LONDON (Reuters) -Britain on Thursday advised its citizens in South Sudan to leave the country following rising tensions that have brought the East African nation to the brink of renewed civil war.
“If you are in South Sudan and judge it safe to do so, you should leave now,” Britain’s foreign office said in new travel advice.
Britain continues to advise against all travel to the country due to the risk of armed conflict, it added.
Western countries including the U.S., Britain and Germany have closed their embassies or reduced operations in South Sudan amid growing tensions in recent weeks between South Sudan’s First Vice-President Riek Machar and his rival, President Salva Kiir.
Machar’s party said earlier on Thursday that his detention under house arrest had effectively collapsed the peace deal that ended the 2013-2018 civil war that left hundreds of thousands of people dead.
“South Sudan’s leaders must make efforts to de-escalate,” British foreign minister David Lammy said in a post on X, echoing calls for restraint from other Western countries and the United Nations.
“A descent into violence and conflict is in no-one’s interests.”
(Reporting by Sachin Ravikumar; Editing by Leslie Adler and Sandra Maler)
