Sudan accepts finally to participate in AUHIP consultative meeting
March 7, 2016 (KHARTOUM) – Sudan will take part in a consultative meeting with the armed groups organized by the African Union High level Implementation Panel (AUHIP) to be held within a week, said an African official on Monday.
The meeting is supposed to discuss the way forward on the national dialogue and how to stop the armed conflicts in the Two Areas and Darfur. Besides, the government and the National Umma Party of Sadiq al-Mahdi the meeting will be attended by three armed movements: SPLM-N, Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) and Sudan Liberation Movement – Minni Minnawi (SLM-MM).
The head of African Union’s Liaison Office in Khartoum, Mahmoud Kan, said that the Sudanese government will participate in the meeting with two delegations the first is led by the Presidential Assistant Ibrahim Mahmoud Hamid and the second id chaired by the Head of Darfur Peace Office Amin Hassan Omer.
Kan further said in statements to the semi-official SMC that all the parties agreed to attend the meeting, except JEM leader Gibril Ibrahim as they are still awaiting his response.
It was reported that Ibrahim would like to see more political forces invited to take part in the meeting particularly the newly established Futures Forces of Change.
The AUHIP chair, former President Thabo Mbeki is expected to visit Khartoum to discuss with the Sudanese officials the ongoing preparations for the meeting which will take place on 16-18 March.
A Sudanese official confirmed to Sudan Tribune the government’s participation in the meeting saying that Hamid received the needed clarifications from the mediation on the nature of the Consultative Strategic Meeting.
“The government asked the mechanism to clarify whether the Consultative Strategic Meeting will deal with the national dialogue or peace negotiations in order to know who we will send to negotiate, the dialogue mechanism (7 +7) or a government delegation,” he stressed.
The invitation of the opposition National Umma Party to take part in a meeting to discuss ways to war troubled all the Sudanese parties.
Last month several rebel groups said they are not sure about the nature of the meeting. Al-Mahdi himself also wrote to the mediation on the invitation.
The Strategic Consultative Meeting is conceived by the mediation to replace a national dialogue preparatory meeting the government had rejected.
The purpose of the pre-dialogue meeting was to gather the armed and political holdout groups and the government to discuss confidence building measures paving the way for their participation in the internal political process.
The pre-dialogue meeting was supposed to intervene after the signing of a cessation of hostilities agreement within the framework of declaration of principles for a peaceful settlement.
(ST)