Sudan, Darfur armed groups to discuss pre-negotiation agreement in Germany
April 4, 2018 (KHARTOUM) – The Sudanese government and two armed groups from Darfur region are expected to meet in Berlin to negotiate a pre-negotiation agreement, Sudan Tribune has learned Wednesday.
Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) leader Girbil Ibrahim told Sudan Tribune that the German government organises a meeting between his movement, the Sudan Liberation Movement led by Minni Minnawi (SLM-MM) and the Government of Sudan on 16 and 17 April.
“The purpose of the meeting is to reach a pre-negotiation agreement”.
“If an agreement is struck, it would pave the way for talks on a cessation of hostilities and then we would move on to negotiations on political issues,” he stressed.
The armed groups refuse to negotiate a political agreement to end the 15-year conflict in western Sudan region on the basis of the framework agreement of the Doha Document for Peace in Darfur (DDPD).
The parties are expected to strike a deal providing that any political agreement reached in the future would be attached as a supplemental protocol to the framework agreement of July 2011.
This annexe would preserve the DDPD, but at the same time would be considered a new agreement with new parties, mechanisms and timetables.
The meeting would be attended by the head of the joint African Union-United Nations Mission in Darfur (UNAMID), the Troika countries, the European Union and France.
Germany and the African Union High-Level Implementation Panel (AUHIP) signed a deal to facilitated the two-track process for a comprehensive peace agreement in Sudan. Berlin already organised a number of meeting in this respect.
Last February, the Peace and Security Council of the African Union (PSC) urged the African Union High-Level Implementation Panel (AUHIP) to make progress in the resolution of Darfur conflict during the upcoming three months.
The SLM-Abdel Wahid is not part of the meeting. The holdout group rejects negotiations with the government before the return of displaced persons to their areas of origin after providing the needed security and compensations.
(ST)