Sudanese rebel leader says insurgent delegation will fly to Khartoum, a major step in the peace process

By NADIA ABOU EL-MAGD Associated Press Writer

CAIRO, Egypt, Dec 03, 2003 (AP) — Sudan’s main rebel group will send a delegation to the Sudanese capital Friday, an unprecedented trip to buttress talks in neighboring Kenya on ending the country’s 20-year civil war.

The Sudanese government welcomed the visit, and Deputy Foreign Minister Motrak Sedeek said Wednesday it represented a “qualitative shift” that could open the way for John Garang’s Sudan People’s Liberation Army to become a genuine part of Sudanese political life.

The SPLA began its insurgency in 1983. Until recent progress in peace negotiations being held under Kenyan mediation, any SPLA leader who flew to government-controlled sections of Sudan would have risked being arrested – or worse.

Garang told The Associated Press the delegation would be headed by Pagan Amum, a member of the group’s leadership council.

“We’ve just started the current round of negotiations in Kenya,” Garang said. “This (visit) is not a part of peace (negotiations). It is our initiative at SPLA.”

Garang told the Arab satellite channel Al-Jazeera that at least nine senior members of the SPLA will spend about a week in Khartoum, meeting “senior government officials, political forces, civil society, religious groups, both Christians and Muslims.”

“Previous circumstances did not help the movement to form a political party because the movement leaned to military rather than political work,” he said.

“We believe it will contribute to national consensus. We want all people to be involved. It will also help in building confidence among people and initiate the process of national healing and reconciliation,” Garang said.

In Khartoum, the government pledged to cooperate with the visiting delegation.

“We will do our very best to see that it achieves its goals,” said a statement from Kamal Obeid, the secretary for foreign affairs of the ruling National Congress.

While the war is a conflict between the Muslim, Arab government and the animist and Christian southerners, it is also a struggle for land and the oil resources that straddle the north-south border.

The war has killed more than 2 million people through combat and attendant famine and disease, but there have been a series of cease-fires began in October 2002.

Although Sudan is on the U.S. list of terrorist sponsoring countries – it was host to al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden in the 1990s – the United States has been working with both side to encourage the peace process.

Secretary of State Colin Powell met the two negotiating teams in October and urged them to meet a deadline of Dec. 31 for reaching a final agreement – a deadline the Sudanese have said is unlikely to be met.

After years of fruitless negotiations in Kenya, the two sides achieved a breakthrough last year and signed the interim Machakos accords, which provide for a six-year transitional period and a referendum on secession for the people of southern Sudan, the SPLA heartland.

In September, the negotiations reached another turning point when the government agreed to allow the SPLA to retain its forces in the south during the transitional period.

The remaining issues to be resolved are the sharing of power, the division of the country’s wealth, and the administration of three disputed areas in central Sudan.

Garang and Sudanese Vice President Ali Osman Mohammed Taha are scheduled to join the negotiations Friday.