JUBA ¨C Oil-rich South Sudan¡¯s former rebel leader and its president will form a unity government by Saturday¡¯s deadline, they announced on Thursday, quashing fears the deadline would be pushed back again.
South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011 but plunged into a civil war in 2013 when President Salva Kiir sacked his then-deputy Riek Machar, who went on to lead the main rebel faction.
The conflict claimed an estimated 400,000 lives, triggered a famine and created Africa¡¯s biggest refugee crisis since the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
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