UN chief in south Sudan to shore up ‘fragile’ peace
September 4, 2007 (JUBA, Sudan) — UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon was in south Sudan on Tuesday to bolster a 2005 peace deal that ended two decades of civil war but whose increasing fragility could herald Sudan’s breakup.
Making his first visit to Sudan as UN chief, mainly in a bid to jump-start the peace process in the western Darfur region, Ban flew first to the southern capital of Juba where a 10,000-strong UN force is monitoring the uneasy peace.
Ban held talks with former rebel leader First Vice President Salva Kiir who took over as Sudan People’s Liberation Army/Movement chief after his predecessor John Garang died in a July 2005 helicopter crash.
Months earlier, Garang had signed the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that ended 21 years of war between the Muslim north and Christian and animist south that killed at least two million people and left millions more displaced.
Both the north-south conflict and that in Darfur, where more than 200,000 people have died in ongoing violence, have their roots in feelings of marginalisation by the Islamist government in Khartoum.
A UN official travelling with Ban described south Sudan as “a fragile state” where the secretary general is “very concerned about the situation.”
“The fear of the disintegration of Sudan is very real among the government of Sudan,” the official said, asking not to be named.
The International Crisis Group said in July that “the CPA holds the seeds for transforming the oppressive governmental system that is at the root of all Sudan’s conflicts into a more open, transparent, inclusive and democratic one.”
“If the CPA fails, which is increasingly likely, Sudan can be expected to return to full-scale war, with devastating consequences for the entire region,” the Brussels-based think-tank said.
The Crisis Group accused the ruling National Congress Party of President Omar al-Beshir of deliberately obstructing implementation of the CPA, in particular oil revenue sharing and the demarcation of the north-south border.
Ban had dinner with Beshir on Monday during which he briefed the Sudanese leader on efforts to push forward Darfur peace talks as well as telling him that “more efforts should be done to accelerate implementation” of the CPA.
Power and wealth-sharing elements of the CPA have also been seen as a potential blueprint for a Darfur peace deal, where the hybrid UNAMID force — the world’s largest peacekeeping operation — is to begin deploying.
The 26,000-strong force from the United Nations and African Union was agreed by the UN Security Council on July 31 after months of intense diplomacy but is not expected to be completely deployed before mid-2008.
Ban told journalists that over dinner Monday he had obtained Beshir’s “commitment and readiness” to facilitate the deployment of UNAMID in Darfur, where he said that “time is of the essence” as fighting continues.
“We are working very hard to finalise a detailed arrangement for peace negotiation talks as soon as possible,” Ban said after several Darfur rebel groups met in Tanzania last month to unify their stance ahead of final peace negotiations.
A peace deal was signed with the Sudanese government in Abuja in May 2006, but only one out of three negotiating factions endorsed the agreement, sparking deep divisions among rebels and a new surge in violence.
In a potential boost to peace efforts, Ban said that Beshir had promised to allow key Darfur rebel Suleiman Jamous to leave Sudan and seek medical attention after which the veteran could take up a role as mediator.
Amid ongoing attacks in the ravaged region the size of France, Ban said that Beshir had assured him he was committed to a ceasefire in Darfur but that “sometimes when there are assaults on his forces he needs to defend himself.”
After Juba, Ban is to head to Al-Fasher in Darfur on Wednesday for a first-hand look at the situation, returning to Khartoum on Thursday. He is then to head to Sudan’s neighbours Chad and Libya.
(AFP)