Sudan’s rebel chief signals willingness to reach peace deal
NAIROBI, Sep 4, 2003 (dpa) — The leader of Sudan’s main rebel movement signalled his willingness Thursday to reach a deal in crucial upcoming peace talks on ending the country’s long-running civil war.
John Garang, chairman of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), said enough negotiating has been done and people are looking for tangible results from the talks.
“Time has come to end the Sudan conflict,” Garang told a news conference Thursday in the Kenyan capital Nairobi. “We have come prepared to make an agreement.”
Garang is slated to meet the Sudanese vice-president Ali Ahmed Othman Muhammad Taha on Friday in the Kenyan town of Naivasha for the pair’s first-ever face-to-face talks.
The meeting, which Garang described as “crucial”, comes just ahead of the next scheduled round of full-fledged peace negotiations, to begin Wednesday in Naivasha.
“The parties have negotiated enough and the time has come for tough decisions,” said Garang.
He said he has a full mandate from the SPLM’s governing council to reach a deal and is “ready and prepared to take tough decisions to bring a just peace to Sudan.”
Asked about the prospects that a deal will be reached, Garang said “It depends on how much the other side is willing to relinquish. My understanding is there are some things in the vice-president’s bag.”
Sudan’s civil war is Africa’s longest-running conflict, raging since 1983. It ostensibly pits the black African people of the south against the Arab north, but the conflict is equally a battle for resources and power between the southern-based rebels and the Islamic government in Khartoum.
The two sides reached a landmark agreement in July 2002 guaranteeing the southern Sudanese freedom from Islamic law and offering them a future vote on secession from the north.
But talks toward a comprehensive peace deal have made only sporadic progress since then.
Both sides have agreed in principle on how to structure a government of national unity, but the specifics of the power-sharing formula remain at issue.
Another major sticking point is how to divvy up revenue from Sudan’s newfound oil wealth. The oil-producing region is currently under government control but is located in the southern heartland of the SPLM.
An estimated two million people have died in the war, mainly from illnesses and famine brought about by displacement.
Also on Thursday, the government in Khartoum said it had signed a ceasefire deal in Chad with opposition rebels based in the western Sudanese province of Darfur.
The ceasefire takes effect on Saturday and lasts for 45 days, Sudanese state television reported.