* U.N. says move is breach of legal obligations
* Officer had accused Sudan army of rights abuses
JUBA, Nov 4 (Reuters) – South Sudan said on Sunday it had
expelled a U.N. human rights investigator, accusing her of
writing false reports, a move the U.N. mission said broke the
country’s legal obligations to the United Nations.
U.N. sources, who named the officer as Sandra Beidas, said
the expulsion may have been related to an August report accusing
the army of torturing, raping, killing and abducting civilians.
South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in July last year
under a 2005 peace deal that ended a decades-long civil war in
which some 2 million people died. Sporadic conflict has
continued in disputed border areas.
Human rights groups accuse the new nation, which depends
heavily on Western donors, of allowing abuses by its security
forces, mostly composed of poorly-trained former guerrilla and
militia fighters.
Government spokesman Barnaba Marial Benjamin said the
officer had been “writing reports which have no truth in them”.
He did not elaborate.
Hilde Johnson, head of the U.N. mission in South Sudan
(UNMISS), called the expulsion a “breach of the legal
obligations of the government of the Republic of South Sudan
under the charter of the United Nations.”
Rights groups Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch
have accused South Sudan’s army of gross human rights violations
during a disarmament campaign aimed at stopping inter-tribal
warfare in Jonglei.
(Reporting by Hereward Holland; Editing by Alexander Dziadosz
and Robin Pomeroy)
