Monitoring Desk
JUBA: A tit-for-tat violence between cattle herders and members of a militia killed twenty-seven people in South Sudan’s Central Equatoria state, on the eve of Pope Francis’s visit to the country.
The pope is arriving from the neighbouring Democratic Republic of the Congo, hoping to restart a peace process centred at ending a decade of conflict fought mainly on ethnic lines that has wiped out hundreds of thousands of people.
A peace deal inked in 2018 by the big parties in a civil war 2013-2018 has considrably reduced violence in the countryin recent years, but lower-level clashes between rival communities are still occurred.
Phanuel Dumo, Kajo-Keji county commissioner, said that violenceerupted after fighters from a rebel group killed 6 member of a herding community. They retaliated on Thursday by killing twenty-one civilians in a nearby area, including 5 children and a pregnant woman.
Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, who is accompanying the pope to the country, said he was horrified by the latest violence.
Pope concludes emotional visit
Pope Francis concluded an emotional visit to the DRC on Friday, following a meeting with Congolese bishops in capital Kinshasa and attending a farewell ceremony at the airport.
