Sudan peace talks to adjourn on Monday – delegates

NAIROBI, Jan 26 (Reuters) – Peace talks between the Sudanese government and southern rebels will adjourn later on Monday to allow Khartoum’s top negotiator to make the Muslim haj pilgrimage, delegates said.

“The talks will be adjourned today,” the Kenyan chief mediator Lazarus Sumbeiywo told Reuters by telephone from the venue of the talks in the Kenyan town of Naivasha.

A senior diplomat at Sudan’s embassy in Kenya, Ahmed Dirdeiry, said the talks would be adjourned later in the morning to allow Sudan’s First Vice President, Ali Osman Mohamed Taha, to go to Saudi Arabia to perform the pilgrimage.

There was no immediate comment from the rebels of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) which has been in talks in Kenya with the Sudanese government for more than a year to try to negotiate an end to Africa’s longest-running civil war.

The SPLA has been fighting the Islamist government in the north for two decades for more autonomy for the largely Christian and animist south.

There was no immediate word on how long the adjournment would be.

All able-bodied Muslims are required to perform the haj, a pilgrimage to the Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina, at least once in their lifetime. It is due to begin in early February and lasts for up to two weeks.

The government and the rebels signed a deal earlier this month on how they will share wealth after the war ends, but they are yet to reach full agreement on power sharing and three contested areas.

Last week, John Danforth, U.S. President George W. Bush’s special envoy to Sudan, said a final deal was in sight.