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)
KHARTOUM Nov 4 (Reuters) - Sudan will not stop supporting Palestinian group
Hamas despite Israeli "aggression," a senior Sudanese official said on
Sunday, less than two weeks after Khartoum accused Israel of bombing an arms
plant in the Sudanese capital.
Israel accuses Sudan of channeling weapons from Iran to Hamas, which
controls the Gaza Strip, via Egypt's Sinai desert. Sudan denies the charge
but often expresses sympathy for Hamas in its conflict with Israel.
A blast at Khartoum's Yarmouk arms factory last month drew new attention to
the accusations after Sudan said an Israeli air strike was behind the
explosion. Israel has not commented on the blast.
On Sunday, Sudan's Second Vice President al-Haj Adam Youssef said the
incident would not stop Sudan supporting Hamas, whose officials have often
visited Khartoum in the past, state radio reported in a text message sent to
mobile phones.
"We declare our support for Hamas ... Israel's aggression has not scared
us," the message quoted him as saying.
A visit by two Iranian warships to a Sudanese port last week highlighted
military ties between the two countries, and prompted speculation the stay
was related to the arms factory blast. Sudan denied this, saying the visit
was "routine."
Israel has declined to admit or deny involvement in a string of explosions
in Sudan that the government has blamed on Israeli air strikes in recent
years.
In May, Khartoum said a blast in Port Sudan that killed one person resembled
an explosion in 2011 it accused Israel of carrying out. Israel did not
comment on those blasts, or on a similar incident in eastern Sudan in 2009.
(Reporting by Alexander Dziadosz and Khalid Abdelaziz; editing by Philippa
Fletcher)
