South Sudan President Salva Kiir. PHOTO | REUTERS
The United States signalled a sharp shift in its South Sudan
policy on Wednesday with its United Nations envoy denouncing President
Salva Kiir as “an unfit partner.”
UN
Ambassador Nikki Haley also abandoned the gentle cajolery previously
employed by the US in its appeals to neighbouring states to facilitate
an end to South Sudan's civil war.
“It
is past time for the leaders of Uganda and Kenya to get involved and
put pressure on President Kiir,” Ms Haley declared in a stinging speech
to the UN Security Council.
“They are key players in the success of a true peace process.”
Decrying
frequent violations of a December 21 ceasefire agreement, she warned,
“It’s not just a lack of forward momentum; things are going backwards in
South Sudan.”
'We're failing'
Ms Haley's comments serve to distance the US from the government
of a country whose birth in 2011 had been midwifed by Washington.
Successive
US administrations — Republican and Democratic alike — had aided South
Sudan's fight for independence and had financed its attempts at
political and economic development.
Ms
Haley noted in her speech that the US has “invested well over $11
billion in South Sudan and the government of President Kiir.”
“We
have treated the Kiir government as a partner in this effort, and we
have assumed that the best interests of the people were its priority,”
the US envoy recounted.
But through
its recent actions, “the government of South Sudan is increasingly
proving itself to be an unfit partner for this Council and any country
seeking peace and security for the people of South Sudan,” she declared.
She
cited continued moves by the government to block deliveries of
humanitarian aid. These include imposing fees of up to $7.6 million on
aid groups, Ms Haley said, suggesting that this money should be used to
shelter two million internally displaced persons or to feed some of the
six million South Sudanese facing famine.
“Our
attempts to ease the suffering of the people of South Sudan aren’t
working,” she continued. “And what’s worse, we’re failing; not despite
the leadership of South Sudan, but because of it. The time has come to
acknowledge the hard reality that the leaders of South Sudan are not
just failing their people, they are betraying them.”
The envoy reiterated the Obama administration's calls for an arms embargo on all sides in South Sudan's conflict.
But
while the United Kingdom voiced support for that action on Wednesday,
two of the Security Council's other veto-wielding members —China and
Russia — did not endorse an arms embargo. France, the fifth veto power,
has supported an arms embargo in the past.
Despite
her explicit condemnation of the South Sudan government, Ms Haley vowed
on Wednesday that “the United States will never give up on this effort”
to make peace.
UN diplomats were left to wonder what new actions the Trump administration might take as it revises US policy on South Sudan.
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