South Sudans justice minister has claimed that evidence shows an armed group fighting state soldiers operated under Riek Machars command

South Sudan's first vice president, Riek Machar, has been charged with murder, treason, and crimes against humanity over his alleged role in ethnic militia attacks on national forces earlier this year.

The East African nation's justice minister announced the charges on Thursday, moments before South Sudanese President Salva Kiir signed a decree suspending Machar from office. Petroleum Minister Puot Kang Chol, who was charged alongside Machar, was also suspended.

Kiir and Machar govern South Sudan under a power-sharing agreement, but tensions have escalated since several state soldiers were killed when a UN helicopter came under attack in the volatile Upper Nile state, where clashes erupted in March. The South Sudan People's Defense Forces are battling the White Army militia, composed largely of Nuer fighters, the vice president's ethnic group.

Machar has since been placed under house arrest, accused of escalating the conflict. Speaking to reporters, Justice Minister Joseph Geng claimed "evidence further reveals that the White Army operated under the command and influence" of Machar and "certain leaders" of his Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army-in Opposition (SPLM/A-IO) party.

The UN and several governments have repeatedly called for the vice president's release, warning that his continued detention could push the country back into civil war. Western nations, including the US and the UK, haveadvisedtheir citizens to leave South Sudan as violence escalates. Russia hasurgedthe warring parties to "demonstrate political wisdom" and prevent further escalation by recommitting to a 2018 peace agreement.

The landlocked country gained independence from war-torn Sudan in 2011, and has remained unstable since the end of a five-year civil war that erupted in 2013 over a feud between Kiir and Machar.

In March, Machar's opposition SPLM-IO warned that his arrest effectively nullifies the 2018 peace agreement that ended the civil war.

In astatementon Thursday, Reath Muoch Tang, deputy chairperson of the party's Foreign Relations Committee, said the latest actions against the opposition leader and seven other officials of the group are a "deliberate attempt to abrogate" the deal, "sideline Machar and the SPLM-IO, and consolidate total authoritarian control and one-tribe rule in the country."

(RT.com)