Welcoming Strengthened Protection Mandate in South Sudan, Secretary-General

Reiterates Call for Additional Uniformed Personnel

 

The following statement was issued today by the Spokesman for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon:

The Secretary-General welcomes the adoption by the Security Council today of resolution 2155 (2014) on South Sudan, which reprioritizes the mandate of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) towards the protection of civilians, human rights monitoring and support for the delivery of humanitarian assistance, and increases the Mission’s troop strength to 12,500 as requested in his last report on South Sudan.

The Secretary-General welcomes the deployment within UNMISS of an Intergovernmental Authority on Development task force to support protection of civilians and the Monitoring and Verification Mechanism established pursuant to the 23 January 2014 Cessation of Hostilities Agreement.

The Secretary-General underlines the importance of this new mandate to peace and security in South Sudan and reiterates that every effort be made by potential contributors to deploy all troops, police and enablers to the Mission, as soon as possible.

The Secretary-General reminds the parties of their primary responsibility to protect civilians from violence and end impunity.  He urges the parties to implement the Agreements signed by both parties on 23 January 2014, and as recommitted to on 9 May 2014, without further delay, show the political will necessary to advance the political process and provide their full cooperation to UNMISS as it carries out its mandate.

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For information media • not an official record