Uganda deploys special forces to South Sudan to protect the government as fears of civil war grow

Ugandan special forces deployed to South Sudan to support President Kiir amid rising tensions and political instability.

Uganda has deployed an unknown number of troops to South Sudan in a bid to protect the fragile government of President Salva Kiir as a tense rivalry with his deputy threatens a return to civil war in the east African nation.

Ugandan special forces have been deployed to Juba, the South Sudanese capital, “to support the government of South Sudan" against a possible rebel advance on the city, said Maj. Gen. Felix Kulayigye, a spokesperson for the Ugandan military.

“We sent a force there two days ago,” he said. “We are not there for peacekeeping."

In deploying Ugandan soldiers to Juba, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni moved as a guarantor of the peace process that keeps Kiir and Machar together in a delicate government of national unity, Kulayigye told The Associated Press Tuesday.

Kiir and Museveni are allies, and Museveni has in the past intervened in the South Sudan conflict to keep Kiir in power.

The deployment of Ugandan troops to South Sudan underscores rising tensions in the oil-producing country that has been plagued by political instability and violence since it gained independence from Sudan in 2011.

The U.S. on Sunday ordered nonemergency government personnel to leave Juba. The U.N. is warning of “an alarming regression that could erase years of hard-won progress” in South Sudan.