Sudan’s SPLA, Southern militia clash, 12 soldiers killed
Mar 8, 2006 (KHARTOUM) — Militia allied to Sudan’s army killed up to 12 former southern rebel soldiers in the first clashes since the two sides signed a peace deal last year to end Africa’s longest civil war, officials said on Wednesday.
The 2005 peace deal between the Islamist northern government and the Sudan People’s Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M) ended a bitter north-south dispute which claimed 2 million lives.
But redeployment of troops from both sides has been slow, complicated by the presence of many militia.
“The militia allied to the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) ambushed SPLA forces near … Abyei, killing 12 and wounding 26 soldiers,” said Elias Waya Nyipuocs, a senior SPLA official. He added there were more soldiers still missing.
A senior U.N. military source in Khartoum said the ambush, which happened at around midnight (2100 GMT), was being investigated by U.N. peace monitors in the oil-rich region of Abyei in central Sudan.
“We have reports of around seven SPLA killed and more than 20 injured,” said the source, who declined to be named.
The attack was in the town of Kharasana, about 40 km (25 miles) north of the regional capital Abyei town.
“This is of course a ceasefire violation,” said Nyipuocs.
A Sudanese army spokesman said they had little information on the attack but denied there were pro-government militias involved, saying instead these were armed tribes.
Sudan’s north-south civil war raged for more than two decades and proxy militias were often used by both armies.
Under last year’s deal, those militia were to have joined either the north or southern armies by Jan 9, 2006.
A U.N. peacekeeping force of more than 10,000 is being deployed to the south to monitor the deal.
An SPLA official in the south eastern region of Upper Nile also accused SAF of supporting militias to attack civilians and SPLA forces.
“Our forces were attacked in Longchuk by the militias supported by SAF … killing and displacing civilians,” said the local SPLA commander Samuel Chaiyot.
He added they had proof of SAF support of militias and said 10 children, 15 women and one SPLA soldiers was killed in the fighting during the past week. Seven SPLA soldiers were injured. SAF denied the reports.
New York-based Human Rights Watch said in a report on Wednesday that the government was reneging on the 2005 peace deal by continuing to support southern militias.
It said the key oil area of Upper Nile was “plagued by instability.”
The southern deal does not cover separate conflicts in Sudan’s east and the western Darfur region.
(Reuters)