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In late January government officials, with the assistance of UNMISS, buried 525 bodies in
mass graves in Bor town, mostly from the Dinka ethnicity and mostly civilians. 102 Many
other dead bodies – government officials say hundreds - were buried by residents and
family members in single, usually shallow graves across the town. Bodies collected and
buried by government officials included those known to have been targeted and killed by
Nuer opposition gunmen during both the first and second period of opposition control, and
also people killed during the chaotic period when opposition forces first defected, and
perhaps while the government was control in the last days of December.
Fighting and the threat of fighting in Bor caused mass displacement. The vast majority of
the town’s population left their homes during the first round of fighting in December, either
fleeing to the UN base outside Bor town, or across the River Nile to Awerial County, in
Lakes state, where over 100,000 people, mostly Dinka, remained displaced as of April. 103
Thousands ran to the UN base in Bor on December 17 and numbered 19,000 within days.
Those who fled Bor town and Bor county experienced severe hunger and were in some
cases also the victims of cattle raids reportedly by armed Nuer. An old displaced woman
with a gunshot wound in her leg, interviewed in Awerial, described how a gunman had
climbed a tree and shot at her group from across the water. 104
Opposition forces also killed civilians in villages in the surrounding areas. A local
government official who had traveled across Bor county recording the names of those
killed showed Human Rights Watch notebooks with the names and details of some 2000
people killed in Bor town and in villages in the surrounding Bor county. 105 Government
bans cluster munitions and became binding international law in 2010. The UNMISS’ human right report describes cases of
aerial bombardment by the UPDF. UNMISS, “Conflict in South Sudan: A Human Rights Report”, (2014), p26.
102 Human Rights Watch interview with UNMISS official (name withheld), Bor, April 1, 2014 and with Bor Mayor Nhial Majak
Nhial, Bor, April 2, 2014. Three mass graves were dug in the Block 10 areas of Bor town. One of these was still open when
Human Rights Watch visited the town at the beginning of April. At that time returning residents were still reporting finding
dead bodies (for example seven bodies were placed in the grave on April 3,2014). Three graves were also made in the St
Andrews Episcopal Church compound, one mass grave and two smaller graves.
103 UNOCHA ‘Humanitarian Snapshot’ April 2014
http://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/South_Sudan_Humanitarian_Snapshot_28April2014.pdf (accessed
May 15, 2014).
104 Human Rights Watch interview, name withheld, Awerial, January 2014.
105 Human Rights Watch interview with Molana Michael Mayen, Bor, April 3, 2014. UNMISS believes that the government
estimate of 2,007 is a reasonable calculation for the number of casualties in Bor county.
47 HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH | AUGUST 2014