|
 At a news conference to present the report, they called on
the international community to cut off the leaders' financial
flows through tougher sanctions.
The report follows a two-year undercover investigation by The
Sentry, a group co-founded by Clooney and fellow activist John
Prendergast to look into the financing of African conflicts and
comes at a time when the United Nations is threatening to impose
an arms embargo against South Sudan's government.
The group said a network of international facilitators stretched
from arms dealers in Ukraine to construction companies in
Turkey, mining firms in Kenya, and Chinese investors involved in
joint ventures in gambling and private security sectors in South
Sudan.
According to the report, South Sudan's leader President Salva
Kiir, his former deputy Riek Machar and military generals have
pilfered state coffers, accumulated an array of luxury homes and
cars, and enriched themselves and family members through stakes
in oil and other business ventures.
Spokesmen for Kiir and Machar both denied the leaders had
properties in Kenya or other African countries, as the report
alleged.
The report also said South Sudanese army chief Paul Malong, who
makes roughly $45,000 a year, has at least two luxurious villas
in Uganda in addition to a $2 million mansion in a gated
community in Nairobi.
The report said family members of top government officials have
stakes in commercial ventures in South Sudan. Local laws forbid
constitutional office holders from engaging in business
activities outside the government while in office, it said.
The report said Kiir's family had been involved in a series of
transitions involving government procurement deals and
relationships with a foreign oil company. The group said it had
obtained documents showing that Kiir's 12-year-old son held a 25
percent stake in a holding company formed in February 2016.
"The past five years South Sudan's leaders have engaged in ...
mass atrocities on its citizens, starvation and rape, all while
plundering the state's resources and enriching themselves and
their families," Clooney told the conference.
"The simple fact is they are stealing the money to fund their
militias who attack and kill one another. It involves arms
dealers, international lawyers, international banks,
international real estate," he added.
Ateny Wek Ateny, a spokesman for Kiir, told Reuters by phone on
Saturday before the release of the report, which was embargoed
for release on Monday, that Kiir did not own properties in
Nairobi.
"The president doesn't have any property in Nairobi or
anywhere," Ateny said. "If there is anyone who says that, he is
only accusing the president for no reason. The president does
not even have a bank account, so how do these people arrive at
all these?"
[to top of second column] |
James Gatdet Dak, spokesman for Machar, also denied that Machar
owned property in Nairobi or Addis Ababa.
"It is a lie. Dr. Riek Machar's family does not own a house in
Nairobi or in Addis Ababa as alleged," he said, "They are renting a
house in Nairobi, while the one in Addis Ababa was a temporary guest
house provided to him by the Ethiopian authorities during the peace
negotiations."
LOBBYING FOR ACTION
Clooney said the group planned to lobby U.S. President Barack Obama
and other senior administration officials to impose sanctions
targeted at South Sudan's leaders and to freeze their assets abroad.
The United States has poured $1.5 billion of aid into South Sudan
despite widespread concerns over corruption.
Prendergast, a former director of African affairs at the White House
National Security Council, said the "fatal flaw" of the
international community was it did not pay enough attention to the
"core rot" at the foundation of the new government.
South Sudan secured its independence in 2011 but by December 2013
longtime political rivalry between Kiir, an ethnic Dinka, and Machar,
a Nuer, had led to civil conflict that often followed ethnic lines.
The fighting has killed thousands of people and driven more than 2
million people from their homes, with many fleeing to neighboring
states.
World powers and regional states have struggled to find leverage
over South Sudan's warring factions despite U.S. and European
sanctions on some military leaders and African threats of punitive
actions.
The U.N. Security Council set up a targeted sanctions regime for
South Sudan in March 2015, then in July blacklisted six generals,
three from each side, by subjecting them to an asset freeze and
travel ban.
(Reporting by Lesley Wroughton in Washington; Additional reporting
by Denis Dumo in Juba and George Obulutsa in Nairobi; Editing by
James Dalgleish)
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