Joint Statement from Troika Capitals on South Sudan

In this context, the “Troika” is the three-country group that has long coordinated policy on South Sudan: the United States, the United Kingdom, and Norway. “Troika capitals” simply means the governments in their capitals (Washington, London, and Oslo) issuing a joint position.

Multiple recent statements on South Sudan explicitly define the Troika as these three countries.

The Joint Statement is issued by the governments of the United States, the United Kingdom, and Norway (the Troika), typically through their foreign ministries and the U.S. State Department’s Office of the Spokesperson.

In the 18–19 December 2025 statement on South Sudan, they:

• Recall that the 2018 Revitalized Agreement for the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (R‑ARCSS) was supposed to bring peace but has not been implemented meaningfully.
• Criticize President Kiir’s “transitional government of national unity” for violating power‑sharing principles, failing to implement the agreement, misusing public resources, leaving civil servants unpaid, and underfunding basic services despite significant oil revenues.
• Describe South Sudan as now “the world’s poorest, and its most corrupt,” and warn of a dangerous return to widespread conflict that would also destabilize neighboring states.
• Demand that all parties, especially SPLM‑IG and SPLM‑IO, stop armed attacks, respect the nationwide ceasefire, and re‑engage in leader‑level dialogue.
• Call on the transitional government to end aerial attacks on its own citizens, release political prisoners, pay public sector workers, fund health, education and other essential services, and stop obstructing UN peacekeepers and humanitarian and international organizations.
• Urge South Sudan’s friends and neighbors to send a united message that “enough is enough,” and say South Sudan’s leaders must reverse course and restore trust to attract international support, investment, and respect.

These points appear in full, identical language, on official UK and Norwegian government sites reproducing the statement.

“Exception: forbidden” alongside “this site is currently experiencing technical difficulties” indicates a web server error (similar to an HTTP 403 Forbidden) rather than a classified or deliberately restricted document for the public.

A 403‑type “Forbidden” status means the server understood the request but refused to fulfill it, often because of misconfigured permissions or access rules. Given that the exact text of the statement is fully available on other official government sites, this error almost certainly reflects a technical or configuration problem on state.gov, not a decision to withhold the statement from the public.

Yes. The full official text of the “Joint Statement from Troika Capitals on South Sudan” is available from other governments in the Troika and via UN‑linked platforms:

• Norway’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs: English text under the same title.
• UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO): “Joint Statement from the Troika Capitals on South Sudan,” dated 18 December 2025, with the complete statement.
• ReliefWeb (a UN OCHA service) and Norwegian government mirrors also host Troika statements, including earlier 2024 “Troika Capitals” statements on South Sudan.

These provide the same wording that is currently inaccessible on the U.S. State Department page.

There is no public estimate for when the affected state.gov page will be fixed; the generic “technical difficulties … Exception: forbidden” message does not include a timeline.

However, the same statement text is already preserved and accessible on:

• Norway’s official government site (regjeringen.no),
• The UK government’s site (gov.uk),
• And other official or quasi‑official mirrors (e.g., ReliefWeb).

If an archived copy of the exact state.gov page is needed, users can try the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine by pasting the URL there, but available, up‑to‑date content is already reliably accessible from these alternate official sources.

For the U.S. version of the release, the issuing office is the U.S. Department of State’s Office of the Spokesperson. When a specific contact is not listed on a malfunctioning page, the practical options are:

• Contact the State Department main public communication channels (e.g., the Public Communication Division via the contact details on state.gov) and reference the title and date of the media note.
• Contact the Bureau of African Affairs, which lists this media note in its releases, and request the text or an accessible copy.
• Alternatively, since the identical text is hosted by partners, one can contact: • The UK FCDO Newsdesk (email newsdesk@fcdo.gov.uk, phone +44 20 7008 3100) listed under the UK version of the statement; or • Norway’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs via the contact information at the bottom of the Norwegian MFA’s page hosting the statement.

These bodies are the appropriate official points of contact for obtaining or verifying the statement’s text.