Armed youth walk through Lekuangole, a village in South Sudan’s Pibor region. Photo: AFP

Nearly 100 people were killed in tribal clashes involving armed youth from Eastern Equatoria State and Pibor Administrative Area in July alone, the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said.

According to its latest humanitarian report released on Tuesday, 80 people were killed in Kapoeta North and 15 in Gumuruk Counties respectively.

The violence was allegedly triggered by cattle raiding and ethnic hostilities between the neighboring areas.

But local officials in Kapoeta North County claimed the death toll of the vicious violence, has risen to 235 people.

The commissioner Emmanuel Epone Lomilo said at least 235 were confirmed dead, a figure Eye Radio could not independently verify.

Dozens of wounded raiders were allegedly captured, and nursed at Torit Referal Hospital, before being released by the State Governor Louis Lobong Lojore this month.

Lobong’s aid, Alliandro Lotok said the governor pardoned and freed 71 raiders captured during the deadly Kapoeta North attack, on humanitarian ground.

Meanwhile, the UN agency OCHA said more than 17,500 people were also displaced in Eastern Equatoria, as well as some 1,700 people in the Greater Pibor Administrative area, due to the violence.

It stated that in July, food insecurity, inter-communal violence, conflict and disease outbreaks persisted and that the situation continued to worsen.

In a separate statement, the agency said ‘worrying’ food insecurity situation in Longochuck County, Upper Nile State, forced some 5,000 people to move to neighboring Maiwut County in July.

It added that torrential rain and floods affected nearly 2,400 people in the IDP site, Twic County in Warrap.