![Visiting members of UN Human Rights Commission on South Sudan addresses journalists at the UN House in Juba on Friday, February 16, 2024. [Photo by Sudans Post]](https://i0.wp.com/www.sudanspost.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/IMG_9665.jpg?resize=1024%2C444&ssl=1)
Speaking to reporters at a press conference at the UN House in Juba, Ms. Yasmin Sooka, Chairperson of the UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan, said the abducted women and children were subjected to sexual slavery and others forced as wives.
“Yesterday, we travelled to Bor and Pibor and we noted an increased proliferation of abduction and while abduction is not a new phenomenon in South Sudan,” she said, “the increase and impact on women and children is deeply troubling.”
The top UN official said the Commission documented cases of abductions leading to killings, forced marriages, sexual slavery, and even trafficking. They attributed these acts to “armed groups and also members of armed forces.”
“The authorities told us that they lack resources to deal with the issue conclusively,” Sooka added. “The Commission documented many testimonies of women being abducted with the release being accomplished by payment of ransom to abductors following the intervention.”
Barney Afako, another member of the Commission, noted a shift in targeting.
“We are told that in the past there was a focus on children, but increasingly older women were being abducted, so we have stories of mothers being abducted alongside their children often several children,” he said.
Carlos Castresana Fernandez, U.N. Commissioner on Human Rights, highlighted the challenges impeding justice.
“South Sudan judiciary is not functioning, it is severely under-sourced, has no money or the personnel or the distribution in the territory and lack the means to be impartial and independent and in most part of the country has no effective present,” he added.
