South Sudan’s First Vice-President Riek Machar has been charged with murder, treason, and crimes against humanity over a March militia attack that killed 250 soldiers and a general.

Seven of his allies, including Petroleum Minister Puot Kang Chol and Army Deputy Chief Lt Gen Gabriel Duop Lam, have also been charged and suspended.

Machar’s spokesperson called the charges a “political witch-hunt,” while tanks block roads to his Juba residence.

The move raises fears of a return to civil war, despite a 2018 peace deal that ended a five-year conflict between Machar’s Nuer forces and President Salva Kiir’s Dinka-aligned troops, which had killed nearly 400,000 people, the BBC has reported.

The White Army militia, linked to Machar’s ethnic group, carried out the attack, and tensions remain high amid sporadic violence and ethnic divisions.