JUBA, April 7 (Xinhua) -- South Sudan police said Friday that at least six civilians were killed and 13 others injured on Thursday afternoon in separate gun attacks on commercial vehicles.
Police spokesman Daniel Justine Bolo told Xinhua that gunmen fired randomly at a convoy carrying internally displaced people to the eastern town of Pibor, killing four people on spot and injured 13 others about 10 Kilometers east of the capital, Juba.
The attack happened on the same road where six humanitarian workers were ambushed and killed two weeks ago.
Bolo added that two more passengers were also killed following an attack on two commercial vehicles along the busy Juba-Nimule road, the only remaining major route linking land-locked South Sudan to its Southern neighbor Uganda.
"A commercial car carrying displaced people was ambushed on Thursday at Sirikat and four people lost their lives and 13 others were wounded. We are still investigating and no arrest has been made despite the scene being near to Juba," Bolo said.
Targeted killings along major roads across war-torn South Sudan have increased since renewed fighting erupted in July 2016.
The government said in October 2016 that at least 95 people were killed in road ambushes in two months. More than three years of conflict have taken a devastating toll on the people of South Sudan.
The UN estimates that the conflict has forced 1.5 South Sudanese into neighboring countries and another 7.5 million people across the country are in need of humanitarian assistance and protection and localized famine has been declared in northern parts of the world's youngest nation.
