandan guerrilla
group under his control with which to threaten Museveni, the President of Uganda, if
Museveni did not cooperate with the SPLA. "For a Strong SPLM/A, By a Group of
Former Detainees," pp. 21-22; "Sudan/Uganda: Border Control," Africa Confidential.
310 Civilian Devastation

Seven were arrested at Dima in July 1987, after Peter Otai announced the
formation in Nairobi of a splinter Ugandan resistance movement, the Uganda
People's Army. Some detainees were members of Otai's tribe, the Iteso. Thirty-three
Ugandans in all were detained in Dima in 1987 by Ugandan guerrilla Commander
Ben Odiek, with the assistance of the SPLA.
The prisoners were held in a corral, exposed to the sun, rain, and cold.
There were no sanitation facilities. Medicine was difficult to come by. One victim
said he was tortured by the SPLA at the direction of Commander Ben Odiek, and
beaten with sticks to pressure him to "confess."
In February, 1988, the Ugandans, prisoners and non-prisoners, were
escorted by the SPLA on foot to the SPLA base in Khor Shum (renamed Pakok
when thousands of Sudanese repatriating refugees arrived in 1991), Upper Nile,
Sudan, on the Ethiopian border. The Ugandans who ran the camp kept the prisoners
in a thorn-enclosed corral, beat them with sticks and fists, and tortured them. The
prisoners received no medicine, little food, no visits from their family or anyone
else and were isolated from the other Ugandans. Three prisoners died in that
detention.
Unlike the case of the SPLA commanders held for years without trial or
court martial, however, a court martial was convened for the Ugandan detainees in
February 1988 in Khor Shum (Pakok) to judge those arrested in 1987. They were
charged with violations of the SPLA Code, including charges of violation of section
29 (1) (d), being an "enemy of the people."337 Why the SPLA Code applied to these
Ugandan guerrillas was not clear, nor of which "people" they were "enemies."
The result was the same as if they had never been tried, however. The six
Ugandan officers who were members of the court martial worked, with breaks due
to paper shortages, from February, 1988, to April, 1989, when the court martial
ended in a stalemate, three for conviction and three for acquittal. The accused
remained jailed. They were joined in jail, in April, 1989, by their former torturer,
Commander Ben Odiek. He and others were arrested with the help of the SPLA on
unrelated charges.
The Ugandans stayed in Khor Shum (Pakok) from February, 1988, until
November, 1992,338 when in anticipation of a government attack on nearby Boma
they were ordered to move. The Ugandan prisoners were taken to a prison in Narus,

337
Seebelow in this Chapter for a description of the SPLA Code and this crime.

338
See above in this Chapter for an account of the forced portering the SPLA
required the Ugandans to do there, and their recruitment as rebels by the SPLA.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 311

where they were housed with thirty SPLA prisoners. The Narus prisoners were
seriously underfed. Initially, they were kept in the open, exposed to rain, then
required to build a cell for themselves. Some fourteen Ugandan prisoners were
transferred to this "Ugandan" cell on December 25, 1992. When government planes
bombed the area, the prisoners were not allowed to find shelter away from the cell,
and bombs often fell nearby.
The prisoners began to resist because they were tired of being whipped
"for minor things." Another platoon of thirty Ugandan soldiers was added to the
sixteen Ugandan military police already in Narus as prison guards. In January,
1993, six more Ugandans were arrested and put in the SPLA-Torit cell in Narus
when they refused orders to fight alongside the SPLA-Torit.
At least twelve Ugandan prisoners in two groups escaped from the
Ugandan and SPLA-Torit cells in Narus, joined by a young guard. The first group
escaped in early 1993; it took them five days to reach Kenya, and one died of thirst
on the way. The second group, including a guard, escaped two days later; although
they reached the Kenyan border in two days, on the way one died of thirst. "The rest
of us drank our urine."
Until the prisoners escaped from Sudan did their relatives know if they
were alive or dead. Of the estimated fifty Ugandans held under SPLA authority in
Ethiopia and Sudan from 1985-1993, over half may still have been in detention in
Sudan in SPLA-Torit-controlled areas in mid-1993.

Other Arbitrary Detention

There are other cases of prolonged or arbitrary detention of less well-
known persons. A court official visited detainees and found cases where people
were in custody for fifteen days "just because of a family quarrel; there was no legal
justification for their detention." In his experience, a soldier could send the military
police to capture his wife because of family matters, and cause her to be kept in
military detention without a hearing. There were many people in custody for two or
three years with no accusation against them. "It was up to the whim of the
commander or the person who got them thrown in custody."
Local chiefs were imprisoned sometimes for being "stubborn." One local
chief in the Kajo Kaji area, Juma Lukolo, used to skip many of the SPLA meetings,
and when he attended, he was very argumentative. According to a resident, the
SPLA put him in jail for a week in 1991 for "arguing," an arbitrary reason for
imprisonment.

SPLA ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE

312 Civilian Devastation

Despite an eleven-year history of controlling a large population and

territory, the SPLA has not developed anything approaching a system of justice and
due process. For a guerrilla army, the difficulties of administering a judicial system
are considerable. Under international rules of war, however, rebels have certain
human rights obligations that the SPLA factions are ignoring.339 The absence of the
rule of law is evident in reports of torture, summary executions, arbitrary and
prolonged detentions, denial of due process, and the failure of military
accountability for human rights abuses.

339
See Appendix A.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 313

HRW/Africa focuses on these legal issues in part because both factions

have indicated an interest in improving their legal systems. This chapter does not
address the government's extensive violations of international law. The issues facing
the government are different and deserve separate treatment which they have
received from HRW/Africa and other human rights organizations; they include and
go far beyond the abuses of the rules of war described herein.340

Customary Southern Sudanese Law

It is difficult to generalize about the administration of justice throughout
southern Sudan. What can be said is that neither shari'a nor the penal code of Sudan
is applied outside of government-controlled garrison towns. In their place are
customary southern Sudanese law and the SPLA Code.

340
See Africa Watch, "Sudan: Violations of Academic Freedom," vol. IV, issue no. 12
(New York: Human Rights Watch, November 7, 1992); "Sudan: The Ghosts Remain,"
vol. no. 4, issue no. 6 (New York: Human Rights Watch, April 27, 1992); "Sudan: New
Islamic Penal Code Violates Basic Human Rights," vol. no. 3, issue no. 9 (New York:
Human Rights Watch, April 9, 1991); "Sudan: Inside Al Bashir's Prisons: Torture,
Denial odf Medical Atten and Poor Conditions" (New York: Human Rights Watch,
February 11, 1991); "Sudan: Suppression of Information, Curbs on the Press, Attacks
on Journalists, Writers and Academics," vol. no. 2, issue no. 28 (New York: Human
Rights Watch, August 30, 1990); "Sudan: Threat to Women's Status from
Fundamentalist Regime," vol. no. 2, issue no. 12 (New York: Human Rights Watch,
April 9, 1990).
314 Civilian Devastation

Customary south Sudanese law,341 varying from tribe to tribe,342 is applied

by chiefs in tribal courts in much the same way as it was under the Anglo-Egyptian
Condominium government (1899-1956), run by the British. That government
recognized three codes of law by which Sudanese peoples were to be governed: the
Sudan Penal Code, which covered offences against persons and property; the
Islamic shari'a law, which regulated the personal and family life of Muslims; and
tribal or customary law, which was not a single code but a recognition of the
different varieties of customary law that existed throughout the rural areas of the
country.343
In south Sudan, disputes among the Nilotic tribes were settled by
negotiations between ad hoc groups of mediators drawn from the heads of opposing
social or family units. In feuds, where strong feeling inhibited groups from meeting
together, a neutral arbitrator who could impose additional sanctions, usually the
land priest, was brought in. He was able to persuade groups to meet and to agree on
a settlement.
The British government was drawn into the traditional system when, in
attempting to end Nuer-Dinka fighting, it acted as an arbitrator and negotiated
settlements according to customary law. The British mediation of external disputes
was facilitated by their gradual creation of chiefs' courts among the Nuer and Dinka,
grafting a system of executive chief and court president onto the system.344

341
Early British officials sometimes wrote about a "tribal code" or "tribal law" but
in general they adopted the legal category of "customary law" to cover all such codes,
and to distinguish it from the written codes of civil, criminal and shari'a law. We refer
to it as customary southern Sudanese law to distinguish it from other areas of the
country.

342
For instance, Nilotic (Dinka, Nuer, Shilluk and Anuak) women have fewer rights
to divorce than do Equatorian women. Customary law is very public: HRW/Africa had
the opportunity to watch part of a trial for adultery under Dinka law. Several hundred
people observed these proceedings, which lasted three days.

343
Douglas H. Johnson, "Judicial Regulation and Administrative Control:
Customary Law and the Nuer, 1895-1954," Journal of African History 27 (London,
1986): p. 62.

344
Johnson, "Judicial Regulation," p. 72. "The court president looked after the
functioning of the courts in his area, the executive chief (also a member of the court)
supervised the execution of judgments." Ibid.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 315

At the same time, the British did not abandon their attempts to introduce
clear categories of crime and punishment, of "law" and deterrence,345 and by 1930
government policy had seriously weakened traditional forms of justice.
This British system did not satisfy the customary requirement of
reconciliation and compromise or the traditional linking of different segments of the
community together by a willingness to share, give, loan, and accept compensation
for wrongs.346
Customary law continued to be applied in the rural areas of southern Sudan
after independence in 1956, without interruption. It was evoked to convene inter-
tribal meetings after the settlement of the first civil war in 1972; the southern
regional government spent years fostering these meetings to sort out the claims and
feuds which grew up during the war.

345
Ibid., p. 62.

346
"To fulfill one's obligations completely is to sever a link; to repay one's full debt
ends a form of relationship." Ibid., p. 74.
316 Civilian Devastation

Today customary southern Sudanese law continues to be applied in SPLA

areas. Candidates from chiefly families continue to be elected to fill the court
offices. The SPLA supervised a number of elections which have brought younger
men into office,347 but many of the chiefs interviewed by HRW/Africa were older
men, who retained an emblem of office, the sash.
Local negotiations along traditional lines were successful in calming
factional feuds along the border between Bahr El Ghazal/Lakes and Upper Nile
provinces after the faction fighting of 1991-92. The Nuer prophet, Wut Nyang, tried
to support such arbitration along the Ayod/Duk border following the looting and
massacres in Kongor and Bor in 1991, but without success.
The SPLA-Nasir/United has utilized the traditional means of negotiations
and payment of compensation to settle some disputes. For example, in 1993, two
Nuer tribes escalated their dispute over fishing rights in the Ulang area of the Sobat
River basin to fighting, including village burning, retaliatory killings, and cattle
raiding. The SPLA-Nasir/United intervened and pressured both sides to enter into
negotiations. The dispute was settled by payment of cattle.

The SPLA Code

The SPLA's initial political goal was a "united secular Sudan," in contrast
to prior southern rebel demands for a separate state and also in contrast to the aim
of northern political parties to make some form of shari'a the law of the land.348 The

347
Commander Riek complained that the SPLA officers used to interfere with and sit
as judges in the customary courts because they liked to collect the fines, paid in cows.
He claimed to have put a stop to this practice.

348
In recent negotiations for settlement of the war, Sudan government officials
expressed a willingness to exempt the south from the application of shar'ia by providing
for local options in areas of non-Muslim populations.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 317

SPLA drew up a legal code, the "Sudan People's Revolutionary Laws, SPLM/SPLA
Punitive Provisions 1983" (SPLA Code) that both factions say they follow.
The SPLA Code is basically secular. It lists substantive offenses that are
military in nature: mutiny, disobedience of lawful orders, drunkenness on duty,
desertion, and theft of firearms.349

349
SPLA Code '' 26-34.
318 Civilian Devastation

The code, however, also attempts far-reaching regulation of civilian life,

criminalizing for civilians the following actions: posing as a soldier, murder,
robbery, theft, criminal breach of trust, forgery, rape, traffic in and kidnapping of
minors. (Most of these acts are crimes for the military also.) The Code also punishes
failure to produce food, to observe sanitation and dress standards, and indolence,
and provides for game preservation.350
In a more serious class than any of these offenses, however, forbidden to
civilians and military alike, is that of being an "enemy of the people." The offense,
which reflects the Soviet/Cold War origins of the 1983 SPLA Code, provides the
greatest opportunity for abuse since its provisions are vague and overly broad. An
enemy of the people includes "[m]embers of Sudan People's Liberation Movement
that may break away from the principles of the people's socialist movement" and
"[i]ndividuals or groups of people who propagate or advocate ideas, [ideologies], or
philosophies, or organize societies and organizations that tend to uphold or
[perpetuate] the oppression of the people or their exploitation by the Khartoum or
similar bourgeois system."351
In other areas of life, customary south Sudanese law still applies to
civilians.352
The actual extent and rigor of the application of the SPLA Code is hard to
determine. According to a former officer, the code was given to each commander,
who was expected to explain the law to his soldiers as part of his responsibility to
lead and control his troops. However, a copy of the code is extremely hard if not
impossible to come by in the field. Many say it is ignored; it obviously cannot be
followed if it is not available to those who should be administering it.

350
Ibid., '' 35-50.

351
Ibid., ' 10, 10 (c), 10 (f).

352
Under the SPLA Code, similar to the British system, the customary courts do not
have the power to sentence defendants to death nor to long-term imprisonment.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 319

It is difficult to know how the rudimentary judicial system functions in all

parts of southern Sudan under the control of the two factions. The formality of the
administrative system seems to have declined since 1992 when the SPLA-Torit lost
control to the government of several towns that were the locales of its embryonic
government.

Due Process Lacking in Procedure and Investigations

A major defect in the SPLA Code is its lack of procedural guarantees or
any procedural guidelines at all. For instance, there is no limit on the time any
accused person may be held for investigation and no requirement to bring him to
trial within a certain time period.353 Prolonged arbitrary detention -- for years -- of
dozens of political prisoners has been the result. Nor is there any rule of law
available to guarantee a fair trial. The lack of procedural guidelines gives absolute
discretion to military officers and others untrained in the law. "In the absence of a
code of procedure, laymen cannot apply the law," said an attorney who had
practiced in the Sudan judicial system before joining the SPLA.
As for procedure during investigations, under the code the battalion
commander or his deputy has the power to direct any officer or other person on his
force to investigate an offense.354 No other provisions, guidelines, or procedures for
investigation exist in the code, with two exceptions. First, the military police have
the "duty" to discover crimes and report them to the commander. The military
police, however, are not regulated or regular. The commander, including the
commander of a platoon, designates soldiers to serve in a "police" capacity on an ad
hoc basis to keep order in the camp and in the force.
The second exception is that on appeal or confirmation of a sentence, the
written investigation as well as a summary of the proceeding is to be provided to the
confirming or appellate authority.355
HRW/Africa was told by a former officer who served on several boards of
investigation that in practice, investigations of military personnel are performed

353
Commander Riek said that in his territory limits are imposed on time spent in
detention, unlike in the SPLA Code. He claimed that investigations are completed with
twenty-four hours. If a General Court Martial is required, that is done "immediately,"
he said, but former SPLA-Nasir detainees contradict this.

354
SPLA Code, ' 51.

355
Ibid., '52 (1).
320 Civilian Devastation

when they are ordered by the commander. A board of investigation, consisting of

three officers, is formed, one of whom must be from the security service. The
board's work is similar to that of an ordinary prosecutor: to collect evidence and
take statements of witnesses. The board gives its report to the commander, who
decides if the matter will be tried by a court martial.
In practice, also absent from the SPLA Code, there is a "combat
intelligence unit" whose duty includes investigating reports of spying. This unit
reports directly to the "leader of the movement" and has a separate chain of
command from the regular army units.
The one exception to the procedural void for investigations in the code is
for investigations of "enemies of the people." When such suspects are captured, the
code provides that the officer in charge shall investigate "the truth of that
suspicion." When the charge is proved "beyond a reasonable doubt," the particulars
are to be reported to the next superior officer, unless the "military situation is one of
grave urgency," in which case the investigating officer may administer the death
penalty on the spot.356

No Independent Tribunal
A specific due process requirement in common article 3 (1) (d) is a
"regularly constituted court." Later expert opinion357 redefined this as "a court
offering the essential guarantees of independence and impartiality."358 A U.N.
proposal defined these requirements of independence and impartiality to include:

1. individual guarantees that allow every judge to "decide matters before

him in accordance with his assessment of the facts and his understanding
of the law without any improper influences, inducements, or pressures,
direct or indirect, from any quarter or for any reason;" and

356
Ibid., ' 12.

357
The opinion was that "it was unlikely that a court could be 'regularly constituted'
under national law by an insurgent party." ICRC, Commentary on the Additional
Protocol, p. 1398.

358
Protocol II, article 6 (2).
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 321

2. membership in a judiciary which is "independent of the executive and

legislature, and has jurisdiction, directly or by way of review, over all
issues of a judicial nature."359

359
Draft Principles on the Independence of the Judiciary, UN Doc. E/CN.4/Sub.
2/481/Add. 1 at 3 (1981); Americas Watch, "Violations of Fair Trial Guarantees by the
FMLN's Ad Hoc Courts" (New York: Human Rights Watch, May 1990).
322 Civilian Devastation

The court system set forth in the SPLA Code is not independent.
Violations of the SPLA Code are to be tried in three tiers of military courts;360 first
mentioned is the highest court, the People's General Courts Martial, which has
personal jurisdiction over high-ranking officers and officials of the SPLA and
subject matter jurisdiction over offenses requiring the death penalty and life
imprisonment, and appeals therefrom.361
The SPLA Code confers on the People's District Courts Martial
jurisdiction over all civil suits; appeals from People's Summary Courts Martial for
less serious offenses; and appeals from People's Regional Courts in cases
traditionally tried by local courts.362
As contemplated in the code, all these courts lack independence from the
military. They are not standing courts, and their personnel are appointed on an ad
hoc basis, with no tenure in office. In the case of the General Court Martial, the
three members are appointed by the chairman of the SPLA; the chair must have a
rank of captain or higher.363 The District Court Martial consists of three members,
all appointed by a battalion commander, with the chair being a first lieutenant or
higher rank.364 The three to five members of the People's Regional Courts are to be
appointed by the battalion commander; the members need not be military.365
Finally, the district judicial officer, who has the powers of a District Court Martial
in "purely civilian trials," is to be appointed by the battalion commander and should
be a military officer "or suitable experienced and educated" citizen "working in the
movement."366

360
Section 16 of the SPLA Code refers to "Three tiers of military courts" which are
the People's General Courts Martial, The People's District Courts Martial, and the
People's Summary Courts Martial.

361
SPLA Code, '17.

362
Ibid., '' 16-19, 21.

363
Ibid., ' 17 (1). According to Riek, a General Court Martial in his area is formed by
zonal commanders, not solely by Riek as chairman.

364
Ibid., ' 18 (1).

365
Ibid., ' 21.

366
Ibid., ' 20 (1)-(3).
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 323

The creation of a military court system to judge military crimes and

offenses committed by military personnel is not objectionable. HRW/Africa objects
to military control of a judicial system that is to judge civilians as a violation of the
requirement that the court be independent and impartial.
The SPLA factions, like most guerrilla armies, lack trained judicial
personnel. From 1983 to the present, there were less than twenty attorneys in the
SPLA, and most of them were not doing legal work, according to one. In the
philosophy of the SPLA movement, one must first be a soldier, lead forces, and
know how to fight, according to an attorney who received SPLA military training in
Ethiopia and commanded SPLA troops. The concept was that everyone should
make a military contribution. Prior education, even advanced education, is not as
highly regarded as military rank.
The courts have been subject to pressure from military commanders.
"There is no clear line between civilian and military," a man who served in a
civilian court told HRW/Africa. In his experience, the commanders sometimes tried
to influence the outcome of the judicial proceedings. One commander even
threatened him with a firing squad if he did not dispose of a case as ordered.

Capital Punishment
Common article 3 requires that the courts afford "all the judicial
guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples," which
include as a matter of customary law the principles that the penalty shall be
proportionate to the offense and that no sentence shall be pronounced by a court
except after a regular trial.367
Other due process rights that are almost certainly included under
customary international humanitarian law include the right to presumption of
innocence, the right not to testify against oneself or to be compelled to confess guilt
(the right against self-incrimination), the right to be tried in one's presence (no trials
in absentia), the right to defend oneself in person or through legal assistance of
one's own choosing, the right to examine witnesses against oneself, the right to have
one's conviction and sentence reviewed by a higher tribunal, and the right not to be

367
Meron, Customary Law, pp. 49-50.
324 Civilian Devastation

tried or punished again for an offense for which one has already been convicted or
acquitted.368

368
Ibid., pp. 95-97, 134.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 325

Capital punishment, a common penalty under the SPLA Code, is a

disproportionate penalty for almost every offense for which it is permitted, and thus
a violation of customary international law.369 HRW/Africa opposes the application
of the death penalty in all circumstances because of its irreversibility and inherent
cruelty.

369
In the twelve months from mid-1992 to mid-1993, Commander Riek claimed, the
death penalty had been imposed in his territory only once, for homicide, on a soldier
who shot his commander in Nasir in 1993.
326 Civilian Devastation

Execution is a punishment permissible under the SPLA Code for being an

"enemy of the people,"370 mutiny,371 disobedience of lawful orders,372 desertion
from the SPLA (with a gun or other military equipment),373 abetting the theft of
military equipment, criminal breach of trust in respect of military equipment, breach
of trust in respect of state property,374 bribery,375 murder,376 theft of property valued

370
SPLA Code ''17 (1), 37.

371
Ibid., '16 (3).

372
Ibid., '27 (1).

373
Ibid., '29 (1).

374
Ibid., ''30-32.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 327

at more than one million Sudanese pounds, criminal breach of trust,377 criminal
misappropriation, cheating or extortion of property valued more than one million
Sudanese pounds,378 forgery of an official document,379 rape with fire arms,380
traffic in minors, and kidnapping of minors.381
The death penalty has been administered at times with rigor for military
offenses such as mutiny. A participant in a court martial told HRW/Africa of a trial
in 1991 of thirty-three soldiers, an entire platoon, for mutiny. They had been
ordered to ambush a government convoy, which they had refused to do, and they
then had resisted arrest. At the court martial they pleaded that the order was not
clear and in addition that it was unlawful, since ambushes were not in their mission,
which was to directly attack the enemy. Four of the soldiers alleged an alibi: they

375
Ibid., '33.

376
Ibid., '38.

377
Ibid., '40 (1).

378
Ibid., '41 (1).

379
Ibid., '42 (1).

380
Ibid., '43 (1).

381
Ibid., '44, 45.
328 Civilian Devastation

were absent from the ambush because they were sick. All thirty-three were found
guilty and executed by firing squad.
The military has great leeway, especially in applying the death penalty to
one accused of being an "enemy of the people." The officer in charge of the army
unit that captures a person suspected of being an "enemy of the people" may be the
judge, jury, and executioner. Such an officer's investigation must prove "beyond
reasonable doubt that the prisoners are in fact enemies of the people."382 How such
a burden of proof might be met is not clear. If the officer is satisfied with his own
investigation, he may execute the accused. He is authorized to:

Summarily dispose of some of the more notorious enemies of the

people by firing squads if the military situation is one of grave
urgency . . . .383

These provisions also violate the principle that no sentence shall be

imposed without a regular trial that conforms to due process. The potential for
abuse is obvious.
Under quieter conditions, those accused of being "enemies of the people"
are to be tried by a People's Court Martial, made up of three members by written
order of the chairman of the SPLA.384 Usually a death sentence must be confirmed
by the chairman, unless "communications with the headquarters are difficult
because of enemy action, or if morale and discipline dictate."385 What constitutes

382
Ibid., '12 (2).

383
Ibid., '12 (2) (a).

384
Ibid., ''14 (2) and 17 (2).

385
Ibid., ' 17 (4).
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 329

morale and discipline is entirely at the discretion of the Court Martial, effectively
removing the right of appeal in a death sentence. A death sentence also may be
carried out without appeal or approval of the Chairman "whenever enemy action
makes it necessary to decamp in flight."386

Accountability

386
Ibid., ' 17 (5).
330 Civilian Devastation

Military discipline for abuses by soldiers and officers is known to occur,

but the frequency and regularity of such discipline is difficult to ascertain. Many
claim that discipline is applied in an ethnically discriminatory fashion.387
As described above, punishment for the most egregious and widespread
human rights abuses is profoundly lacking in both factions. Some observers rate the
SPLA factions as more disciplined than many other African insurgents, but this is
not an acceptable standard. It is clear that neither faction demands that its soldiers
and officers be held responsible for wrongful acts committed during combat,
including indiscriminate shooting of civilians, looting and burning civilian property,
and, in most cases, abduction and rape. Ethnically targeted attacks on civilians are
clearly part of a command decision in some incursions into
factional enemy territory.
Accountability for combat-related abuses and violations of the rules of war
is discussed above in this chapter for the SPLA-Torit (for the 1992 killing of relief
workers and its 1993 campaign) and for the SPLA-Nasir (for the 1991 Bor
Massacre).
Reports of SPLA-Torit accountability for non-combat-related abuses of
civilians are mixed. In June 1992, an SPLA-Torit soldier raped a girl he
encountered at the river at Palataka. The girl's father, accompanied by his daughter,
confronted the soldier's commander, who arrested the soldier but released him when
the father left, according to another soldier who was present.
In some areas, commanders have been more strict with their soldiers, often
following local protests. A local man observed that if the people complained to the
commander of Kajo Kaji that the SPLA soldiers "came as thieves and just took
whatever they wanted," the soldiers involved sometimes would be lashed a hundred
times and jailed. These punishments were instituted following local dissatisfaction
with the SPLA prior to its capture of Kajo Kaji in 1990. During that period, women

387
"There were orders that if you rape you will be executed," one Maban
(Equatorian) soldier said, complaining that in practice, the Dinka soldiers were simply
transferred as a punishment for rape, but Equatorians and other non-Dinka were
executed. He claimed that fourteen SPLA soldiers from the Maban tribe were executed
for various reasons from 1986 to 1991.
SPLA Violations of the Rules of War 331

from nearby Mere were so often sexually abused by the soldiers, and their cattle,
goats, and chickens so often looted by the soldiers, that the population organized
and confronted the SPLA commanders. The situation thereafter improved. Later in
1990, a soldier was publicly executed for raping a woman from the area.
In 1991, an officer accused of killing a detainee was said to be court
martialed. The Toposa militia had attacked an SPLA base near Kapoeta. After the
attack, a fifteen-year-old boy was apprehended, suspected of working with the
Toposa. While he was in custody, the officer killed him, alleging that the boy had
tried to escape. The officer was found guilty, sentenced to death, and executed by
firing squad.
As for SPLA-Nasir accountability for non-combat-related abuses,
Commander Riek cited the case of Commander Thomas Tot Bangaong of Waat as
an example of military discipline. According to Riek, the commander shot a
prisoner, Commander Kuol Ajak (a Dinka from the Kongor area who belonged to
SPLA-Nasir), in custody. The Dinka prisoner was accused of the tribally motivated
murder of two Nuer (a RASS official and a radio operator) in Kongor when they
went there in December 1992 to prepare that outpost, then unoccupied, for U.N.
relief operations.388 Commander Thomas Tot Bangaong arrested the Dinka suspect
and then summarily executed him.389 Commander Thomas was tried by SPLA-Nasir
court martial for executing a captive, found guilty, dismissed from the army, and
sentenced to three years in jail--a disproportionately light punishment.

388
One murder was discovered when relief workers flew in and found a dead body
but no RASS staff in Kongor.

389
Initially an SPLA-Nasir press release claimed that Garang forces captured
Commander Kuol Ajak. Department of Information and Culture, Press Release,
January 14, 1993. Several other details of this account are not consistent, either.
 V. RECOMMENDATIONS

UNITED NATIONS

HRW/Africa recommends that the U.N. Security Council:

$ institute an arms embargo on the warring parties in Sudan, with special
attention to bombs and airplanes used to deliver them.
$ authorize a contingent of full-time U.N. human rights monitors to observe,
investigate, bring to the attention of the responsible authorities, and make
public violations of humanitarian and human rights laws by all parties. The
monitors should have access to all parts of Sudan and be based in southern
Sudan because the conflict is at its most extreme there.
$ establish a civilian-directed and -staffed program of human rights
education for all regions of and all parties in Sudan. This program should
be a supplement to, not a substitute for, the human rights monitors.

HRW/Africa recommends that UNICEF and UNHCR :

$ conduct voluntary family reunfication; where small groups of minors are
separated from their larger tribe, efforts should be made to reunite them in
the safest location, even if that means reuniting them outside of Sudan or
from one country of refuge to another. This task should receive the
cooperation of all U.N. and NGO agencies.

UNITED STATES, UNITED KINGDOM,

AND OTHER CONCERNED COUNTRIES

HRW/Africa recommends that the U.S., U.K., and other concerned countries:
$ support an arms embargo.
$ support the creation of a full-time U.N. human rights monitoring team.
$ maintain pressure on the Sudan government to respect human rights and
humanitarian law and permit access to relief operations.
$ pressure all parties to improve their human rights performance by 1)
instituting due process, 2) abolishing political detention, torture and
summary executions, 3) abolishing the death penalty, 4) halting attacks on
civilians, 5) ceasing abuse of civilian access to food, 6) ceasing to draft
minors or to permit them to participate in hostilities, and 7) facilitating
relief access, voluntary family reunification, and access for human rights
monitors.
 Until the human rights performance of the Sudan government is
substantially improved, other governments should not provide any assistance except
for humanitarian assistance.
Until the human rights performance of the SPLA factions is improved,
there should be no consideration given to any assistance to the SPLA factions by
any government.
The recommended U.N. human rights monitors and educational program
should not be funneled through the government, the SPLA factions or their
agencies.
The concerned countries of Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Zaire and other
refugee-receiving countries should permit those unaccompanied minors in Sudan or
in other countries to be reunited with their parents or closest surviving relatives who
are refugees in their territories pursuant to their obligations under the Convention of
the Rights of the Child, article 10.

SUDAN GOVERNMENT

HRW/Africa calls on the Sudan government to:

$ respect international humanitarian and human rights law, particularly the
prohibitions on targeting civilians, indiscriminate bombardment, and
destruction or looting of civilian property.
$ cease using aerial bombardment in southern Sudan except where the
bombs can be precisely aimed at military objectives.
$ abolish political detention, torture and summary executions.
$ institute due process.
$ abolish the death penalty.
$ permit the International Committee of the Red Cross to visit persons
detained in connection with the conflict according to its specific criteria.
$ facilitate access to all parts of the country, particularly the Nuba
Mountains and the south, for human rights monitors, human rights
educators, and relief workers.
$ disarm and disband tribal militias and Popular Defence Forces created
from them.
$ facilitate voluntary family reunification.
$ refrain from involuntarily recruiting anyone; refrain from drafting those
under the age of fifteeen or permitting them to participate in hostilities. If
persons under eighteen and older than fourteen participate voluntarily in
the hostilities, those who are older should be given priority in assignments.
334 Civilian Devastation

$ refrain from taking food or non-food items, directly or indirectly, from

those at or below the subsistence level.

SPLA-TORIT AND SPLA-NASIR/UNITED

Africa Watch calls on SPLA-Torit and SPLA-Nasir/United to:

$ respect international humanitarian and human rights law, particularly the
prohibitions on targeting civilians, indiscriminate attacks on civilians, and
destruction or looting of civilian property.
$ institute due process.
$ abolish political detention, torture and summary executions.
$ abolish the death penalty.
$ permit the International Committee of the Red Cross to visit persons
detained in connection with the conflict according to its specific criteria.
$ cooperate with relief efforts and human rights monitors and educators, and
facilitate their access to all parts of the country.
$ facilitate voluntary family reunification.
$ refrain from involuntarily recruiting anyone; refrain from drafting those
under the age of fifteeen or permitting them to participate in hostilities. If
persons under eighteen and older than fourteen participate voluntarily in
the hostilities, those who are older should be given priority in assignments.
$ refrain from taking food or non-food items, directly or indirectly, from
those at or below the subsistence level.

Both factions claim to respect human rights. At least one, the SPLA-
Nasir/United, has sought funding for training for its cadre to protect and promote
human rights.1 We believe this is a worthwhile effort, provided the training is not
funded through the SPLAs' organizations.

1
Sudan People's Liberation Movement and Sudan People's Liberation Army United,
"Request for Support from the international Community Government, Non-
Governmental Organisation (NGOs) and Others," Nairobi, Kenya, January 12, 1994.
Recommendations 335

Nongovernmental organizations play a vital role in the delivery of food

and non-food relief to the needy in south Sudan, and several are attempting
development projects. In the course of their work, they should not hesitate to
discuss international standards of humanitarian law and human rights with the
parties to the conflict and to urge them to adhere to these norms.
 APPENDIX A
APPLICATION OF THE RULES OF WAR
TO THE CONFLICT IN SUDAN

The conduct of government armies and insurgent forces fighting an

internal conflict is governed not by human rights laws such as the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights but by the rules of war, also called
international humanitarian law, which comprise the four 1949 Geneva Conventions,
the two 1977 Protocols to those Conventions, and the customary laws of war.
Unlike human rights law, the rules of war ordinarily apply during armed conflicts
and their basic provisions are not derogable nor capable of suspension. The rules
are primarily intended to protect the victims of armed conflicts.
Despite their separate origins and fields of application, human rights and
international humanitarian law share the common purpose of securing for all
persons a minimum standard of treatment under all circumstances. For example,
both human rights and humanitarian law conventions absolutely prohibit summary
executions, torture and other inhuman treatment and the application of ex post facto
law.

THE SUDAN: A NON-INTERNATIONAL ARMED CONFLICT

International humanitarian law makes a critical distinction between

international and non-international (internal) armed conflicts. Since the rules
governing each type of conflict vary significantly, a proper characterization of the
conflict is necessary to determine which aspects of humanitarian law apply.
For the past eleven years, the government of the Sudan has been engaged
in an armed conflict with the dissident SPLA forces. Over the years the government
has requested and received military assistance, advisers and training from various
countries in its efforts to fight the SPLA.
Since no state has either declared war against Sudan or directly intervened
with its armed forces against the government, the requisite
preconditions for the existence of an international armed conflict are not satisfied at
this time.1

1
Under article 2 common to the four 1949 Geneva Conventions, an international
armed conflict must involve a declared war or any other armed conflict which may arise
"between two or more of the High Contracting Parties" to the Convention; it is also
described as any difference between two states leading to the intervention of armed
forces. Only states and not rebel groups may be "High Contracting Parties."
338 Civilian Devastation

The nature of hostilities between the government Sudan People's Armed

Forces and SPLA forces in the Sudan, and of one SPLA faction against the other,
therefore is that of a non-international armed conflict. As such, government and
insurgent forces' conduct is governed by common article 3 of the Geneva
Conventions and customary international law applicable to internal armed conflicts.
The 1977 Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions contains rules providing
authoritative guidance on the conduct of hostilities by the warring parties.2

THE APPLICATION OF ARTICLE 3

Article 3 common to the four Geneva Conventions3 is virtually a

convention within a convention. It is the only provision of the Geneva Conventions
that directly applies to internal (as opposed to international) armed conflicts.
Common article 3, section 1, states:

In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in

the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each Party to the
conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:

(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including

members of armed forces who had laid down their arms and
those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or
any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely,
without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion
or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.

To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any
time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned
persons:

2
Sudan has not yet ratified Protocol II.

3
Sudan acceeded to the four Geneva Conventions on September 23, 1957.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 339

(a) violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds,

mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
(b) taking of hostages;

(c) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and

degrading treatment;

(d) the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions

without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted
court, affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized
as indispensable by civilized peoples.

Article 3 thus imposes fixed legal obligations on the parties to an internal

conflict to ensure humane treatment of persons not, or no longer, taking an active
role in the hostilities.
Article 3 applies when a situation of internal armed conflict objectively
exists in the territory of a State Party; it expressly binds all parties to the internal
conflict, including insurgents although they do not have the legal capacity to sign
the Geneva Conventions.4 In the Sudan, the government and the two SPLA factions
and possibly a third SPLA faction, that of William Nyuon, are parties to the
conflict.
The obligation to apply article 3 is absolute for all parties to the conflict
and independent of the obligation of the other parties. That means that the Sudan
government cannot excuse itself from complying with article 3 on the grounds that
the SPLA is violating article 3, and vice versa.
Application of article 3 by the government cannot be legally construed as
recognition of the insurgent party's belligerence, from which recognition of
additional legal obligations beyond common article 3, would flow. Nor is it

4
As private individuals within the national territory of a State Party, certain
obligations are imposed on them. ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p.
1345.
340 Civilian Devastation

necessary for any government to recognize the SPLA's belligerant status for article
3 to apply.
Unlike international conflicts, the law governing internal armed conflicts
does not recognize the combatant's privilege5 and therefore does not provide any
special status for combatants, even when captured. Thus, the Sudan government is
not obliged to grant captured members of the SPLA prisoner of war status.
Similarly, government army combatants who are captured by the SPLA need not be
accorded this status. Any party can agree to treat its captives as prisoners of war,
however.
Since the SPLA forces are not privileged combatants, they may be tried
and punished by the Sudan government for treason, sedition, and the commission of
other crimes under domestic laws.

CUSTOMARY INTERNATIONAL LAW

APPLICABLE TO INTERNAL ARMED CONFLICTS

United Nations General Assembly Resolution 2444,6 adopted by

unanimous vote on December 19, 1969, expressly recognized the customary law
principle of civilian immunity and its complementary principle requiring the
warring parties to distinguish civilians from combatants at all times. The preamble
to this resolution states that these fundamental humanitarian law principles apply "in
all armed conflicts," meaning both international and internal armed conflicts.
Resolution 2444 affirms:

. . . the following principles for observance by all government

and other authorities responsible for action in armed conflicts:

5
The combatant's privilege is a license to kill or capture enemy troops, destroy
military objectives and cause unavoidable civilian casualties. This privilege immunizes
members of armed forces or rebels from criminal prosecution by their captors for their
violent acts that do not violate the laws of war but would otherwise be crimes under
domestic law. Prisoner of war status depends on and flows from this privilege. See Solf,
"The Status of Combatants in Non-International Armed Conflicts Under Domestic Law
and Transnational Practice," American University Law Review 33 (1953): p. 59.

6
U.N. General Assembly, Respect for Human Rights in Armed Conflicts, United
Nations Resolution 2444, G.A. Res. 2444, 23 U.N. GAOR Supp. (No. 18), p. 164, U.N.
Doc. A/7433 (New York: U.N., 1968).
Appendix A: The Rules of War 341

(a) That the right of the parties to a conflict to adopt means of

injuring the enemy is not unlimited;

(b) That it is prohibited to launch attacks against the civilian

populations as such;

(c) That distinction must be made at all times between persons

taking part in the hostilities and members of the civilian
population to the effect that the latter be spared as much as
possible.

PROTECTION OF THE CIVILIAN POPULATION

UNDER THE RULES OF WAR

In situations of internal armed conflict, generally speaking, a civilian is

anyone who is not a member of the armed forces or of an organized armed group of
a party to the conflict. Accordingly, "the civilian population comprises all persons
who do not actively participate in the hostilities."7

7
R. Goldman, "International Humanitarian Law and the Armed Conflicts in El
Salvador and Nicaragua," American University Journal of International Law & Policy 2
(1987): p. 553.
342 Civilian Devastation

Civilians may not be subject to deliberate individualized attack since they

pose no immediate threat to the adversary.8
The term "civilian" also includes some employees of the military
establishment who are not members of the armed forces but assist them.9 While as
civilians they may not be targeted, these civilian employees of military
establishments or those who indirectly assist combatants assume the risk of death or
injury incidental to attacks against legitimate military targets while they are at or in
the immediate vicinity of military targets.

8
Bothe, New Rules for Victims of Armed Conflicts, p. 303.

9
Civilians include those persons who are "directly linked to the armed forces,
including those who accompany the armed forces without being members thereof, such
as civilian members of military aircraft crews, supply contractors, members of labour
units, or of services responsible for the welfare of the armed forces, members of the
crew of the merchant marine and the crews of civil aircraft employed in the
transportation of military personnel, material or supplies. . . . Civilians employed in the
production, distribution and storage of munitions of war . . . ." Ibid., pp. 293-94.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 343

In addition, both sides utilize as part-time combatants persons who are

otherwise engaged in civilian occupations. These civilians lose their immunity from
attack for as long as they directly participate in hostilities.10 "[D]irect participation
[in hostilities] means acts of war which by their nature and purpose are likely to
cause actual harm to the personnel and equipment of enemy armed forces," and
includes acts of defense.11
"Hostilities" not only covers the time when the civilian actually makes use
of a weapon but also the time that he is carrying it, as well as situations in which he
undertakes hostile acts without using a weapon.12 Examples are provided in the
United States Army Field Manual which lists some hostile acts as including

sabotage, destruction of communication facilities, intentional misleading

of troops by guides, and liberation of prisoners of war. . . . This is also the
case of a person acting as a member of a weapons crew, or one providing
target information for weapon systems intended for immediate use against
the enemy such as artillery spotters or members of ground observer teams.
[It] would include direct logistic support for units engaged directly in
battle such as the delivery of ammunition to a firing position. On the other
hand civilians providing only indirect support to the armed forces, such as
workers in defense plants or those engaged in distribution or storage of
military supplies in rear areas, do not pose an immediate threat to the
adversary and therefore would not be subject to deliberate individual
attack.13

Once their participation in hostilities ceases, that is, while engaged in their
civilian vocations, these civilians may not be attacked.
Persons protected by article 3 include members of both government and
SPLA forces who surrender, are wounded, sick or unarmed, or are captured. They

10
Ibid., p. 303.

11
ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p. 619.

12
ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p. 618-19. This is a broader
definition than "attacks" and includes at a minimum preparation for combat and return
from combat. Bothe, New Rules for Victims of Armed Conflicts, p. 303.

13
Ibid., p. 303 (footnote omitted).
344 Civilian Devastation

are hors de combat, literally, out of combat, until such time as they take a hostile
action such as attempting to escape.

DESIGNATION OF MILITARY OBJECTIVES

Under the laws of war, military objectives are defined only as they relate to
objects or targets, rather than to personnel. To constitute a legitimate military
objective, the object or target, selected by its nature, location, purpose, or use, must
contribute effectively to the enemy's military capability or activity, and its total or
partial destruction or neutralization must offer a definite military advantage in the
circumstances.14
Legitimate military objectives are combatants' weapons, convoys,
installations, and supplies. In addition:

an object generally used for civilian purposes, such as a dwelling,

a bus, a fleet of taxicabs, or a civilian airfield or railroad siding,
can become a military objective if its location or use meets [the
criteria in Protocol I, art. 52(2)].15

Full-time members of the Sudan government's armed forces and SPLA are
legitimate military targets and subject to attack, individually or collectively, until
such time as they become hors de combat, that is, surrender or are wounded or
captured.16

14
Protocol I, art. 52 (2).

15
Bothe, New Rules for Victims of Armed Conflicts, pp. 306-07.

16
Killing a wounded or captured combatant is not proper because: it does not offer a
"definite military advantage in the circumstances" because the fighter is already
rendered useless or hors de combat.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 345

Popular Defence Forces (PDF), government-sponsored militia, are proper

military targets while they directly participate in hostilities, which includes guard
and patrol duties. Part-time PDF members may not be individually attacked when
they are not directly participating in hostilities or performing military duties.
Unofficial paramilitary tribal militias, often organized by political parties
or operating with impunity and/or equipped bythe Sudan military, like other
civilians lose their immunity from attack whenever they assume a combatant's role.
Thus, when they prepare for, actively participate in and return from combat or
raiding (while carrying a weapon or committing hostile acts without using a
weapon), they are proper military targets for the SPLA.
Policemen without combat duties are not legitimate military targets, nor
are certain other government personnel authorized to bear arms such as customs
agents.17 Policemen with combat duties, however, would be proper military targets,
subject to direct individualized attack.
Those mujahedeen participating in hostilities in Sudan, whether as part of a
Holy War or for financial motives, are legitimate military targets.

PROHIBITED ACTS

While not an all-encompassing list, customary and conventional

international law prohibits the following kinds of practices, orders, or actions:
$ Orders that there shall be no survivors, such threats to combatants, or
direction to conduct hostilities on this basis.

$ Attacks against combatants who are captured, surrender, or are placed

hors de combat.
$ Torture, any form of corporal punishment, or other cruel treatment of
persons under any circumstances.
$ Desecration of corpses.18 Mutilation of the dead is never permissible and
violates the rules of war.

17
Report of Working Group B, Committee I, 18 March 1975 (CDDH/I/238/Rev.1; X,
93), in Howard S. Levie, ed., The Law of NonInternational Armed Conflict, (Dordrecht,
Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff, 1987), p. 67. See Rosario Conde, "Policemen without
Combat Duties: Illegitimate Targets of Direct Attack under Humanitarian Law,"
student paper (New York: Columbia Law School, May 12, 1989).

18
Protocol II, article 8, states:

Whenever circumstances permit, and particularly after an

346 Civilian Devastation

$ The infliction of humiliating or degrading treatment on civilians or

combatants who are captured, have surrendered, or are hors de combat.
$ Hostage taking.19

engagement, all possible measures shall be taken, without delay, . . .

to search for the dead, prevent their being despoiled, and decently
dispose of them.

19
The ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p. 874, defines hostages as
persons who find themselves, willingly or unwillingly, in the power
of the enemy and who answer with their freedom or their life for
compliance with the orders of the latter and for upholding the
security of its armed forces.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 347

$ Shielding, or using the presence of the civilian population to immunize

areas from military operations, or to favor or impede military operations.
In addition, the parties may not direct the movement of civilians in order
to attempt to shield legitimate military objectives from attack, or to favor
militiary operations.20
$ Pillage and destruction of civilian property. This prohibition is designed to
spare civilians the suffering resulting from the destruction of their real and
personal property: houses, furniture, clothing, provisions, tools, and so
forth. Pillage includes organized acts as well as individual acts without the
consent of the military authorities.21

TAXATION OR REQUISITION OF FOOD

There is little authority in international law for a rebel army fighting in an

internal conflict to requisition property from the civilian population, or to impose
taxes upon them. Such are usually powers of States over their own citizens and
others residing in their territory. A rebel army is not a State and does not have all
the powers of States vis a vis those who reside under its military jurisdiction.
In an international armed conflict, a State army that occupies territory of
another State has certain limited powers to requisition food from the population in
that territory. That occupying power has the duty first to ensure the food and
medical supplies of the population, however, and must bring in the necessary food
and other articles if the resouces of the occupied territory are inadequate. The
occupying power may only requisition food if the requirements of the civilian

20
See Protocol I, article 51 (7).

21
International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Commentary, IV Geneva
Convention (Geneva: ICRC, 1958), p. 226.
348 Civilian Devastation

population have been taken into account. Then the occupying power must make
arrangements to pay fair value for the requisitioned goods.22

22
IV Geneva Convention of 1949, art. 55. These limitations and restrictions were
specifically not imposed on the relations between a State party and its own residents or
citizens.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 349

A noted authority comments, "During recent conflicts thousands of human

beings suffered from starvation during the occupation of the country. Their
destitution was made still worse by requisitioning."23 The above provisions in the
1949 Geneva Conventions were designed to prevent such destitution.
Common article 3 to the four 1949 Geneva Conventions and Protocol II,
which are relevant to internal armed conflicts, do not specifically empower the rebel
army to requisition food or other articles, or to tax civilians.
Even if such authority to requisition or tax existed, however, there is no
reason it should be superior to the authority conferred on occupying powers under
IV Geneva, article 55. In almost every respect, a rebel army and its combatants in
an internal conflict have fewer humanitarian law rights than does a State party to an
international conflict.24
If the rebel army does have rights comparable to those of the occupying
power to requisition food from the civilian population as described in IV Geneva,
article 55, then the SPLA's requisition of food from the civilian population of
southern Sudan is a violation of article 55. The occupying power may under no
circumstances take food from the population without taking the needs of the civilian
population into account, and, for a large portion of the southern Sudan population,
simply no surplus food at all. There are pockets of famine throughout this
population, and many other areas where there is nothing beyond a minimal
subsistence. The situation is as bad as or worse than anything in World War II, on
which experience the IV Geneva Convention was based.

PROHIBITION OF INDISCRIMINATE ATTACKS:

23
ICRC, Commentary, IV Geneva Convention, p. 309.

24
For example, in an internal conflict there is no combatant's privilege and thus
captured combatants do not have the status of prisoners of war. In an international
conflict, captured combatants have extensive rights and protections detailed in III
Geneva Convention.
350 Civilian Devastation

THE PRINCIPLE OF PROPORTIONALITY

The civilian population and individual civilians general are to be protected

against attack.
As set forth above, to constitute a legitimate military object, the target must
1) contribute effectively to the enemy's military capability or activity, and 2) its total
or partial destruction or neutralization must offer a definite military advantage in the
circumstances.
The laws of war implicitly characterize all objects as civilian unless they
satisfy this two-fold test. Objects normally dedicated to civilian use, such as
churches, houses and schools, are presumed not to be military objectives. If they in
fact do assist the enemy's military action, they can lose their immunity from direct
attack. This presumption attaches, however, only to objects that ordinarily have no
significant military use or purpose. For example, this presumption would not
include objects such as transportation and communications systems that under
applicable criteria are military objectives.
The attacker also must do everything "feasible" to verify that the objectives
to be attacked are not civilian. "Feasible" means "that which is practical or
practically possible taking into account all the circumstances at the time, including
those relevant to the success of military operations."25
Even attacks on legitimate military targets, however, are limited by the
principle of proportionality. This principle places a duty on combatants to choose
means of attack that avoid or minimize damage to civilians. In particular, the
attacker should refrain from launching an attack if the expected civilian casualties
would outweigh the importance of the military target to the attacker. The principle
of proportionality is codified in Protocol I, article 51 (5):

Among others, the following types of attacks are to be considered

as indiscriminate: . . .
(b) an attack which may be expected to cause incidental
loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to
civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would
be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct
military advantage anticipated.

25
Bothe, New Rules for Victims of Armed Conflict, p. 362 (footnote omitted).
Appendix A: The Rules of War 351

If an attack can be expected to cause incidental civilian casualties or

damage, two requirements must be met before that attack is launched. First, there
must be an anticipated "concrete and direct" military advantage. "Direct" means
"'without intervening condition of agency.' . . . A remote advantage to be gained at
some unknown time in the future would not be a proper consideration to weigh
against civilian losses."26

26
Ibid., p. 365.
352 Civilian Devastation

Creating conditions "conducive to surrender by means of attacks which

incidentally harm the civilian population"27 is too remote and insufficiently military
to qualify as a "concrete and direct" military advantage. "A military advantage can
only consist in ground gained and in annilihation or weakening the enemy armed
forces."28
The "concrete and direct" military advantage surpasses the "definite"
military advantage required to qualify an object or target as a "legitimate military
target."29
The second requirement in the principle of proportionality is that the
foreseeable injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects not be
disproportionate, that is, "excessive" in comparison to the expected "concrete and
definite military advantage."
Excessive damage is a relative concept. For instance, the presence of a
soldier on leave cannot serve as a justification to destroy the entire village. If the
destruction of a bridge is of paramount importance for the occupation of a strategic

27
ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p. 685.

28
Ibid., p. 685.

29
As set forth above, to constitute a legitimate military objective, the object, selected
by its nature, location, purpose or use must contribution effectively to the enemy's
military capability or activitiy, and its total or partial destruction or neutralization must
offer a "definite" military advantage in the circumstances. See Protocol I, art. 52 (2)
where this definition is codified.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 353

zone, "it is understood that some houses may be hit, but not that a whole urban area
be levelled."30 There is never a justification for excessive civilian casualties, no
matter how valuable the military target.31
Indiscriminate attacks are defined in Protocol I, article 51 (4), as:

a) those which are not directed at a specific military objective;

b) those which employ a method or means of combat which cannot be
directed at a specific military objective; or
c) those which employ a method or means of combat the effects of which
cannot be limited as required by this Protocol; and consequently, in each
such case, are of a nature to strike military objectives and civilians or
civilian objects without distinction.

PROTECTION OF CIVILIANS FROM DISPLACEMENT

FOR REASONS RELATED TO THE CONFLICT

There are only two exceptions to the prohibition on displacement, for war-
related reasons, of civilians: their security or imperative military reasons. Article 17
of Protocol II states:

1. The displacement of the civilian population shall not be

ordered for reasons related to the conflict unless the security of
the civilians involved or imperative military reasons so demand.
Should such displacements have to be carried out, all possible
measures shall be taken in order that the civilian population may
be received under satisfactory conditions of shelter, hygiene,
health, safety and nutrition.

30
ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p. 684.

31
Ibid., p. 626.
354 Civilian Devastation

The term "imperative military reasons" usually refers to evacuation

because of imminent military operations. The provisional measure of evacuation is
appropriate if an area is in danger as a result of military operations or is liable to be
subjected to intense bombing. It may also be permitted when the presence of
protected persons in an area hampers military operations. The prompt return of the
evacuees to their homes is required as soon as hostilities in the area have ceased.
The evacuating authority bears the burden of proving that its forcible relocation
conforms to these conditions.
Displacement or capture of civilians solely to deny a social base to the
enemy has nothing to do with the security of the civilians. Nor is it justified by
"imperative military reasons," which require "the most meticulous assessment of the
circumstances"32 because such reasons are so capable of abuse. One authority has
stated:

32
Ibid., p. 1472.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 355

Clearly, imperative military reasons cannot be justified by

political motives. For example, it would be prohibited to move a
population in order to exercise more effective control over a
dissident ethnic group.33

Mass relocation or displacement of civilians for the purpose of denying a

willing social base to the opposing force is prohibited since it is a political motive
as described above.
Even if the government were to show that the displacement were
necessary, it still has the independent obligation to take "all possible measures" to
receive the civilian population "under satisfactory conditions of shelter, hygiene,
health, safety, and nutrition."

STARVATION OF CIVILIANS AS A METHOD OF COMBAT

Starvation of civilians as a method of combat has become illegal as a

matter of customary law, as reflected in Protocol II:

Article 14 -- Protection of objects indispensable to the survival of the

civilian population

Starvation of civilians as a method of combat is prohibited. It is

prohibited to attack, destroy, remove or render useless, for that
purpose, objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian
population, such as foodstuffs, agricultural areas for the
production of foodstuffs, crops, livestock, drinking water
installations and supplies and irrigation works.

What is prohibited is using starvation as "a weapon to annihilate or weaken

the population." Using starvation as a method of warfare does not mean that the
population has to reach the point of starving to death before a violation can be

33
Ibid.
356 Civilian Devastation

proved. What is forbidden is deliberately "causing the population to suffer hunger,

particularly by depriving it of its sources of food or of supplies."
This prohibition on starving civilians "is a rule from which no derogation
may be made."34 No exception was made for imperative military necessity, for
instance.
Article 14 lists the most usual ways in which starvation is brought about.
Specific protection is extended to "objects indispensable to the survival of the
civilian population," and a non-exhaustive list of such objects follows: "foodstuffs,
agricultural areas for the production of foodstuffs, crops, livestock, drinking water
installations and supplies and irrigation works." The article prohibits taking certain
destructive actions aimed at these essential supplies, and describes these actions
with verbs which are meant to cover all eventualities: "attack, destroy, remove or
render useless."
The textual reference to "objects indispensable to the survival of the
civilian population"

34
Ibid., p. 1456.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 357

does not distinguish between objects intended for the armed

forces and those intended for civilians. Except for the case where
supplies are specifically intended as provisions for combatants, it
is prohibited to destroy or attack objects indispensable for
survival, even if the adversary may benefit from them. The
prohibition would be meaningless if one could invoke the
argument that members of the government's armed forces or
armed opposition might make use of the objects in question.35

Attacks on objects used "in direct support of military action" are

permissible, however, even if these objects are civilian foodstuffs and other objects
protected under article 14. This exception is limited to the immediate zone of actual
armed engagements, as is obvious from the examples provided of military objects
used in direct support of military action: "bombarding a food-producing area to
prevent the army from advancing through it, or attacking a food-storage barn which
is being used by the enemy for cover or as an arms depot, etc."36

35
Ibid., p. 1458-59.

36
Ibid., p. 657. The New Rules gives the following examples of direct support: "an
irrigation canal used as part of a defensive position, a water tower used as an
observation post, or a cornfield used as cover for the infiltration of an attacking force."
Bothe, New Rules for Victims of Armed Conflicts, p. 341.
358 Civilian Devastation

The provisions of Protocol I, article 54 are also useful as a guideline to the

narrowness of the permissible means and methods of attack on foodstuffs.37 Like
article 14 of Protocol II, article 54 of Protocol I permits attacks on militiary food
supplies. It specifically limits such attacks to those directed at foodstuffs intended
for the sole use of the enemy's armed forces. This means "supplies already in the
hands of the adverse party's armed forces because it is only at that point that one
could know that they are intended for use only for the members of the enemy's
armed forces."38 Even then, the attacker cannot destroy foodstuffs "in the military
supply system intended for the sustenance of prisoners of war, the civilian
population of occupied territory or persons classified as civilians serving with, or
accompanying, the armed forces."39

Proof of Intention to Starve Civilians

Under article 14, what is forbidden are actions taken with the intention of
using starvation as a method or weapon to attack the civilian population. Such an
intention may not be easy to prove and most armies will not admit this intention.
Proof does not rest solely on the attacker's own statements, however. Intention may
be inferred from the totality of the circumstances of the military campaign.
Particularly relevant to assessment of intention is the effort the attacker
makes to comply with the duties to distinguish between civilians and military targets

37
Article 54 of Protocol I is the parallel, for international armed conflicts, to article
14, Protocol II in its prohibition on starvation of civilians as a method of warfare.

38
Bothe, New Rules for Victims of Armed Conflict, p. 340.

39
Ibid., pp. 340-41.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 359

and to avoid harming civilians and the civilian economy.40 If the attacker does not
comply with these duties, and food shortages result, an intention to attack civilians
by starvation may be inferred.
The more sweeping and indiscriminate the measures taken which result in
food shortages, when other less restrictive means of combat are available, the more
likely the real intention is to attack the civilian population by causing it food
deprivation. For instance, an attacker who conducts a scorced earth campaign in
enemy territory to deprive the enemy of sources of food may be deemed to have an
intention of attacking by starvation the civilian population living in enemy territory.
The attacker may not claim ignorance of the effects upon civilians of such a
scorched earth campaign, since these effects are a matter of common knowledge and
publicity. In particular, relief organizations, both domestic and international, usually
sound the alarm of impending food shortages occurring during conflicts in order to
bring pressure on the parties to permit access for food delivery and to raise money
for their complex and costly operations.
The true intentions of the attacker also must be judged by the effort it
makes to take prompt remedies, such as permitting relief convoys to reach the needy
or itself supplying food to remedy hunger. An attacker who fails to make adequate
provision for the affected civilian population, who blocks access to those who
would do so, or who refuses to permit civilian evacuation in times of food shortage,
may be deemed to have the intention to starve that civilian population.

Sieges

40
Civilians are not legitimate military targets; this is expressly forbidden by U.N.
General Assembly Resolution 2444, above. The duty to distinguish at all times between
civilians and combatants, and between civilian objects and military objects, includes the
duty to direct military operations only against military objectives.
360 Civilian Devastation

Proportionality is an important principle in the context of sieges and other

methods of war directed at combatants comingled with civilians. While starvation
of the civilian population is forbidden, starvation of combatants remains a permitted
method of combat, as in siege warfare or blockades.41
A blockade consists of disrupting the maritime trade of a country; a siege
"consists of encircling an enemy location, cutting off those inside from any
communication in order to bring about their surrender."42
Siege is the oldest form of total war, in which civilians have been attacked
along with soldiers, or in order to reach soldiers. A siege may occur when an army
takes refuge inside city walls, or when the inhabitants of a threatened city seek the
most immediate form of military protection and agree to be garrisoned.43

41
ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p. 1457.

42
Ibid., 1457.

43
Michael Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars (New York: Basic Books, 1977).
Appendix A: The Rules of War 361

Both blockades and sieges are theoretically aimed at preventing military

materiel from reaching the combatants. Both are considered low-cost alternatives to
frontal assaults.44
Under the rule of proportionality and the duty to distinguish, besieging
forces may not close their eyes to the effect upon civilians of a food blockade or
siege. It is well recognized that, in reality, "in case of shortages occasioned by
armed conflict, the highest priority of available sustenance materials is assigned to
combatants".45 In other words, "Fed last, and only with the army's surplus,
[civilians] die first. More civilians died in the siege of Leningrad than in the
modernist infernos of Hamburg, Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki, taken
together."46 The besieging forces therefore are deemed to know that, in any
besieged area where civilians as well as combatants are present, the civilians will
suffer food shortage long before the combatants.
Historically, sieges have been used as weapons to bring pressure through
civilians on the military leadership.

44
One historian notes that "the capture of cities is often an important military
objective -- in the age of the city-state, it was the ultimate objective -- and, frontal
assault failing, the siege is the only remaining means to success. In fact, however, it is
not even necessary that a frontal assault fail before a siege is thought justifiable. Sitting
and waiting is far less costly to the besieging army than attacking, and such calculations
are permitted by the principle of military necessity." Ibid., p. 169.

45
Bothe, New Rules for Victims of Armed Conflicts, p. 680.

46
Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars, p. 160.
362 Civilian Devastation

When a city is encircled and deprived of food, it is not the

expectation of the attackers that the garrison will hold out until
the individual soldiers, like Josephus' old men, drop dead in the
streets. The death of the ordinary inhabitants of the city is
expected to force the hand of the civilian or military leadership.
The goal is surrender; the means is not the defeat of the enemy
army, but the fearful spectacle of the civilian dead.47

One authority notes that soldiers "are under an obligation to help civilians
leave the scene of a battle." In the case of a siege, "it is only when they fulfill this
obligation that the batttle itself is morally possible.

47
Ibid.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 363

But is it still militarily possible? Once free exit has been offered,
and been accepted by a significant numbers of people, the
besieging army is placed under a certain handicap. The city's
food supply will now last so much longer. It is precisely this
handicap that siege commanders have in the past refused to
accept.48

Under the prohibition on starving the civilian population as a method of

combat, sieges are a form of starvation by omission. One ICRC Commentary notes
that

Starvation can also result from an omission. To deliberately

decide not to take measures to supply the population with objects
indispensable for its survival in a way would become a method of
combat by default, and would be prohibited under this rule.49

It is therefore incumbent upon the attackers, in sieges and blockades as

well as in other methods of combat, to take actions to ameliorate the effects upon
civilians. The Protocols suggest various alternatives, among them permitting relief
supplies to the civilian population.50
Failure to take any action to relieve the threat of civilian starvation leads
directly to the inference that the intention of the besieging forces is to starve
civilians.

RIGHTS OF THE CHILD

48
Ibid., pp. 169-70.

49
ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p. 1458.

50
See Protocol I, articles 68-71.
364 Civilian Devastation

Recruitment of Child Soldiers

Military recruitment of those under the age of fifteen is forbidden.51 This
principle also prohibits accepting voluntary enlistment. The child should not be

51
Protocol II, article 4 (3) provides:
Children shall be provided with the care and aid they require, and in
particular:
Appendix A: The Rules of War 365

(a) they shall receive an education, including religious and moral

education in keeping with the wishes of their parents or, in the
absence of parents, of those responsible for their care;
(b) all appropriate steps shall be taken to facilitate the reunion of
families temporarily separated;
(c) children who have not attained the age of fifteen years shall
neither be recruited in the armed forces or groups nor allowed to
take part in hostilities;
(d) the special protection provided by this Article to children who
have not attained the age of fifteen years shall remain applicable to
them if they take a direct part in hostilities despite the provisions of
366 Civilian Devastation

allowed to take part in hostilities, that is, to participate in military operations

including gathering information, transmitting orders, transporting ammunition and
foodstuffs, or acts of sabotage.52

sub-paragraph (c) and are captured;

(e) measures shall be taken, if necessary, and whenever possible with

the consent of their parents or persons who by law or custom are

primarily responsible for their care, to remove children temporarily

from the area in which hostilities are taking place to a safer area

within the country and ensure that they are accompanied by persons

responsible for their safety and well-being.

52
ICRC, Commentary on the Additional Protocols, p. 1380.
Appendix A: The Rules of War 367

The reason for these special rules for children in warfare is that "[c]hildren
are particularly vulnerable; they require privileged treatment in comparison with the
rest of the civilian population."53

53
Ibid,, p. 1377.
368 Civilian Devastation

In addition to the rules of war, other authoritative guidance is provided by

the Convention on the Rights of the Child.54 The provisions of Protocol II are
echoed in article 38 (2) of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, stating that the
parties "shall take all feasible measures to ensure that persons who have not attained
the age of fifteen years do not take a direct part in hostilities." The parties to the
Convention also agreed that in "recruiting among those persons who have attained
the age of fifteen years but who have not attained the age of eighteen years, [we]
shall endeavor to give priority to those who are oldest."55
Article 9 of the Convention states as a matter of principle that a child shall
not be separated from his or her parents against their will except where such
separation is deemed necessary in the best interests of the child after judicial
review. Forced recruitment of children violates these principles as well as the rules
of war.
Although it has not yet come into effect, the African Convention on the
Rights of the Child prohibits recruitment of those under eighteen years of age.

Family Reunification
Article 10 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child addresses the need
for family reunification across national borders.
1. In accordance with the obligation of States Parties under article 9,
paragraph 1, applications by a child or his or her parents to enter or leave a
State Party for the purpose of family reunification shall be dealt with by
States Parties in a positive, humane and expeditious manner. . . .
2. A child whose parents reside in different States shall have the right to
maintain on a regular basis save in exceptional circumstances personal

54
Sudan ratified this convention on August 3, 1990. It came into force on September
2, 1990. This Convention applies to States Parties, and makes no mention of rebel
groups, but does provide authoritative guidance for interpreting customary
international humanitarian law applicable to rebels.

55
Convention on the Rights of the Child, art. 38(2).
Appendix A: The Rules of War 369

relations and direct contacts with both parents. Towards that end . . . States
Parties shall respect the right of the child and his or her parents to leave
any country, including their own, and to enter their own country. . . . .

Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Zaire, and other countries host Sudanese

refugees. These named countries have ratified the Convention on the Rights of the
Child.56 Under the above mentioned article 10, they have an obligation to permit the
unaccompanied minors now in Sudan or even in refugee camps in other countries,
whose parents or families are refugees in their countries, to be reunified with their
families, even if it means taking in additional refugees.

56
Kenya ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child on July 30, 1990; Uganda
ratified it on August 17, 1990; Ethiopia acceded to it on May 14, 1991; and Zaire
ratified it on September 27, 1990.