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U.N. Sends Rescue Helicopters to South Sudan as Crisis Worsens 2,000 Youths Attacked South Sudan Base, U.N. Says, With More Assaults Feared
(about 7 hours later)
LONDON — The United Nations said Friday that it had sent helicopters to rescue personnel from a base in South Sudan that came under lethal attack amid a worsening political crisis, and President Obama warned that South Sudan, the world’s youngest country, “stands at the precipice.” The United Nations provided sobering details on Friday of the assault on a peacekeeping base in South Sudan that underscored the organization’s fragile ability to protect civilians in the country, where sectarian mayhem has escalated in recent days.
The number of civilians seeking refuge in the United Nations’ other outposts there exceeds 30,000, and diplomats expressed fears about the potential for a civil war. Two-thousand armed youths of Nuer ethnicity overran the facility the previous day, killing at least 11 ethnic Dinka civilians seeking refuge along with two Indian peacekeepers who had tried to protect them, the United Nations said.
Britain, which began evacuating its citizens on Thursday, said Friday that it would send a second airplane to Juba, the capital. “We strongly advise all British nationals in South Sudan to leave the country if they can do so safely,” the Foreign Office said, adding that it might become more difficult to escape if the situation worsened. The United States offered similar advice to Americans and suspended operations at its embassy in Juba this week. The assault on the base in the town of Akobo in Jonglei State on Thursday was among a number of alarming developments that have increased the fear of an impending civil war in South Sudan, the world’s youngest country, where ethnic hatreds, initially obscured after independence from Sudan two years ago, have been reaggravated and inflamed.
China, which operates oil fields near Juba, also took steps on Friday to protect its nationals in the country. The China National Petroleum Corporation began what it called “the orderly evacuation of our workers,” Agence France-Presse reported. Between 35,000 and 40,000 civilians have taken refuge in at least three other United Nations peacekeeping bases in the country, including two in the capital of Juba, United Nations officials said, and there were fears of an attack on a peacekeeping base in Bor, the capital of Jonglei State, where 14,000 civilians had sought sanctuary in a base surrounded by at least 2,000 armed youths.
On its Twitter feed, the United Nations peacekeeping force in South Sudan said early on Friday that it had sent four helicopters to rescue personnel at its base in the town of Akobo in Jonglei State, where, it said, two Indian peacekeepers had been killed when it was attacked on Thursday. India said earlier that three of its soldiers had died. “The situation, of course, is very, very unstable there,” Gérard Araud, the French ambassador to the United Nations and current president of the Security Council, told reporters after an emergency session of the council, which issued a statement expressing “grave alarm” and strong condemnation of the fighting.
The mission said it had “received assurances from forces in charge of Akobo town that its helicopters will be permitted to land safely this morning.” Earlier, Kieran Dwyer, a spokesman for the United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations, said communications with the base in Akobo had been lost. Four United Nations helicopters evacuated the remaining peacekeepers from the Akobo base on Friday, the organization said, as other countries joined the growing voices of concern about South Sudan’s frayed stability and took action to evacuate their citizens, including China, which operates a number of petroleum projects there.
At the time of the assault by unidentified attackers, the Akobo base housed 43 Indian peacekeepers, six United Nations police advisers, two civilians of undisclosed nationality and about 30 South Sudanese who had sought refuge there from the fighting in the area, the United Nations said. “I deplore this unjustified and unwarranted attack on the United Nations Mission base in Akobo, killing peacekeepers that were here to protect civilians and serve the people of South Sudan,” Hilde F. Johnson, the top United Nations official in the country, said in a statement distributed by the United Nations Mission in South Sudan, the peacekeeping force known by its acronym, Unmiss, which has about 6,800 soldiers and 700 police officers.
Earlier Friday, the mission said on Twitter that 34,000 people had taken refuge at its compounds. Around 20,000 people are housed at its two compounds in Juba and up to 14,000 at its compound in Bor, the capital of Jonglei, about 125 miles north of Juba, the mission said. In an account of the episode, the statement said that the Akobo base’s Nuer attackers opened fire at the Dinka civilians inside and that while members of the peacekeeping contingent there sought to open negotiations, they, too, “came under sustained attack.”
The United Nations Security Council is expected to hold an emergency meeting about South Sudan on Friday. The assailants overran the base, the account said, and “seized weapons, ammunition and other supplies.” The peacekeeping contingent of about 40 Indian soldiers then coordinated with soldiers of South Sudan’s armed forces, the Sudan People’s Liberation Army, and re-established control of the base within a few hours. “The base remains under the protection and control of S.P.L.A. troops,” the account said.
The situation in South Sudan, which gained independence from Sudan in 2011, has been tense for months, but it has quickly deteriorated in the past five days since the president, Salva Kiir, accused his former vice president, Riek Machar, of attempting a military coup, which Mr. Machar denied. There have been unconfirmed reports that more than 500 people have been killed and that sectarian animosities between the Dinka and Nuer ethnic groups have been inflamed. After initially reporting that at least 20 civilians had been killed, Unmiss revised the number to at least 11.
In a letter to Congress released Thursday night, Mr. Obama said 45 American troops had been sent to South Sudan to “support the security of U.S. personnel and our embassy.” Hundreds of people have been killed in South Sudan over the past week, mostly in areas around Juba and in Jonglei State to the north, in an escalation of the crisis precipitated by President Salva Kiir’s claim on Monday of an attempted coup by soldiers loyal to his former vice president, Riek Machar, who was dismissed months ago. President Kiir is a Dinka and Mr. Machar a Nuer, and the killings appear to be increasingly divided along those ethnic lines.
“In recent years, against great odds, South Sudan has made great progress toward breaking the cycle of violence that characterized much of its history,” the letter said. “Today, that future is at risk. South Sudan stands at the precipice. Recent fighting threatens to plunge South Sudan back into the dark days of its past.” Farhan Haq, a spokesman for Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, told reporters on Friday that there were no immediate plans to strengthen the Unmiss force. But Mr. Haq also said that “if the fighting continues to expand to many locations, there’s only so many peacekeepers we have in place.”
Navi Pillay, the top human rights official at the United Nations, expressed concern on Thursday about the “rapidly deteriorating security situation in South Sudan and the consequences for the civilian population.” Britain, which began evacuating its citizens on Thursday, said Friday that it had sent a second airplane to Juba, the capital, to carry Britons to safety. “We strongly advise all British nationals in South Sudan to leave the country if they can do so safely,” the Foreign Office said, adding that it might become more difficult to escape if the situation worsened. The United States offered similar advice to Americans and suspended operations at its embassy in Juba this week.
The United Nations, which has operated in South Sudan for years and aided its transition to independence, has a tense relationship with the government, and South Sudanese officials have accused the organization of taking sides in the simmering conflict with Sudan. China, which operates oil fields near Juba, also took steps on Friday to protect its nationals. The China National Petroleum Corporation began what it called “the orderly evacuation of our workers,” Agence France-Presse reported.
In April, seven United Nations employees and five Indian peacekeepers were killed in an ambush in Jonglei that South Sudan attributed to rebels. A year ago, the military, in what it called a miscommunication, shot down a United Nations helicopter, killing the four Russian crew members aboard.

Rick Gladstone reported from New York, and Alan Cowell from London.

Alan Cowell reported from London, and Rick Gladstone from New York.