South Sudan Crisis: Uganda says it has deployed special forces

Uganda’s military chief announced on Tuesday that special forces had been deployed to South Sudan’s capital, Juba.

The move is meant to secure the country as tensions between President Salva Kiir and First Vice President Riek Machar heighten fears of renewed conflict.

Uganda’s military chief, Muhoozi Kainerugaba, confirmed the deployment in a series of posts on the X platform, stating, “As of two days ago, our Special Forces units entered Juba to secure it.”

In another post, he reaffirmed Uganda’s stance, declaring, “We, the UPDF (Ugandan military), only recognize one President of South Sudan, H.E. Salva Kiir… any move against him is a declaration of war against Uganda.”

Tensions have intensified in recent days in the oil-producing nation following the arrest of two ministers and several senior military figures linked to Machar by Kiir’s administration.

One of the detained ministers has since been released.

The arrests in Juba, along with violent clashes near the northern town of Nasir, are putting the 2018 peace agreement at risk.

That deal ended a devastating five-year civil war between Kiir and Machar’s forces, which claimed nearly 400,000 lives.

Uganda has a history of military intervention in South Sudan. It first sent troops to Juba in 2013 to support Kiir against Machar’s forces, withdrawing them in 2015.