US says Sudan’s CPA making “steady progress”
Jan 26, 2007 (WASHINGTON) — The agreement the United States helped broker in Sudan that ended more than 20 years of civil war is making “steady progress,” says Lauren Landis, director of the State Department’s Sudan Programs Group.
“We see the CPA [Comprehensive Peace Agreement] moving forward,” Landis told USINFO during a January 25 interview. “But like any comprehensive settlement, the hard parts are going to take longer.”
Nagging issues still remain, she said, like ongoing violence in Darfur, but gains have been made under the agreement in the areas of power sharing, the economy and security. She said such progress forms building blocks for reunifying the divided nation.
During Sudan’s 21-year-long conflict, more than 2.5 million people were killed while 4 million were displaced. The CPA was signed January 2005 between the warring parties — the Islamic Congress Party of President Omar Bashir and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), the main power behind the government of South Sudan. The agreement provides for national elections before the end of 2009 to decide on North-South unification.
The idea, Landis explained, is to make unification “attractive” to both the North and South by ensuring security and raising peoples’ standards of living — not an easy task. But the former U.S. Agency for International Development official said progress was being made by the Sudanese themselves in partnership with international donors.
In the past two years, the United States has provided close to $3 billion in humanitarian, development and peacekeeping assistance, making it the largest single donor to Sudan.
Landis said a prime focus of her work was to keep policymakers attention riveted on the peace process in Sudan. “I make a regular phone call every week to our counterparts in a number of different European capitals to see how we, as donors, can come together to have an increased influence and help the Sudanese reinforce their transition to unification.”
Part of that effort involves strengthening South Sudan, Landis explained, and progress is being made there in rebuilding infrastructure, especially roads, as well as training the Southern army. Such training is allowed under the CPA, and those soldiers eventually will be folded into the national army under unification.
The South also is receiving oil revenues under the CPA — about $1 billion since the agreement was signed — she added.
Landis spoke on the eve of a trip she is making with Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, where the officials will attend a summit of the African Union (AU). The AU currently has more than 7,000 peacekeepers in Sudan.
(USINFO)