South Sudan is the world's youngest country. It gained independence in 2011 with the strong support of the Bush and Obama administrations. The South Sudanese government has received copious amounts of aid from the United States and United Nations ever since, around $1 billion every year.
But the United States may have broken its own law, by providing financial support to a government that has committed genocide and crimes against humanity.
In 2013, civil war broke out in South Sudan, and a peace deal brokered by the U.S. and the international community broke down in the summer of 2016. The South Sudanese government soldiers ransacked the country's Yei region. A handful of U.N. and U.S. officials begged their leaders to help. They warned that the United Nations must send peacekeepers to South Sudan's Yei region. They said they were needed to protect the civilians from President Salva Kiir's forces who were burning villages and slaughtering men, women and children. They said the U.S. needed to help stop a potential genocide.
The pleas fell on deaf ears. The U.N. did not send peacekeepers. The United States continued their support for the South Sudanese military, possibly in violation of U.S. law, found an AP investigation. The investigation was based on more than 30 internal documents from the U.N., White House, State Department, and dozens of interviews with current or formal state officials and civilians.
National Security Advisor Susan Rice played a key role in refusing to enforce an arms embargo on the South Sudanese government (Foreign Policy). And when asked to comment, she said that both sides were at fault. (NPR)
After the U.S. failed to stop their support for the South Sudanese military, Yei became the center of a nationwide genocide, or "ethnic cleansing." This has created the largest exodus of civilians in Africa since the Rwandan genocide in 1994. More than 1 million people have fled to Uganda, mostly from the Yei region. While there is no official tally of how many have died, estimates put the number in the tens or even hundreds of thousands.
Kate Almquist Knopf, director at the Africa Center for Strategic Studies at the U.S. Defense Department, compared the situation in South Sudan to Rwanda, where nearly a million people died in 100 days with little action from the U.S. or other world leaders.
“The reality is that Rwanda happened while the U.N. was there, while the international community was there, and they didn’t do anything. The same thing is happening now in South Sudan,” said Knopf. “It’s happening on Africa’s watch. It’s happening on America’s watch. It’s happening on the United Nations watch. It’s happening on everyone’s watch.”
More than a year later, the U.N. says that it is considering sending a permanent peacekeeping force to the Yei region if it gets more troops. The U.N. now has 12,000 peacekeepers throughout Southern Sudan, but U.S. officials say it would take roughly 40,000 to secure the country. Which leaves Yei, and other regions like Bentiu, Malakal and Wau vulnerable.
For its part, the U.S. gave the South Sudanese military $30 million for technical training, non-lethal equipment and advisers for the 2016 and 2017 fiscal years. The State Department in July gave a further $2 million for a military and security operations center that supported the country’s security service and presidential guards. This assistance appears to violate a U.S. law prohibiting support to any unit that has committed a gross violation of human rights — ethnic cleansing and genocide is an obvious violation of human rights.
The U.S. aid is a “red flag,” said Sen. Patrick Leahy, who sponsored the law. “The South Sudanese security forces, like their rebel counterparts, are notorious for violating human rights without fear of being punished. We do not want the United States to be associated with such misconduct.”
RELATED CONTENT
UN, US failed to prevent ‘ethnic cleansing’ in South Sudan (AP, 10-18-17)
U.S. support of South Sudanese military may have broken the law (Axios, 10-18-17)
'Both Sides Are At Fault': Susan Rice On South Sudan's Civil War (NPR, 3-8-16)
Inside the White House Fight Over the Slaughter in South Sudan (Foreign Policy, 1-26-15)
THE LAW WHICH MAKES CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY A VIOLATION OF U.S. LAW
Senator Leahy's Crimes Against Humanity Act of 2010 (Read the Official Bill Here)
PRESS RELEASES FROM SENATOR LEAHY
Durbin, Leahy, Feingold Introduce Legislation Making Crimes Against Humanity A Violation Of U.S. Law (Press Release on Leahy Official Site, 2009)