UN Security Council demands Sudan withdraw from disputed region Reuters United Nations, 17/05/12 - The U.N. Security Council demanded on Thursday that Sudan immediately and unconditionally withdraw troops from the disputed Abyei border region but Khartoum pledged only to do so after a joint military observer body was created for the area. The 15-member council renewed a U.N. peacekeeping mission in Abyei, a region containing fertile grazing land that is claimed by both Sudan and South Sudan, and expressed deep concern at delays in establishing an Abyei Area Administration. South Sudan withdrew its 700-strong police force from Abyei last week but Sudan's deputy U.N. envoy, Idris Ismail Faragalla Hassan, on Thursday criticized the move as the wrong approach. “The withdrawal should take place simultaneously and it should be monitored by a body agreed upon by the two parties,” Hassan told reporters. “What happened is that the government of South Sudan took a piecemeal approach, not the comprehensive approach that the government of Sudan is calling for.” Hassan said former South African President Thabo Mbeki, head of a high-level AU panel given the job of resolving the north and south disputes, was in Khartoum on Thursday to meet with Sudanese officials and that positive results could be expected. In the resolution to renew the mandate of the peacekeeping force in Abyei, the Security Council welcomed the withdrawal of South Sudan's police from the area and demanded “the government of Sudan redeploy all remaining military and police personnel from the Abyei area immediately and without preconditions.” The council also demanded Sudan and South Sudan “urgently finalize the establishment of the Abyei Area Administration” and described the situation in Abyei as a “serious threat to international peace and security.” "My government regrets the progress on the implementation of certain elements of ... an agreement on Abyei area remains impeded and it is fully prepared to move forward with the establishment of an Abyei Area Administration,'' South Sudan's U.N. ambassador, Francis Nazario, told reporters. The United Nations said in March that Sudan had 400 to 500 troops in Abyei and South Sudan had about 300 soldiers based less than 2 miles south of its border with Abyei.
-- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "South Sudan Info - The Kob" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/SouthSudanKob?hl=en.
