South Sudan’s renowned Teacher Peter Kiano killed in crossfire in Khartoum

KHARTOUM, MAY 20, 2023 (SUDANS POST) – South Sudan’s renowned secondary school teacher Peter Kiano was killed on Friday morning in crossfire following clashes between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) group in central Khartoum.

Eyewitnesses and colleagues told Sudans Post that Kiano’s death occurred after outbreak of fighting between Sudanese Armed Forces troops and elements from the RSF at Abu Hamama neighborhood during morning hours of Friday.

“He left his home at Hela el-Gos and went to Abu Hamama for shopping and there, fighting suddenly broke out between the RSF and the Sudanese Armed Forces who all came from no where to clash there,” one source told Sudans Post in Khartoum.

“Everyone include Peter Kiano was running for his life to move away from what has become a battlefield and, in the process, he was shot in his head from behind. We cannot say it is a targeted killing, but he was killed in crossfire,” the source added.

Kiano was born in Juba in July 1964 and moved to Khartoum in the late 1980s and begun working as a science and mathematics teacher at Comboni College Khartoum (CCK) Secondary School with which he become well-known.

He was 58 at the time of his death.

The renowned schoolteacher who is regarded by many as “generational educator” has been reluctant to return to South Sudan following the country’s independence from Sudan in July 2011, and told Al Jazeera at the time that he would remain in Sudan.

“I still feel this is my country and this is my capital, and I am optimistic that one day the two parts can come together in a kind of confederation or something like that,” he told the Doha-based news organization.