A/HRC/40/CRP.1 cantons should be allowed 83 and who was eligible to enter a canton84 as well as a lack of funding.85 Critics assessed that both parties had bad faith agendas regarding cantonment, “viewing [it] as a tool to reach their respective military objectives” with the Government using it to “reunify and strengthen the SPLA” whilst the Opposition saw it as “an instrument to strengthen [its] forces and extend [its] military power base”. 86 The continued disagreement over cantonment led the Chairman of JMEC to express concern in June 2016 that the issue could lead to the collapse of the peace agreement. 87 The role played by cantonment in the breakdown of the 2015 ARCSS must also be considered within the wider security arrangements under which the First Vice President Machar, apparently with great reluctance and under pressure from the Chair of JMEC over security concerns, returned to Juba in April 2016. The SPLA-IO had declined the original IGAD proposal for Juba to be completely de-militarised, and First Vice President Machar returned with a personal protection force 1,750 strong composed of soldiers and police.88 At the insistence of the Government, they came with only light weapons, and established themselves at a base in the Jebel suburb of Juba city. Meanwhile, the SPLA retained 5,000 troops in Juba city, ostensibly to guard key installations, and a further 25,000 troops just outside the city (at a radius of 25 km) from where they could be easily redeployed into town should the need arise.89 There were further allegations that 10,000 to 12,000 SPLA soldiers were hiding in Juba’s residential areas dressed as civilians.90 By being effectively cantoned in the Jebel camp, the SPLA-IO force responsible for ensuring the security of First Vice President Machar was vulnerable to attack being in a fixed and identified, exposed location when fighting broke out in Juba on 8 July 2016. As it was in 2015, the cantonment process for the R-ARCSS will likely be a delicate element of the peace agreement. Cantonment was scheduled to start on 12 September 2018, the date of signing of the R-ARCSS, and to be completed within one month.91 At the time of writing, two months beyond that deadline, the cantonment process is still far from complete with many troops remaining in their field deployment positions. 92 The parties offered numerous operational and technical difficulties by way of explanation for these delays, but the most pressing reason appears to be the late establishment of the JDB, which has the ultimate responsibility for the implementation of the cantonment process and only held its first meeting on 25 November 2018.93 CTSAMVM has been working to verify the disposition of forces, and had by mid-January 2019 verified 109 of the 145 declared SSPDF positions, 83 The Government insisted that it be limited to those forces previously in combat in Juba, Jonglei, Upper Nile and Unity States whilst the SPLA-IO insisted that the provision for “any other forces related to the conflict in other areas that are declared by the warring parties” allowed it to have cantons in Greater Bahr el Ghazal and Greater Equatoria. See Claudia Breitung, “South Sudan’s stalled Peace Process Security arrangements in need of adjustment”, Bonn International Centre for Conversion, Policy Brief 5/2017; Golla, Rajiv, “Reassessing Ethno-Political Calculus in South Sudan’s War”, December 2017; Radio Tamazuj, “S Sudan parties in dispute over cantonment sites in Equatoria and Bahr el Ghazal”, 9 March 2016. 84 The Government insisted that cantonment be limited to those already under arms whilst the SPLA-IO demanded that their field commanders could designate who entered the canton. The Government also sought to deny the right of entry to “other armed groups”, again despite the provision for “any other forces related to the conflict” (ARCSS, Chapter II, Article 2.2), whilst the SPLA-IO pushed for Equatorian groups to be admitted, thereby potentially boosting their ranks/numbers. See International Crisis Group, “South Sudan’s South; conflict in the Equatorias”, ICG Report No. 236/Africa, 25 May 2016 Golla, Rajiv, “Reassessing Ethno-Political Calculus in South Sudan’s War”, December 2017. 85 Claudia Breitung, “South Sudan’s stalled Peace Process Security arrangements in need of adjustment”, Bonn International Centre for Conversion, Policy Brief 5/2017. 86 Claudia Breitung, “South Sudan’s stalled Peace Process Security arrangements in need of adjustment”, Bonn International Centre for Conversion, Policy Brief 5/2017. 87 Sudan Tribune, “S. Sudan president rejects consensus to establish cantonment areas for SPLA-IO”, 25 June 2016; 88 John Young, “Isolation and endurance: Riek Machar and the SPLA-IO 2016-17”, Small Arms Survey, October 2017. 89 John Young, “Isolation and endurance: Riek Machar and the SPLA-IO 2016-17”, Small Arms Survey, October 2017. 90 Human Rights Watch, “South Sudan: Killings, Rapes, Looting in Juba”, 15 August 2016. 91 R-ARCSS, Article 2.2.2. 92 The CTSAMVM Technical Committee Fifth meeting, Khartoum, Sudan, 27-28 November 2018 reported the following: “immediate freezing of forces- ongoing…. Progress has been made but more needs to be done so as to avoid future clashes.” The “immediate disengagement of forces in close proximity- incomplete… there is need for the establishment of the JDB and the JMCC to help solve the problem of the movement of forces.” And regarding the “Ceasefire map (ongoing) of 532 declared positions [cantons] 30 have been verified. Parties were requested to submit updates on size of forces, contact numbers and GPS locations.” The sixth CTSAMVM Technical Committee Meeting in Addis Ababa on 18-19 December 2018 listed 531 declared positions. 93 R-ARCSS, Article 2.4.4; Sudan Tribune, South Sudan Joint Defence Board holds its first meeting, 26 November 2018. 20