Dar es Salaam, March 11 -- KAMPALA, UGANDA: Uganda has deployed an unknown number of troops to South Sudan in a bid to protect the fragile government of President Salva Kiir as a tense rivalry with his deputy threatens a return to civil war in the east African nation.

Ugandan special forces have been deployed to Juba, the South Sudanese capital, “to support the government of South Sudan” against a possible rebel advance on the city, said Maj. Gen. Felix Kulayigye, a spokesperson for the Ugandan military.

“We sent a force there two days ago,” he said. “We are not there for peacekeeping.”

In deploying Ugandan soldiers to Juba, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni moved as a guarantor of the peace process ...