Eastern Sudan rebels say peace talks delayed anew
Jan 25, 2006, (ASMARA) — The thrice-delayed first-ever round of peace talks between the Sudanese government and eastern rebels due to start this month in Libya has once again been postponed, the rebels said.
Instead of beginning in January, after earlier delays from November and December, the talks are now set to start next month at Libya’s request, the Eastern Front rebel group said.
“The talks will now start on February 7th because the Libyans have asked this,” said Abdalla Kuna, the head of political affairs for the front from its offices in the Eritrean capital.
The peace talks are to be held in Tripoli but their start has been delayed several times these last few months.
Earlier this month, the rebels accused the Sudanese army of launching an attack on its camps in the eastern Hamesh Koreb region, sparking clashes that left casualties.
Despite this, Kuna said the talks would go ahead “because now there are no more problems in Hamesh Koreb, the UN has deployed some troops there this week.”
Like their better-known rebel counterparts in Sudan’s troubled western Darfur region, the Eastern Front complains of marginalization by the government in Khartoum, which it accuses of exploiting natural resources such as oil, natural gas, gold and other minerals at the expense of the local population.
The Eastern Front was founded by eastern Sudan’s two main rebel groups, the Beja Congress and the Free Lions, early last year and claimed to have launched its first combined offensive against Sudanese government positions in the Red Sea state in June.
An influential policy group warned this month that simmering tensions in east Sudan were a “powderkeg” that could explode into a major war, damaging peace efforts in the western Darfur region and last year’s north-south peace deal.
The International Crisis Group called on the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), former southern rebels who are now part of a power-sharing government in Khartoum, to urge Sudan’s leadership to negotiate in good faith with the Eastern Front.
(ST/AFP)