5 killed in South Sudan blast

Five people including four children were killed in a South Sudanese market on Thursday when explosives left over from decades of civil war were accidentally set off, an AFP reporter said. Three others were wounded when the blast -- believed to have been caused by a grenade -- was triggered as a Ugandan man dug into the soil to build the foundations of his hut near a market on the outskirts of the capital Juba. An AFP reporter who saw the dead bodies said that charred limbs were scattered across the blast site. South Sudan split from Sudan two years ago after a brutal civil war. Juba was a garrison town held by government troops from Khartoum, but southern rebel forces controlled the surrounding countryside. Large areas of the impoverished country are littered with debris of war including unexploded explosives such as artillery as well as landmines. Casualties are reported every year, especially as thousands of refugees return home and begin to build houses or till the land for farming. Source: AFP