JUBA, South Sudan
South Sudan's President Salva Kiir has dissolved parliament, a long-awaited step to pave the way for the appointment of lawmakers from formerly warring parties in the country.
The move was in line with a peace deal signed
to end a civil war that began in 2013.
The president dissolved parliament on
Saturday and the new body will be formed in "a matter of time, not too
long", his spokesman Ateny Wek Ateny told reporters.
According to the deal that ended the civil
war, parliament must be expanded from 400 members to 550 and must include
members from all parties to the peace accord.
South Sudan won independence from Sudan in
2011 after decades of civil war. Violence erupted in late 2013 after Kiir, from
the Dinka ethnic group, sacked vice president Riek Machar, a Nuer.
The two men have signed many deals to end a
war estimated to have killed more than 400,000 people. They repeatedly pushed
back deadlines to form a government of national unity, but in 2020 finally did
so.
Despite the peace deal, violence is still
raging in parts of the country, according to United Nations reports.
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