A Slovakian missionary sister who runs a hospital in South Sudan was ambushed and shot while driving in the town of Yei this week.
According to the Slovakian Bishops' Conference press office, Sr Veronika Terézia Racková was shot in the stomach on Monday as she drove to a nearby hospital with a patient. Among other injuries, she suffered multiple fractures of the pelvis, and was taken by helicopter to Kenya for surgery.
“We can confirm that our citizen was shot and wounded in South Sudan," Slovakian Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman, Peter Stano, told the news agency TASR. "Our office in Nairobi is providing necessary consular assistance to the Slovak citizen...Her condition is stable,” he added.
Sr Racková, a member of the Holy Spirit Missionary Sisters (SSpS), is head of St Bakhita’s Medical Centre in Yei, South Sudan. In the past she has served in Italy, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Indonesia, and Ghana, TASR wrote.
The regional leader of the Holy Spirit missionaries in South Sudan said: "We continue to ask for your prayers for God to grant her Jesus’ merciful healing, asking too, for His compassionate love for the people who wounded her. And for us, that we may be open to the Holy Spirit’s grace in accordance to the Father’s will to accept with faith whatever may happen in the coming hours of Sr Veronika’s condition."
The media in South Sudan reported that the authorities have already detained three suspects – soldiers from the ‘Joint Military Unit’, which is deployed in the area to provide security for civilians at night. Yei River State Information Minister, Stephen Lodu Onesimo, condemned the incident as an “undisciplined and barbarian act”, adding that the attackers “must be brought to justice”, TASR reported.
The latest attack underlines the risks nuns face in the conflict-torn country. Recently, an educational centre run by sisters, including some from California, was attacked and the nuns threatened. The gunmen ransacked the centre for money and other items.
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