JUBA
The capital of South Sudan is, again, being plagued by shootings and killings by people in army uniform.
"Reports are reaching me that there are rampant shooting in the Munuki, Gudele, Tongpiny, Mia Saba and Lologo areas," police spokesman Col. James Monday Enoka told Anadolu Agency on Thursday.
On Wednesday night, a man was shot dead by a Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) soldier in Mia Saba, a neighbourhood of capital Juba.
One day earlier, a woman was shot dead in her home in Munuki, another part of the capital.
"According to the reports, these are undisciplined members of the organized forces who move around with their guns while drunk and begin shooting," Enoka said.
"These security organs sometimes pick quarrels among themselves or with residents and draw their guns," he explained.
Asked about the reasons behind such criminal acts, the police spokesman blamed the phenomenon on South Sudan's current political crisis.
"What's happening now is a problem created by the crisis," he said.
South Sudan has been shaken by violence since last December, when President Salva Kiir accused sacked vice-president Riek Machar of standing behind a failed coup attempt against his regime.
The violence has already claimed more than 10,000 lives. The UN estimates that some 3.7 million South Sudanese are now "severely food insecure," while more than 867,000 have been displaced by the fighting.
Representatives of the two warring camps are currently in Addis Ababa for a second round of peace talks after agreeing to a cessation of hostilities in January.
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Brig. Gen. Malak Ayuen, the SPLA's director of information, said the night-time shootings had been carried out by thugs and drunken soldiers prowling the streets of Juba.
"Police are working in joint operations together with the army," Ayuen told AA. "They should arrest any disobedient soldier."
According to Enoka, police have stepped up their patrols in the poorly-planned city.
"Because it's difficult to drive through some of these places, we have deployed security personnel in the areas," Enoka noted. "In Mia Saba, we have 400 policemen now doing patrols."
He went on to suggest that people still living in displaced persons camps should return home and work with police by reporting unruly security personnel in their respective areas.
"We've already set up an emergency court system at police headquarters to try anyone caught in such acts immediately," Enoka asserted.
"This is very serious," he stressed. "We can't leave room for such acts among our forces."
englishnews@aa.com.tr
