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AFRICA/SUDAN - Father Youhanna Al-Amin, parish priest in Kaduna in the Nuba Mountains, murdered

Khartoum – Father Youhanna Al-Amin, parish priest in Kaduna in the Nuba Mountains of Sudan for over thirty years, was killed for remaining with the parishioners entrusted to his pastoral care. According to reports from Aid to the Church in Need, which first published the news, the priest was murdered on June 19, along with the caretaker and another person. Local sources cited by the organization, stated that the triple murder appears to have been an act of revenge against Father Youhanna, who had reported the theft of medicines stored in the parish and intended for the local population. The online newspaper Sudan Now, citing local witnesses, reports that the crime was committed by members of a faction of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North . The newspaper provides further details about the two other victims: the parish warehouse manager, identified only as Yohanna, and the caretaker, identified as John Lama. The triple murder occurred amid months of tension. Since March, internal conflicts between SPLM-N factions have erupted in several areas of the Nuba Mountains. This has led to the displacement of hundreds of civilians and a further deterioration of the humanitarian situation for the local population. The violence stems from years of ongoing land disputes and disagreements over administrative boundaries in the Otoro area. The SPLM-N leadership accuses a segment of the population of rebelling against the authority of the movement, which controls the region. Local community representatives, however, claim the movement is attempting to forcibly expropriate their land. Since Kauda is the main center of the Nuba Mountains, the city has become one of the epicentres of tensions. The SPLM-N was founded in 2011, after South Sudan's independence. Many Nuba fighters from the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army remained in the north of the country and continued fighting against the Sudanese government over the marginalization of non-Arabic-speaking populations, land rights, and the political exclusion of peripheral regions. In 2017, the movement split into two main factions: the SPLM-N, led by Abdelaziz al-Hilu, which is primarily active in the Nuba Mountains, and the SPLM-N, led by Malik Agar, with a stronger presence in the Blue Nile region.

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