Deadly Clashes In Sudan Leave 150 Dead
MEP: Nearly 150 people including soldiers and civilians have been killed in deadly clashes in South Sudan’s capital Juba on Friday evening between forces loyal to the president and supporters of the first vice president.
Gunfire erupted outside the presidential palace at around 4:20pm as President Salva Kiir had been holding a meeting to discuss a previous clash in which five government soldiers were killed the day before, according to military sources.
“We are expecting a bigger number of casualties because the two units of the presidential guard were all engaged yesterday,” said Roman Nyarji, a spokesman for Machar, referring to the bodyguard units of both sides.
Estimates of the death toll vary, but most accounts put the number over 100 – some as high as 150.
“South Sudan today marked the most horrifying Independence Day in the world this year,” said government official James Gatdet Dak on Facebook.
Another resident, Buay Joshua De Kapduel, wrote simply: “Unhappy 5th Independence Day”.
Sudan Tribute sources said that they counted 180 dead bodies outside the presidential compound. The official number has not been announced, but inflow of the victims of the shooting grew so large that a nearby military hospital ran out of beds.
“We did not sleep the whole of yesterday [Friday] night. We received more [than] 58 soldiers with gunshot wounds by around 8:00pm yesterday evening and received 30 others this morning. We have now run out of beds,” one of the military medical officers at the SPLA military hospital told Sudan Tribune on Saturday.
