Not less than seven individuals have been killed and one other 20 injured in an assault on a city in South Sudan, the medical charity Medical doctors With out Borders, identified by its French initials MSF, has stated, as fears develop that the world’s youngest nation will relapse into all-out civil war.
MSF stated in assertion that it “strongly condemned the deliberate bombing of its hospital in Outdated Fangak” on Saturday and that the assault destroyed the final remaining functioning hospital and pharmacy there within the north of the nation.
MSF initially urged in an X publish: “Cease the bombing. Shield civilians. Shield healthcare.” It stated the assault was “a transparent violation of worldwide regulation”.
It was not instantly clear why the ability was focused. A spokesperson for South Sudan’s navy couldn’t be reached for remark, based on The Related Press information company.
🔴 Right now, MSF’s hospital in Outdated Fangak, South Sudan, was bombed.
The pharmacy was destroyed. All medical provides misplaced. There are reviews of individuals killed and injured.
That is the one purposeful hospital within the space.
Cease the bombing. Shield civilians. Shield healthcare. pic.twitter.com/2xVtEV0sLp
— MSF South Sudan (@MSF_SouthSudan) May 3, 2025
Mamman Mustapha, Head of Mission with MSF in South Sudan, advised Al Jazeera from the capital Juba that his crew on the bottom reported “two helicopter gunships attacking the hospital”.
Mustapha stated the helicopters bombed the hospital and its medical provides, then “continued shelling the city of Outdated Fangak”.
“The civilian inhabitants has fled and the scenario is kind of horrific and catastrophic … We’re fairly shocked. The hospital has been there for 10 years, since 2014,” he added.
An additional MSF assertion stated, “The assault started at round 4:30am (02:30GMT) when two helicopter gunships first dropped a bomb on the MSF pharmacy, burning it to the bottom, then went on to fireside in town of Outdated Fangak for round half-hour…There are reviews of extra fatalities and wounded locally.”
Extra assaults came about hours later close to a market in Outdated Fangak, inflicting widespread panic and displacement of civilians, based on a number of witnesses.
Fears of renewed civil struggle
The United Nations has warned in current weeks that South Sudan, tormented by instability since gaining independence from Sudan in 2011, is getting ready to a renewed civil struggle.
The nation descended into battle in current months because of the collapse of a power-sharing settlement between rival generals, President Salva Kiir and First Vice-President Riek Machar.
Kiir and Machar signify the 2 largest ethnic teams, the Dinka and Nuer, respectively, which fought a civil struggle between 2013 and 2018 that price some 400,000 lives earlier than a 2018 peace deal noticed the 2 leaders type a authorities of nationwide unity.
Now, tensions between Kiir and Machar have boiled over once more, the latter positioned beneath home arrest since March for alleged subversion.
Outdated Fangak, the place the assault on the MSF hospital occurred, is certainly one of a number of main cities in Fangak county, Jonglei State, an ethnically Nuer a part of the nation that’s traditionally related to Machar’s Sudan Individuals’s Liberation Motion-in-Opposition (SPLM-IO) get together.
Reporting from Nairobi, Al Jazeera’s Catherine Soi stated she had been chatting with the Fangak county commissioner, who pointed the finger of blame on the authorities for the assault. The official, she stated, was allied with the SPLM-IO.
This commissioner advised Al Jazeera that “solely the military has the capability to hold out such an assault”. “We’ve additionally been speaking to eyewitnesses who say that … the plane was a authorities plane,” stated Soi.
“We additionally know that two weeks in the past one other MSF facility in that space was additionally attacked and looted, so we’re ready for the federal government official to provide their model of the story,” she stated.
Final month, a military base was looted by gunmen within the northern city of Nasir in oil-rich Higher Nile State. Soi stated the assault had allegedly been carried out by the White Military, which is alleged to be allied with Machar’s SPLM-IO.
“He’s beneath home arrest, a number of of different opposition politicians have additionally been arrested,” stated Soi. “We’ve heard from the federal government spokesman who says investigations are nonetheless happening. And when that occurs, these politicians are going to be charged with rise up.”
The hospital assault is the most recent escalation in a government-led assault on opposition teams throughout the nation. Since March, authorities troops backed by troopers from Uganda have performed dozens of air raids on areas in neighbouring Higher Nile State.
A number of Western embassies, together with that of the US, stated in an announcement on Friday that the political and safety scenario in South Sudan has “markedly worsened” in current days.
The embassies urged Kiir to free Machar from home arrest and known as for a “return to dialogue urgently geared toward reaching a political resolution”.
An election, which was purported to be held in 2023, has already been postponed twice and is no longer scheduled till 2026.
