{"id":29518,"date":"2016-10-18T02:39:25","date_gmt":"2016-10-18T02:39:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/south-sudan-conflict-exiled-machar-vows-to-return\/"},"modified":"2016-10-18T02:39:21","modified_gmt":"2016-10-18T02:39:21","slug":"south-sudan-conflict-exiled-machar-vows-to-return","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/south-sudan-conflict-exiled-machar-vows-to-return\/","title":{"rendered":"South Sudan conflict: Exiled Machar vows to return home"},"content":{"rendered":"

{South Sudan’s sacked Vice-President Riek Machar – who fled the country in August – has vowed to return, saying his credibility is intact.}<\/p>\n

Speaking from South Africa, Mr Machar told the BBC that his rebel faction could still negotiate a peace deal with President Salva Kiir.<\/p>\n

His statement comes despite last week’s heavy fighting in the city of Malakal.
\nMr Machar, who first fled to the Democratic Republic of Congo, is now being treated in Johannesburg.<\/p>\n

In July, Mr Machar’s bodyguards and President Salva Kiir’s presidential guards fought each other, sparking days of violence.<\/p>\n

Hundreds of people died and more than 100,000 fled across the border.<\/p>\n

The fighting erupted less than a year after a peace deal was signed to form a unity government and end the civil war.<\/p>\n

{{Riek Machar profiled}}<\/p>\n

‘No warmonger’<\/p>\n

Speaking to the BBC’s HARDtalk programme, Mr Machar said: “I’m going to return to South Sudan.”<\/p>\n

“Because President Salva Kiir doesn’t want democratic and transparent and fair elections to be conducted, he attacked us, he has restarted the war.<\/p>\n

“But I am hoping that wise leaders in the region, and in Africa, and the rest of the world will throw up a political process which will bring about peace again, and the resuscitation of the peace agreement, and the reconstitution of the transitional government of national unity.”<\/p>\n

Mr Machar also denied that claims that he was a warmonger, saying that his troops were simply defending themselves against government attacks.<\/p>\n

President Kiir’s officials accuse Mr Machar’s forces of starting the attacks.<\/p>\n

Both sides in the bitter conflict have been accused of perpetrating atrocities, the BBC’s Karen Allen in South Africa reports.<\/p>\n

\"Riek<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{South Sudan’s sacked Vice-President Riek Machar – who fled the country in August – has vowed to return, saying his credibility is intact.} Speaking from South Africa, Mr Machar told the BBC that his rebel faction could still negotiate a peace deal with President Salva Kiir. His statement comes despite last week’s heavy fighting in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[100],"byline":[249],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-29518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics-48","tag-africa","byline-bbc"],"bylines":[{"id":249,"name":"BBC","slug":"bbc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":104}],"contributors":[{"id":249,"name":"BBC","slug":"bbc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":104}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29518"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29518\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29518"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=29518"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=29518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}