By William Madouk
Minister of Cabinet Affairs Dr. Martin Elia Lomuro has accused the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan of compiling ‘concocted’ report in a frantic push for regime change.
During a workshop to analyze two human rights reports, Dr. Lomuro criticized UN Commission on human rights under Yasmin Sooka for incessantly distorting the country’s image for their own ‘clandestine’ agenda.
“Year in and out, we are being disreputed by report of human right council in Geneva and by UNMISS and various other clandestine organizations including NGOs that claims of misreport of human rights in South Sudan,” Lomuro said.
“The human rights council specifically the office of the commissioner of human rights in South Sudan and her staff continuously preyed on reputation for the country for their employment and other purposes such as sanctions, arms embargo and regime change,” he lamented.
He said, in spite of huge improvement on human rights records in South Sudan as a country emerging out of war, still UN rights commission keeps government hostage to scare away investors.
“They kept us hostage with unfounded allegations and claims to tarnish the image of our country, discourage the investors and undermine development in our country,” Lomuro added.
Minster Lomuro claims that human rights body has gone beyond their mandate and start reporting on political economy, rebellion, inter-communal conflicts, cattle raiding and the agreement itself.
“We all know the standards of human rights in terms of violations that are constitutional in any country but as you can see, they have gone out of it, to areas that have nothing to do with human rights,” he noted.
“They say all this is happening because all of us here, president, our five vice presidents, our cabinet and parliament don’t care and that it is our policy to abuse citizens in this country,” he continued.
Dr. Lomuro stated that commissioner Ms. Sooka is totally oblivious of the fact that the country is being built from zero, adding that their move shows that they are for ‘secret’ mission of regime change.
“Of course, the commissioner is driven by regime change agenda of others who do not want peace and political stability and development in our country,” he stressed.
He was reacting to UN experts report, on Feb 14 by 18 UN experts team that visited the country to discuss human rights situation, compile latest finding and recommendations before UN Human Rights council’s 52nd session.
The United Nations Commission on Human Rights called on South Sudanese leaders to end all hostilities against civilians in South Sudan.
Commissioner Barney Afako said “The suffering across the country remains immense. South Sudanese women and girls continue to face unspeakable sexual violence.”
Meanwhile, Commissioner Andrew Clapham said they were still shocked by the continued attacks on civilians while culprits at large are left to scot-free.
“Our Commission has documented human rights violations in South Sudan for many years, but we were still shocked by the sexual violence and continuing attacks against civilians,” Clapham lamented.
“The accounts from survivors are horrific. Many people the Commission has met have experienced attacks over and over again. At the same time, people responsible for crimes walk free” he added.