South Sudanese leader Salva Kiir accused his sacked vice president and rival Riek Machar on Tuesday of seeking to topple him and declare himself president earlier this month when fighting broke out between their forces, Reuters reported. While swearing in former mining minister Taban Deng Gai as the new vice president, Kiir accused Machar of bringing a "huge force" when he came to the state house for a July 8 meeting that led to four days of battles between the two men's supporters. The two sides fought on the streets of the capital Juba with artillery, tanks and helicopters, killing at least 272 people and forcing an estimated 26,500 people to flee to neighbouring Uganda, according to the United Nations. Tensions and recriminations persisted in Africa's youngest nation after the fighting ended and resulted in Machar's dismissal on Monday. "That huge force was to come and take over the palace and Riek declare himself as the president," Kiir said. "I am alive not because Riek did not kill me but because he couldn't get the chance to kill me." Officials in Machar's SPLM-IO group were not immediately available for comment. There is mounting fear the latest unrest could return South Sudan, a crude oil producer, to fully-fledged war while the country is still reeling from a devastating two-year conflict. That civil war, which erupted in December 2013 after Kiir sacked Machar as vice President for the first time.
