Survivors say a promise of food assistance turned deadly in a remote corner of South Sudan, where gunmen allegedly tricked villagers into gathering before opening fire.
The attack took place early Saturday in Pankor village in Ayod County, Jonglei State, roughly 250 miles north of Juba. According to two people who lived through the assault, fighters aligned with the government drove in on pickup trucks and used a loudspeaker to announce they were registering residents for humanitarian aid. Women and children were among those killed.
The witnesses, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliation, said the gunmen instructed villagers to assemble, claiming they would be enrolled for food distribution.
“They gathered them in a luak” said one witness, referring to a traditional mud hut used to house cattle. “People were thinking they would get aid or some help.”
Instead, the attackers allegedly tied the hands of several men and began shooting. The two survivors said 22 people were killed and several others wounded. James Chuol Jiek, the government-appointed county commissioner of Ayod, put the death toll at 16.
Images shared with the AP by an opposition representative showed the bodies of women and young men, some with their hands bound behind their backs, apparently shot at close range. The photographs were deemed too graphic for publication.
Makuach Muot, 34, arrived in Pankor on Sunday to bury eight relatives. He said much of the village had already emptied out months earlier as fighting intensified, leaving mainly elderly residents and children behind.
Army spokesman Maj. Gen. Lul Ruai Koang was unavailable for comment, according to AP’s report.
Commissioner Jiek confirmed that more than a dozen people, mostly women and children, died in the attack. He attributed the violence to the Agwelek militia, a predominantly Shilluk force that has not been fully absorbed into the national army but has played a significant role in recent operations.
According to Jiek, the fighters left their barracks overnight without their commander’s approval. He said they later told him the killings were in retaliation for 2022 attacks by a Nuer militia on Shilluk communities, incidents in which hundreds of civilians were killed or abducted.
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While condemning the bloodshed, Jiek rejected claims that residents had been deceived with a promise of aid registration. “This is an opposition lie,” he said. He added that several officers had been detained and that 150 fighters from the battalion involved had been disarmed.
The Agwelek militia has faced scrutiny before. In January, its commander, Lt. Gen. Johnson Olony, was recorded instructing troops during operations in Jonglei State. “Spare no lives,” he said. “When we arrive there, don’t spare an elderly, don’t spare a chicken, don’t spare a house or anything.”
The remarks sparked condemnation from the United Nations and other observers. Olony later issued an apology.
Ayod County has been battered by armed confrontations, aerial bombardments and years of severe flooding, leaving more than half its population struggling with acute food insecurity. The county sits in northern Jonglei, an opposition stronghold and a focal point of renewed clashes that the U.N. estimates have displaced 280,000 people since December. Humanitarian organizations have warned that restrictions on access to opposition-controlled areas are putting civilians at further risk.
Northern Jonglei is largely inhabited by members of the Nuer ethnic group, associated with suspended vice president and opposition leader Riek Machar. Opposition figures have repeatedly described government actions in Nuer-majority areas as “genocidal.” Reath Tang Muoch, a senior official in the SPLM-IO, characterized Olony’s earlier comments as “an early indicator of genocidal intent.”
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