SOUTH SUDAN: SOLDIER SENTENCED TO DEATH FOR ETHNIC KILLING

December 16, 2014: The South Sudanese army's court-martial sentenced one soldier to death for killing a colleague on ethnic grounds and jailed six others for murder and gunrunning.
"When asked why he killed his colleague, he said it was because he is a Nuer [i.e., hails from the Nuer tribe]," Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) Director for Military Justice Henry Oyai told a press conference at army headquarters in capital Juba.
"He was also charged with indulging in politics, for which the military court-martial passed a death penalty verdict by firing squad," he said.
Nuer is the tribe of sacked vice president Riek Machar, whose supporters have fought the regime of President Salva Kiir since December of last year.
Michael Deng Nguen was found guilty for killing a Nuer colleague at the outset of the ongoing political crisis, which has claimed tens of thousands of lives, displaced nearly two million people and left some four million people at risk of food insecurity.
"The ruling is in the office of the president, who is commander-in-chief of the national army, awaiting approval," said Oyai.
Several other SPLA soldiers have been slapped with prison terms of varying length for killing, selling guns, robbery and land grabbing, among other things.
They have all been dismissed from the army service.
Deputy Chief of General Staff for Administration Malual Ayom Dor said the army was committed to reform, stressing that the sentences doled out to the convicted men should be seen in this light.
"The SPLA as a national army has embarked on radical reformation. The sentencing of these soldiers, as well as dismissal from the army, will give room for reform," he said.
"All these soldiers who were sentenced were from one ethnic group [the Dinka tribe]; therefore, those who say that we target one ethnic group have now witnessed that the law is above all people," Dor insisted.
The Dinka is the tribe from which President Kiir hails.
South Sudan's Nuer and Dinka tribes represent the country's two main ethnic groups.
Together, they are estimated to account for some 80 percent of the fledging country's total population of 11 million.  (Sources: en.haberler.com, December 16, 2014)