The United States has lost trust in South Sudan’s government for fueling the country’s civil war and must bring peace or risk losing support from Washington. US Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, who was the first senior member of President Donald Trump’s administration to visit South Sudan, told the nation’s President Salva Kiir.
South Sudan spiraled into civil war in 2013, just two years after gaining independence from Sudan. She met one on one with Kiir for some 45 minutes.
“I let him know that the United States was at a crossroads and that every decision going forward was going to be based on his actions,” Haley told reporters after the meeting in the capital Juba.
The United Nations has warned that the violence in South Sudan was providing “fertile ground” for a genocide. Kiir’s government has denied UN allegations of ethnic cleansing. “He understood that Americans were disappointed in his leadership in South Sudan, I made that very clear.
“And he understood that all the aid or help that he hopes will go forward is not a given,” she said. Haley did not elaborate on what further action Washington could take, but said that Kiir “got what I was trying to say.” On Monday she said Washington was considering how to pressure Kiir into peace, though noted that withdrawing aid may not work.
The Trump administration last month imposed sanctions on two senior South Sudanese officials and the former army chief.
“We have lost trust in the government and we now need to regain that trust and the only way to regain that trust is through the actions of taking care of all of the people,” Haley told South Sudan’s Eye Radio. She demanded that Kiir allow full and consistent humanitarian aid access and bring peace and stability to the country.
She said she pushed a timeline for Kiir to act, but declined to elaborate. Nhial Nihal, a senior adviser to Kiir, said the president told Haley his government and a UN peacekeeping mission in South Sudan had established “mechanisms that work jointly to improve and address the humanitarian problems.”
He also told reporters that Kiir said government troops “will also be observing a cessation of hostilities in order to create an atmosphere for dialogue.”
