Sudan’s vice president, main rebel chief to address Security Council

NAIROBI, Nov 16 (AFP) — Sudan’s Vice President Ali Osman Taha and the country’s main southern rebel leader John Garang will address this week’s UN Security Council meeting in Nairobi, officials said on Tuesday.

Sudanese Vice president Ali Osman Mohamed Taha (L), SPLM leader John Garang show the signed agreement on Wealth Sharing in Nivasha with general Lazaro in the middle, January 7, 2004. (AFP).

“The two leaders have been invited to address the Security Council on Thursday,” the Kenyan mediator of marathon Sudanese peace talks, Lazaro Sembeiywo, told AFP by phone in Nairobi.

High level discussions between Taha and Garang, who heads the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), broke up for the Islamic holy month of Ramadan on October 16, and junior delegates are due to resume talks on November 26.

Professor Nicholas Hayson, the chief advisor to the mediators, confirmed that the two leaders would address the council and explained that the decision to hold Security Council meeting in Nairobi would expedite the peace talks towards a final deal.

“We hope that this UN Security Council’s attention on Sudan (peace talks) will encourage a sense of urgency among the negotiators,” Hayson told AFP by phone.

Since Garang and Taha, who will rejoin the talks on December 11, first began meeting in Kenya more than two years ago, half a dozen protocols, covering issues such as power and wealth sharing, have been signed.

The remaining part of the talks is aimed at consolidating these deals into a permanent accord, ironing out the details of a comprehensive ceasefire, and reaching agreement on security arrangements — essentially the positioning of various forces in the wake of a settlement.

SPLM/A’s spokesman Samson Kwaje told AFP that Garang will reiterate his side’s commitment to ending the conflict that flared up in 1983, when the largely Christian and animist south took up arms against Khartoum.

“Garang will address the council and reiterate our commitment to reaching a peace deal,” Kwaje said.

Together with diseases and a famine, the conflict has claimed at least 1.5 million lives and displaced four million others.

Despite a truce that was signed in October 2002, Khartoum-backed militia and SPLM/A fighters clashed in April and May in Upper Nile state in southern Sudan, claiming several lives and displacing at least 50,000 people, according to aid groups.

The ambassadors from the 15-nation Council, along with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, are expected to adopt a resolution in Nairobi that urges both sides in the war to clinch a final deal.