Ethnic conflict behind South Sudanese clashes - UN Security Council

South Sudan’s former vice president, Riek Machar, denied allegations made on Monday, that he had led an attempted coup against President Salva Kiir.
“What took place in Juba was a misunderstanding between presidential guards within their division, it was not a coup attempt,” he told Sudanese press today.
The accusation has triggered clashes between the rival factions over the past 2 days, which the United Nations, using unconfirmed reports, claims have killed over 500 people.

A meeting of the UN Security Council in New York on Tuesday was told that the clashes in South Sudan were “apparently largely along ethnic lines.”

Addressing reporters at the United Nations, Security Council president Gerard Araud said,
“There is a heavy toll, it is obvious.
Gerard Araud further outlined that the ethnic nature of the conflict had the potential of a civil war between the two ethnic groups, the Dinka and the Nuer.

The Sudanese government has denied that there was an ethnic aspect to the conflict.

Amidst the heightening tension the US State department earlier today ordered US government personnel and citizens to leave the country due to ‘ongoing political and social unrest’.

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