A soldier walks past women carrying their belongings near Benitu, Northern Liech State in February 11, 2017. PHOTO: Siegfried Modola/REUTERS

A United Nations investigation team says it is outraged by the latest human rights violations in South Sudan.

The report released yesterday by the UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan documents increased incidents of rape, abductions, sexual slavery and brutal killings within the last 12 months.

Even after signing of the new revitalized peace agreement, there have been reports of fighting, particularly in the Equatoria Region and former Unity state.

The chair of the commission, Yasmin Sooka, says the human rights violations ‘have become a commonplace’ in the country.

“There is a confirmed pattern of how combatants attack villages, plunder homes, take women as sexual slaves and then set homes alight – often with people in them,” Ms Sooka said at the launch of the three-member expert-body’s third report in Nairobi, Kenya.

“There is no doubt that these crimes are persistent because impunity is so entrenched that every kind of norm is broken.”

The Commission, which was set up in 2016 by the UN Human Rights Council, urges the government, the region and the international community to “take urgent steps” to respect the cessation of hostilities, implement the Revitalized Agreement signed five months ago and “push to silence the guns completely.”