S Sudan oil tanker blast 'kills 170'

At least 170 people have been killed after an oil tanker exploded in South Sudan, a presidential spokesman said.

The tanker had veered off the road in Maridi, Western Equatoria state, and local residents were siphoning off the fuel when the vehicle exploded, Ateny Wek Ateny said.

At least 50 people are reported to have been injured.

Local hospitals have been overwhelmed, and state officials have appealed to the Red Cross and the UN for help.

The tanker was travelling from the capital Juba to Maridi, some 250km (155 miles) away, when it came off the road.

Residents of nearby communities did what many people do after similar crashes in Africa, they rushed to scoop up the leaking fuel before it seeped away.

The state's minister for information Charles Kisagna told the Reuters news agency he feared for the injured.

"We don't have medical equipment and these people may not survive because we do not have the facilities to treat the highly burnt people," he said.

South Sudan became an independent country in 2011, after a peace deal with Sudan that ended Africa's longest-running civil war.

But the country is one of the poorest in Africa, and more than 2.2 million people have been forced to flee their homes because of a conflict between government troops and rebel factions.

A tentative internationally-mediated peace agreement was signed in August but the ceasefire has already been violated.