South Sudan to receive mail directly

March 30, 2007 (JUBA) — Authorities in southern Sudan and Khartoum have signed an agreement that will allow the southern capital of Juba to receive mail directly for the first time, officials said on Friday.

Currently letters headed for the south have to pass through northern Sudan.

“The Sudan postal service has accepted that we should have our own gateway,” said Francis Apaya Elia, the south’s director of postal services.

The agreement also meant the south can produce its own stamps, said Gier Cuang Along, southern minister for telecommunications and postal services.

Elia said the national postal service would now apply to the International Postal Union (IPU) for permission to make Juba a postal gateway.

Along said the issue of postal service had not been properly addressed during the peace negotiations that culminated in a 2005 agreement ending 21 years of civil war between north and south Sudan.

The peace agreement led to the formation of a semi-autonomous southern state with its own government. It also gave the south the option to vote for secession in 2011.

The possibility of an independent southern state made the issue of postal service a security concern.

“There are things you have to do now,” Along said.

(Reuters)