The government is trying to convince the African Union Peace and Security Council not to release the report of an enquiry into the current conflict, the foreign minister has said.

A leaked draft of the report says both parties committed human rights violations in the conflict.

It says President Salva Kiir and Dr Riek Machar should be excluded from any transitional government in the future.

The report recommends that South Sudan should be administered by a joint committee led by the AU.

Dr. Barnaba Marial Benjamin says the report will have a negative contribution to the peace process.

“We argue that the Obasanjo report should not be released now because if you release it now, how are you going to implement the accountability?” Dr Marial argued.

“If there are those in rebellion, how are you going to bring them in? It will be negative response because the rebels are in their area. You think that Peter Gatdet is going to come here because he has been called by a court in Juba that you are being brought to court? No! You bring peace first.”

Civil society and human rights groups have been calling for the publication of the report.

The AU’s commission of inquiry on South Sudan, headed by former Nigerian president Olusegun Obasanjo, was expected to brief the body’s peace and security council (PSC) at a meeting in Addis Ababa in January, but the PSC decided to defer the commission’s report indefinitely,

Activists say the report would help bring justice to the victims of crimes and abuses.