Well drillers, en route to Christian school, killed in South Sudan ambush

Drillers — on their way to dig a water well for a new Christian school in South Sudan — were ambushed and killed, church members say.
Fox News reports:

Five United Nations peacekeepers from India and 7 civilians were shot dead during an attack on a convoy in South Sudan, officials said.
South Sudan military spokesman Col.  Philip Aguer said the attack took place on a convoy traveling between the South Sudanese towns of Pibor and Bor on Tuesday morning. Aguer blamed the attack on militants led by David Yau Yau, a rebel leader that South Sudan says is armed by Sudan.
The top U.N. envoy in South Sudan, Hilde Johnson, said in a statement that five peacekeepers and seven civilians working with the U.N. mission were killed. She said at least nine additional peacekeepers and civilians were injured and some remain unaccounted for.

Five of the people killed were members of a company hired to create a water well for a Christian vocational boarding school in Bor. The school is a work of the Starfish Foundation, a nonprofit organized by Church of Christ members in Wichita Falls, Texas. Dennis Cady and Chuck Dennis are supervising the work. The governor of South Sudan’s Jonglei State requested the school.
The six tribes that comprise Jonglei state have a history of conflict, Cady said in a recent Christian Chronicle news brief.

“The governor is right when he says, if young people from all six tribes are brought to a boarding school where they will live, eat, study and play together,” Cady said. “They will form friendships and influence others towards unity and harmony.”
After receiving the grim news from a contractor in South Sudan, Chuck Dennis wrote the following reply: “Among those who strive for peace and to help others with their physical needs, there is no way to comprehend the actions that take innocent lives.”
“Please keep the friends and family of those who lost loved ones in your prayers,” he added, “and pray that all the efforts to do good will not be deterred.”
Read our 2011 coverage of a Kansas City church’s efforts to bring education to South Sudan’s Jonglei state, and our report on South Sudan’s independence.

• Feedback
  Condolences to the families of those who perished. This should act as an encouragement to keep working. The significance is no even more valuable to the cause of Christ. Not only a nation but a culture is at stake. These are the stories which show the importance of wat we’re about.

  oshane

  April, 16 2013