UN Security Council to witness Sudan peace pledge
By Evelyn Leopold
NAIROBI, Nov 18 (Reuters) – The Sudanese government and its southern rebel opponents have agreed to sign a pledge in the Kenyan capital on Friday to formally end a brutal 21-year-old civil war, with U.N. Security Council ambassadors as witnesses.
The council, leaving its New York home for the first time in 14 years, wants all 15 ambassadors to place their signatures on a memorandum of understanding in which the Sudanese promise to complete their two-year peace negotiations by December 31.
“The fact they are doing it in the presence of the council increases the pressure on them to now implement the agreement,” said Britain’s U.N. Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry.
Sudan faces conflict on many fronts — mainly in the south where rebels have been fighting the government since 1983, when Khartoum tried to impose Islamic law on the entire country, but also in Darfur in the west, where violence that erupted nearly two years ago has led to one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
Sudanese Vice President Ali Osman Mohamed Taha and former rebel leader John Garang, head of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, addressed a public meeting of the council on Thursday but will have junior officials sign the memorandum, saving their signatures for the final accord.
They spoke after U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan urged the council to deliver “the strongest warning” to all forces in Sudan, especially in Darfur.
“When crimes on such a scale are being committed, and a sovereign state appears unable or unwilling to protect its own citizens, a grave responsibility falls on the international community, and specifically on this council,” he said.
The visit to the Kenyan capital was only the fourth time since 1952, the year the United Nations moved into its permanent Manhattan headquarters, that the council has left New York.
John Danforth, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, who initiated the trip, argued that direct talks with northern and southern leaders would send a message that the world is watching and that peace would earn substantial development aid.
“SUBSTANTIAL SUPPORT”
“Clearly there’s an interest on the part of the world to try to help Sudan,” Danforth told reporters. “I am confident that there is going to be very, very substantial support for Sudan, provided there is peace — and I mean throughout the country.”
Taha said long-term plans would require $1.8 billion in aid over three years. Britain, the former colonial power, has pledged some $180 million but diplomats doubted any package would reach $1 billion.
A resolution the Security Council is expected to adopt on Friday asks the European Union, the World Bank and the United Nations to devise a reconstruction program.
It tells Sudan the preliminary accords negotiated in Kenya in June should be part of the final agreement. They include a coalition government, an integrated military and a sharing of oil revenues. The south can vote for secession in six years.
On Darfur, the council negotiated until the last minute, starting in New York, continuing while munching hamburgers in a canteen during a refueling stop at a military base in Spain, and on the U.S. Air Force flight to Nairobi.
The final version warns the Sudanese that the council will monitor the implementation of the peace accord and would take “appropriate” action in case of non-compliance.
Although the council had threatened sanctions against Sudan in previous resolutions, Russia, China, Algeria and Pakistan are wary of imposing them.