Juba - Gunmen in South Sudan have raped girls, torched towns and looted aid supplies in one of the heaviest government offensives in the 17-month-long civil war, the UN and diplomats said Tuesday.
Over 300,000 civilians have been left without "life-saving aid" in the northern battleground state of Unity, after the UN and aid agencies pulled out due to a surge in fighting, with over 100,000 forced to flee their homes.
Boys as young as 10 have been abducted as child soldiers, the UN said, while aid groups said their bases had been ransacked.
The United States said it was "deeply disturbed by credible reports of grave human rights abuses against civilians" in the "government offensive against opposition forces."
The UN peacekeeping mission said reports from Guit and Koch counties in Unity included "towns and villages being burned, killings, abductions of males as young as 10 years of age, rape and abduction of girls and women, and the forced displacement of civilians".
Government forces are pushing towards the cut-off opposition zone around the town of Leer, home to some of the country's once lucrative oil fields.
International Committee of the Red Cross chief in South Sudan Franz Rauchenstein said he was "deeply worried" as frontlines moved closer.
The ICRC has withdrawn staff from Leer and warned that escalating fighting between forces loyal to President Salva Kiir and rebel leader Riek Machar was forcing thousands of civilians to flee for their lives yet again.
Some 120,000 displaced people were sheltering in Leer, Rauchenstein told AFP Tuesday, warning that "now they were moving out into the swamps to hide, where they have no access to food or healthcare".
Unity state Governor Joseph Monytuil told reporters late Monday that government troops aimed to take Leer from opposition forces within days.
"Our forces... are now pursuing them to where they came from," Monytuil said.
AFP
