Written by Staff Writer, CNN
China’s Foreign Ministry has condemned a UN panel’s decision to appoint an expert to investigate an artillery strike that killed 10 Chinese nationals in South Sudan.
“The South Sudanese authorities must thoroughly investigate the incident and take concrete and effective measures to prevent this from happening again,” China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement Saturday.
“The international community must not politicize this issue,” it said.
Two shells slammed into Juba’s Castle 3 military base on January 24, leaving 10 Chinese workers dead and six wounded, according to the South Sudan government.
After the attack, the government announced that a joint investigation with the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) was being carried out in a bid to identify who fired the two projectiles.
That announcement came in response to a request by China, the second-largest contributor to UNMISS behind the United States, according to the UN website.
The spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry said Saturday that the deadly incident should “not be politicized.”
The statement did not clarify any possible punishment for the perpetrators.