North & South Sudan agree to form joint committee on Abyei
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May 30, 2011 (KHARTOUM) – The ruling National Congress Party (NCP) and
the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) agreed on Monday to
establish a joint committee that will look into ways to defuse the
crisis that erupted this month over the border region of Abyei.
JPEG - 27.2 kb
South Sudan’s Vice President Riek Machar speaks during a news
conference after meeting north Sudan’s Vice President Ali Osman
Mohamed Taha in Khartoum, May 30, 2011, to discuss the disputed Abyei
region (Reuters)
The announcement was made following discussions between the Vice
President of South Sudan government Riek Machar and his Northern
counterpart Ali Osman Taha in Khartoum today.
"We have the full political will to resolve the Abyei problem in a
peaceful manner and we assure to our people that the South will never
return to war with the North because of this crisis because we are
able to overcome and resolve it," Machar told reporters in Khartoum.
However the senior Southern official acknowledged that he failed to
convince Khartoum to pull its forces out of from Abyei.
"During the meeting we have reiterated the [Sudan People Liberation
Movement] SPLM position calling for withdrawal of the Sudanese army
from Abyei. We have reiterated our commitment not to return to war and
demanded that the UN peacekeepers remain in Abyei and the popular
consultation areas in Blue Nile and Nuba Mountains," he added.
"We agreed to form a committee but Khartoum has conveyed to us its
refusal to withdraw the army from the region without reaching a
comprehensive agreement on it," he said.
The Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) overran the oil-producing region over a
week ago forcing Southern units along with residents to flee inside
the South’s borders.
Khartoum justified its takeover of Abyei by saying that it was in
retaliation to an ambush near the region blamed on the Southern
military groups. The SAF convoy that came under attack was escorted by
peacekeepers from the United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS).
Widespread fighting and looting forced around 40,000 people to flee
down muddy roads without their possessions. Entire villages were
emptied and set on fire international organizations say.
The United Nations says at least 15,000 of those displaced are now
living in the open in Turalei, some 130 kilometers (80 miles) south of
Abyei town.
The 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) promised Abyei residents
a referendum over whether to join north or south, but that did not
take place as neither could agree who was qualified to vote.
The South already voted last January in a separate referendum in favor
of secession which will become official next July.
The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) along with Western nations
have condemned the SAF military takeover and called for immediate and
unconditional withdrawal. Furthermore, they urged Khartoum to
reinstate the Abyei administration that was dissolved by president
Omer Hassan Al-Bashir following SAF’s move.
The officials in the North have given conflicting remarks on the
endgame with regards to Abyei with some saying that SAF will remain
until new security arrangements are reached while others insist that
the army is staying until the long-delayed referendum takes place.
Today the Sudanese army declared that it had appointed Brigadier Ezz
Al-Deen Osman to be in charge of Abyei.
"He is not a military governor. But the government has given him the
task of administering the area before the new administration is
appointed," SAF spokesman Al-Sawarmi Khalid Sa’ad told Agence France
Presse (AFP).
Machar said that the South rejects the appointment of the "military
administration" stressing that it was not capable of resolving the
"humanitarian disaster in the area."
"The people who have been displaced from Abyei have no confidence in
the Sudanese army, and they will not return," he said.
Another topic discussed during the two vice presidents’ hour-long
meeting on Monday was the fate of UNMIS peacekeepers in the north.
The Sudanese foreign minister Ali Karti wrote a letter to the United
Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon affirming that his government
wants UNMIS to leave by the end of its term on July 9th.
Machar said that the North rejected the demand of the South for
peacekeeping troops to remain in the north after the separation
becomes official next July. He argued that the UN force was needed
even more post-July in Abyei as well as in the northern border states
of South Kordofan and Blue Nile, both of which have strong links to
the south.
The SAF gave SPLA until early June to withdraw its forces from South
Kordofan and Blue Nile before intervening by force to make that
happen.
The two areas are inside the north’s territory but are home to
thousands of fighters that fought against Khartoum during the last
civil war. They lie near a 1956 internal border drawn shortly before
Sudan became independent.
"We are committed to imposing security and law north of the 1956 line,
and we will not permit the presence of any forces on northern land,"
Esmat Abdel-Rahman Zain al-Abdeen, chairman of the northern joint
chiefs of staff, said last week.
Officials with the southern ruling party, known as the Sudan People’s
Liberation Movement (SPLM), say troops in those areas are northerners,
and so Juba cannot ask them to withdraw.
"Even if we told them, ’Come back,’ they would not accept to go to the
south, because they are foreign there," Machar said.
Popular consultations are planned to decide the two regions’
relationship with Khartoum, but they have yet to take place. Machar
said joint north-south military units should be allowed to operate in
the regions until consultations are held.
Analysts say the northern government could be trying to secure a
strong bargaining position in talks over oil-sharing and other issues
ahead of the split.
"They [the north] are trying to corner the SPLM. They are putting the
SPLM in a very difficult situation in Abyei, Southern Kordofan and
Blue Nile," Fouad Hikmat of the International Crisis Group said.
ETHIOPIAN PEACEKEEPERS
Western officials have revealed to New York Times (NYT) that there are
behind the scenes efforts to bring in Ethiopian peacekeepers into
Abyei to act as buffer between the North and South.
“We need something quick for Abyei, and the Ethiopians are it,” a
Western diplomat said Monday.
Under the proposal, the northern army would withdraw from the Abyei
area in the next few weeks, and in their place would come thousands of
Ethiopian soldiers until a permanent solution could be reached.
Ethiopia is seen as a neutral player in Sudan, trusted by both
northern and southern leaders.
Publicly, northern officials have said that Abyei is part of the north
and therefore they do not want any foreign country deploying troops
there.
“We will not accept this,” said Rabie Abdel-Aati from the NCP. “Maybe
this is something under discussion. There have been many discussions,
but no decision has been made.”
But one Western official who works closely on Sudan issues said
“privately both sides have bought into this.”
Col. Philip Aguer, a spokesman for the SPLA, said, “the government of
southern Sudan is negotiating, and definitely the SPLA will welcome
Ethiopians as part of the U.N. mission in Sudan.”
Western diplomats said that the Ethiopian proposal was the only way to
quickly de-escalate tensions in Abyei, and that Ethiopia was prepared
to dispatch troops in the next few weeks.
The mission may be run under a regional body known as the
Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), which consists of
Ethiopia, Kenya and several other east African nations. Or it could
possibly be connected to a United Nations mission, similar to the
arrangement in Sudan’s Darfur region, where the United Nations and
African Union jointly run a large peacekeeping operation.
Western diplomats emphasized that the details of the Ethiopian
proposal had not been fully worked out and that negotiations were
continuing between northern and southern officials over Abyei and
other disputed areas.
UGANDA CONCERNED ON ABYEI CRISIS
The Ugandan government expressed concern that the situation in Abyei
could escalate into a full blown war between the North and South.
“We have asked for restraint. Abyei should be handled in a diplomatic
manner rather than conflict,” Ugandan International relations minister
Henry Okello Oryem said.
“If we allow the situation in Abyei to turn into a war, it can
escalate into a civil war,” he added.
Oryem suggested that the return to war would have an impact on other
countries in the region.
“There will be re-emergence of refugees fleeing into Uganda, Kenya and
Ethiopia,” Oryem noted.
He disclosed that Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni spoke to South
Sudan president Salva Kiir, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi and
Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki to discuss the fallout from the crisis in
Abyei.
He said Museveni had also talked to the Ethiopian Prime Minister,
Meles Zenawi, and the Kenyan President, Mwai Kibaki, over the matter.
“We are asking the governments of Khartoum and that of Juba to be
patient,” Oryem said.
(ST)
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