
South Sudan's Council of Ministers has declared Jonglei state a "humanitarian disaster area" and called on international aid agencies to provide urgently needed humanitarian assistance.
The declaration came Wednesday during a council meeting led by President Salva Kiir Mayardit, according to a posting Thursday on the government's website.
Government spokesman Barnaba Marial Benjamin said the council asked that international relief agencies, including the United Nations, provide aid to the Lou Nuer and the Murle ethnic groups and to people in other affected areas in the state.
Marial said the council had resolved to deploy more forces to guarantee security. He further reported that the council had resolved to establish a high-level committee to effect reconciliation between the Lou Nuer and Murle.
The council of ministers directed the two ethnic groups to return women and children from both sides who have been abducted and to reunite them with their communities, Marial said. The council said the national forces were in full control of Pibor, in Jonglei.
The United Nations sent a battalion of peacekeepers to Pibor last week amid reports that members of the Lou Nuer tribe were marching toward the town, which is home to the Murle tribe, after attacking the village of Lukangol.
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