‘Shadows of silence’: The untold stories of S. Sudanese war victims’ quest for justice

By Matik Kueth

In South Sudan, the echoes of civil war still linger, not only in memory but in ashes, silence, and the shattered lives of survivors.

More than a decade after violence erupted in December 2013, the country remains shackled by the weight of unhealed wounds that still crush families.

Despite multiple peace agreements, international pledges, and formal investigations, the grim reality endures; perpetrators of mass atrocities continue to walk free, protected by power and political privilege.

According to United Nations data, more than 400,000 people have died since 2013 due to direct violence, famine, and displacement, many of them civilians, deliberately targeted in ethnically motivated attacks.

Yet, accountability mechanisms remain stalled, and survivors continue to wait for justice that seems increasingly out of reach.

For survivors, justice is no longer just a legal pursuit, it is the only path to sanity, healing, and hope.

In an interview with King Media on Thursday, Gatkuoth Kuany, 63, a father of 15 children and four wives, is among the victims still seeking justice after the horrific loss of his entire family in 2014.

His home in Malakal town, Upper Nile State, was set ablaze by the government soldiers, where his 15 children and four wives perished in a fire in March 2014.

This happened during a period of fierce local clashes, as the white army from Fangak County advanced toward Malakal, forcing civilians to flee.

“It’s a situation that makes me run mad whenever I think about it because what happened has never happened when we were fighting the Arabs. When the government troops clashed with the white army in the outskirt of Malakal town but after they heard that, The government troops there started targeting my family because they are Nuer and burnt them in the house,” Gatkuoth explains.

Gatkuoth’s grief is raw, a father reduced to ashes, left with nothing but questions and unanswered cries.

He lamented that though the incident happened while he was at the market that day, there was nothing he could do to save them.

“I was actually at the market that day when the incident happened. One of my wives called me, and there was a loud noise in the background. I rushed home to find out what was going on, only to be shocked to see my own house burning. But there was nothing I could do at that moment. Even if I wanted to hold the soldiers accountable, I couldn’t win the case, because they are soldiers, and no one would listen. We’re just left to see how the situation in the country unfolds,” he stressed.

For a victim like Bol Madut, 37, the trauma of loss is compounded by the absence of justice.

Now living in Bor, Madut narrowly escaped death during a night raid in Gudele suburb in December 2013, where his two brothers were killed.

“Well, the impact it has added on me is that I feel the sense of loss when I lose both of my brothers. This happened when we were attacked at home in 2013, December. That was the beginning of the crisis,” Madut stated, bemoaning that he doesn’t see anyone he can complain to.
He added, “So, we who were in the position to run, we ran, and we made it to the universe compounds. But those brothers of mine, I just mentioned the number right now, couldn’t make it to the UN compounds. They were found home, and they were killed.”

Madut stated that only a hybrid court with international justices can provide justice, but not in the current situation.

“We need the international community to intervene and help the government of South Sudan to cope up with the protection of its civilians. Previously during the liberation times, that was back then when the constitution was not established, it was just a kind of freedom given to these generals. So, we need to abide by the law and give full authority to the law so that no one is controlled by the law while the others are free from law. So, law is above all, not even the president is above the law,” he urged.

Another victim, Ayom Lueth, 26, said the war in 2013 shattered his life when his parents were burned alive in a grass-thatched hut in Pigi County, Jonglei State.

He said the attack that night, was a terrible night for him and had to flee to Malakal town of Upper Nile State same night.

“The conflict in 2013 has really affected me a lot. And whenever I think about the incident sometimes I go crazy. My father, mother, and my three siblings all were burnt in hut in Pigi county in January 2014,” he explains.

Lueth, who now lives in Juba noted that sometimes he feels like to die, noting that he was able to hold and put high hope on God.

Of course there’s nothing I can do, he said, decrying the fact that the perpetrators are still in power.

“I have been living with trauma all these years. The very people who killed people in 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016 are the ones in power. So, even if I try to look for justice, I can just waste my time because no one would listen to me,” he said.

However, attempts to reach Chief Justice Dr. Benjamin Baak Deng for comment were futile, as he declined to grant an interview when contacted by King Media.

Mary Perez, a UNMISS civilian protections advisor, noted that human rights violations in South Sudan has raged with civilians suffering greatly.

She emphasized that there is clear proof that war crimes or crimes against civilians have occurred, stressing the urgent need for ICC to take immediate action.

“There’s clear evidence of war crimes and crimes against humanity. But without a functioning court or a referral to the ICC, perpetrators enjoy impunity,” she emphasized.

Meanwhile, Ter Manyang, a South Sudanese human rights activist and Director of the Center for Peace and Advocacy (CPA), said accountability is essential and urged the African Union (AU) and the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to take swift action, to ensure justice for victims of war crimes and atrocities committed during the country’s civil conflict.

“I call upon the African Union, the United Nations Security Council, to urgently move toward in dropping the legal framework established by the hybrid court for South Sudan. Without accountability, reconciliation is incomplete, and the victims cannot truly heal. Enquiring justice is not only about addressing the past, but also preventing the future atrocities in the country,” he said.

According to him, South Sudan is experiencing a “shrinking civic experience,” where journalists, civil society actors, and victims are systematically silenced.

Amid these oppressive conditions, Manyang warned that the voices of victims, particularly women, refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs), and other marginalized communities, are being silenced, ignored, or entirely denied.

The Hybrid Court for South Sudan, outlined in Chapter Five of the 2015 Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict and reaffirmed in the 2018 Revitalized Peace Agreement, remains unimplemented.

The African Union and Government of South Sudan were tasked with establishing it, but a decade later, nothing has materialized.

Reports by the African Union’s Commission of Inquiry on South Sudan and investigations by the International Criminal Court (ICC) have also detailed brutal atrocities, but efforts to hold those responsible have faltered in the face of political resistance and regional silence.

Also, reports from Amnesty International and the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) affirm that without the Hybrid Court, there’s no viable path to justice.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) remains a last-resort option, but without either government consent or a UN Security Council referral, its hands are tied.

The African Union’s Commission of Inquiry on South Sudan, led by former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo in 2014, documented chilling atrocities, mass rapes, ethnic killings, forced displacement, but enforcement mechanisms were never activated.

Manyang slammed political elites and social justice leaders for deliberately stalling the process in order to maintain their positions of power and shield themselves from accountability.

“The reality is that some of the regional political elite and the social justice leaders reduce effort to establish the justice mechanism. They prefer to maintain the state-acquired and benefit from the infinity, while international actors have shown interest in their inconsistency to pressure. A lack of the concrete action allows the culture of the infinity to persist in the country, and this one is not acceptable,” he stressed.

With the UN estimating more than 400,000 people killed, the call for justice is louder, but the path remains littered with political obstacles and broken promises. For victims like Kuany, Ayom, and Madut, time is not healing, it is simply fading hope.

“This story is reported with a grant from Journalists for Human Rights under the ‘Tackling Mis/Disinformation Project,’ funded by the Peace and Stabilization Program of the Government of Canada.”