Eleven children have been killed and one injured in an accident involving unexploded ordnance in South Sudan.
This was announced by the spokeswoman for the UN mission, Linda Tom, in the violence-wracked country on Friday.
The accident occurred on Thursday in a remote village in Western Bahr el-Ghazal state, northwest of the capital Juba, spokeswoman Linda Tom told Radio Miraya, a station owned and operated by UNMISS.
“As many as 11 children died and one is still receiving medical treatment,”
“The scale of this drama is immense, we convey our deepest condolences to the families of the victims”, Tom added.
South Sudan was plunged into a brutal civil war in 2013, two years after achieving independence from Sudan.
The conflict lasted five years and killed nearly 400,000 civilians before the warring leaders Salva Kiir and Riek Machar agreed to lay down their arms.
Landmines and unexploded bombs still cover large areas of the world’s youngest country, posing yet another threat to a population already grappling with armed violence, natural disasters and hunger.
