A/HRC/40/CRP.1 able to reach, and that they had reached an understanding with the Church to carry out grassroots consultations in those places.1516 Although some refugees were reluctant to engage in the consultation process, arguing that the political conditions were not conducive for genuine dialogue, many interacted quite openly with the representatives of the National Dialogue.1517 Despite lingering perceptions that it is acting at the behest of the Government to undermine the Chapter V Transitional Justice obligations, the National Dialogue has continued its work. In June 2018, the grassroots consultations were completed amidst challenges of security concerns and lack of resources, which limited the depth and geographic coverage of the consultations. The National Dialogue organisers are in the process of analysing the views gathered, and it plans to hold three regional conferences, for Equatoria, Greater Upper Nile and Bahr el Ghazal, after which it would convene a national conference in the first half of 2019, apparently prior to the establishment of the R-TGoNU. Although there is still no clarity about how the outcome of the National Dialogue will be integrated into policy making processes, leaders of the National Dialogue also expect that the outcome of the consultations, particularly the recommendations would, at the very least, contribute ideas for addressing some of the challenges that the country faces, including on such constitutional matters as the administrative restructuring of the country. In December 2018, the National Dialogue Committee informed the Commission it had begun engaging constitutional experts1518 to assist in their deliberations and the formulation of their conclusions. Since the signing of the R-ARCSS, the steering committee has also renewed its calls to the opposition groups to participate in the process, stressing the complementarity between the Revitalized Agreement and the National Dialogue. This prompted the SPLA/IO and the South Sudan Opposition Alliance, two of the signatories of the agreement, to indicate their interest in potentially participating in the National Dialogue process, although at the time of writing, they had not yet fully embraced the process. President Kiir has pledged to consider changes in the structuring of the National Dialogue, to make participation more appealing to opposition groups. Despite the difficulties surrounding the National Dialogue, many citizens within the country have engaged with the organisers during the consultations in good faith, expressing their views with a remarkably high degree of candour. When citizens express their views at the invitation of the state, they are putting their trust in the authorities to respond to their concerns. Their views must therefore be accorded due consideration, otherwise there is a risk that such citizens who would have participated in good faith might lose faith in future consultation processes. More efforts should therefore be made to raise awareness about the how those views will be processed and considered for implementation. A recent survey conducted by the South Sudan Civil Society Forum revealed that whilst most South Sudanese recognized the importance of grassroots healing and dialogue process (76 percent), only 45 percent of respondents had heard of the National Dialogue.1519 C. Accountability As already discussed in this report, there has been a consistent pattern of the commission of gross violations of international human rights law and serious violations of international humanitarian law, with devastating consequences for individuals and society. Government and allied forces, both factions of the SPLA/IO, and other armed groups continued to deliberately target civilians including on ethnic grounds, committed abductions, rape and sexual violence, looting and wanton destruction of villages and civilian property. 1520 Whilst the UN estimates that at least 50,000 may have been killed since the outbreak of the 1516 Meeting with National Dialogue representatives, Juba, 6 December 2018. Radio Tamazuj, “National dialogue committee concludes consultations in Arua district, Uganda”, 22 November 2017. 1518 Confidential discussion with Expert from the National Dialogue Steering Committee, Juba, 9 December 2018. 1519 See South Sudan Civil Society Forum, “Revitalizing Peace in South Sudan: Citizen Perception of the Peace Process”, 27 November 2018, p. 29. 1520 See above Emblematic Incidents sections “Unity State, 2018”, “Central Equatoria, 2018”, and “Western Bahr el Ghazal, State 2018” (Section VII). 1517 191