178 Die in South Sudan 'surprise' attack
The number of people killed in an attack in South Sudan last Sunday when a group of unidentified men launched an assault in the north of the country has risen to 178, a local official has told the BBC.
Describing the attack as carried out by dozens of armed youth, Ruweng Administrative Area's Information Minister, James Monyluak Mijok, alleged that the thugs came from neighbouring Unity State and were linked to the Sudan People's Liberation Army in Opposition (SPLA-IO).
The SPLA-IO has denied any involvement in the attack, accusing the authorities of politicising the violence.
The UN has repeatedly warned that the country is at risk of sliding back into full-scale civil war.
Medical aid groups have described the scale of casualties as alarming, even for a region that has experienced repeated outbreaks of violence.
A diplomatic source quoted anonymously by the AFP news agency last Monday put the death toll at 70, but said it could increase.
'The dead include 90 children, women and elderly people, as well as 79 members of regional forces, including police,'' Mr Mijok said, adding that many of them had been buried in a mass grave.
He said 73 people were still in hospital, many of whom were taken to neighbouring Abyei Administrative Area for treatment.
Medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) described the situation in Abyei as extremely challenging.
"It was really difficult to manage the mass casualty situation, but many MSF and Ministry of Health staff came on their day off and from other facilities to support," Abraham Deng Lual Wek, an MSF nurse supervisor, told the BBC yesterday.
"For the surgical team, it was a challenge to manage all of the emergency cases between the two operating theatres," he said.
"Our triage area, emergency room and wards were full of patients, so we expanded capacity by using tents and a meeting space, which also filled quickly."
Mijok told the BBC that the attackers entered Abiemnom county in Ruweng before dawn on Sunday, at around 04:30 local time (02:30 GMT), when people were still sleeping and "surprised them."
