Chief mediator visits AU president over Darfur peace talks
Dec 31, 2005 (LAGOS) — Chief mediator Salim Ahmed Salim of the African Union-sponsored Sudan’s Darfur peace talks on Saturday visited Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo at his farm in the south of the country, the official News Agency of Nigeria reported.
The peace talks on Darfur have been held in the Nigerian capital Abuja for more than one year, with representatives from the Sudanese government and rebel groups in the Darfur region sitting side by side to secure peace for the troubled region.
Only on Tuesday, Obasanjo met with officials of the Sudanese government, led by a special adviser to President Omar Hassan al-Bashir at his Ota farm on the outskirts of Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital.
Shortly before the Christmas, the Sudanese government and rebel groups in Darfur have adopted a five-point agenda for discussions on the thorny issue of security, marking the beginning of serious talks between the parties.
The agenda includes the general principles, security arrangements for an enhanced humanitarian ceasefire, comprehensive ceasefire and final security arrangements, social reintegration, and time line for implementation, according to a statement issued by the AU.
The Darfur conflict, which pits the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army and the Justice and Equality Movement against the Sudanese government since February 2003, has claimed many lives and driven more than one million others from their homes.
(Xinhua/ST)