JUBA, July 6 (Xinhua) -- The UN on Friday called on South Sudan to enhance its legal framework in a bid to speed up justice for survivors of sexual violence during the more than four years of conflict.
Visiting Under-Secretary-General and UN Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict, Pramila Patten, urged the government to strengthen laws in order to address the widespread sexual violence in the world's youngest nation.
Patten who started her five-day visit on Tuesday noted that rape and other forms of sexual violence are clearly consistent and systematic feature of the South Sudan conflict, which have been used as a tactic of war to displace populations, disperse instant fear within particular ethnic groups.
She led a UN delegation to the northern town of Malakal and in Juba where they talked to survivors of rape and other forms of sexual violence living in the internally displaced persons camps (PoCs).
Patten who cited the recent attack in Unity State between April and May disclosed that the conflict has been characterized by the abduction, rapes and gang rapes of women and girls, pregnant women, lactating mothers and children as young as 4 year olds.
She said the South Sudan army (SPLA), South Sudan National Police Services (SSNPS) and the rebel group the Sudan People's Liberation Army-in opposition (SPLA-IO) are listed in the soon-to-be-released report on sexual violence by the UN Mission in South Sudan.
"Both the SPLA and South Sudan police have expressed their commitment to address sexual violence being perpetrated by their forces which is a condition for their delisting," she said.
Patten added that the government should expedite judgment in the ongoing trial of soldiers accused of rape at the Terrain Hotel during the renewed violence of July 2016, in which dozens of foreign and local women were gang raped by SPLA soldiers.
She disclosed that victims and survivors of sexual violence suffer from widespread stigma and still have difficulty in receiving medical services due to remote locations and insecurity, and they fear to report due to lack of trust in authorities.
"Some of these abuses happened five years ago and what is alarming is that in spite of this, up to now they complained about the lack of adequate care, suffered very deep physical and psychosocial trauma from these atrocities that they have endured. But what is encouraging is that all these women said they wanted to see their perpetrators punished," said Patten.
South Sudan descended into a civil war in late 2013, and the conflict has created one of the fastest growing refugee crises in the world.
The UN estimates that about 4 million South Sudanese have been displaced internally and externally.