FVP, Dr Riek Machar addressing a workshop for the state's ministers of parliamentary affairs in Juba on Tuesday -Nov. 16, 2021. Credit | Lou Nelson/Eye Radio

The First Vice President, Dr. Riek Machar has ordered his forces in the Upper Nile region to disengage and cease hostilities with the breakaway Kit-Gwang forces.

On Sunday, the chairman of the SPLM/A-IO of the Kit-Gwang faction, General Simon Gatwech Dual and his deputy Gen. Johnson Olony signed two separate agreements with President Kiir’s party in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum.

The agreement stressed on the status of forces and maintaining the 2018 permanent cease fire agreement.

One of the articles, provides for the establishment of coordination offices in Jonglei state’s capital Bor and Upper Nile’s capital Malakal to enable for the reintegration of the forces into the SSPDF.

In a statement issued on Wednesday, the Khartoum agreement, Machar describes as defection of the Kit-Gwang to the SSPDF forces.

This, he says entails respect of the existing ceasefire agreement between the SPLA-IO and the SSPDF as per the Khartoum declaration of agreement of June 27th.

In August 2021, the kit-gwang group announced Dr. Riek Machar’s ouster – claiming he no longer represented the interests of the group.

Machar then rejected the ouster and called on his supporters to respect the terms of the 2018 revitalized agreement.

Since then reports of deadly fighting between the breakaway faction forces and those loyal to Dr. Machar in Magenis area in Upper Nile State where the group is based, continued being recounted.