South Sudan’s president signed a peace deal on Wednesday to end a 20-month conflict with rebels, but he told regional African leaders at the ceremony that he still had “serious reservations.”
President Salva Kiir, who has led South Sudan since it seceded from Sudan in 2011, last week asked for more time for consultations, drawing threats of United Nations’ sanctions if he failed to ink it within a two-week deadline, Reuters reported.
“With all those reservations that we have, we will sign this document,” he told African leaders gathered in Juba for the ceremony, speaking shortly before he signed.
Rebel leader Riek Machar, Kiir’s long-time rival who is expected to become the country’s First Vice President under the deal, signed the document last week in the Ethiopian capital.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon welcomed the signing of the peace deal, but his spokesman noted in a statement that it must be implemented.
“Now is the time to ensure that this agreement translates into an end to the violence, hardship and horrific human rights violations witnessed throughout this conflict,” the statement said.
Thousands of people have been killed since the conflict erupted in December 2013 after a power struggle between Machar, an ethnic Nuer, and Kiir, from the dominant Dinka group. The fighting has increasingly followed ethnic lines, unsettling an already volatile region.
Many of the 11 million population had been driven to the brink of starvation and two million people have fled their homes, often to neighbouring states.
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