Sudanese peace talks outcome should be clear by end March: Powell

WASHINGTON, March 3 (AFP) — US Secretary of State Colin Powell said that it should be clear by the end of March whether or not peace negotiations between the Sudanese government and southern rebels have been successful or not.

“I think we will know by the end of this month. By the end of March I hope we’ll have cracked this,” Powell told a congressional committee.

“We are very close. We’ll work very hard in the days ahead to try to bring this to a successful conclusion,” Powell told US lawmakers on the panel.

Negotiations have been stuck on how to share power and decide the future of disputed regions, particularly the Abyei region.

“The power sharing part is pretty much complete, the wealth sharing part is complete, two of the three disputed areas are pretty much taken care of, Abyei is the hard one,” Powell explained.

Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman Ismail said Sunday that the government’s talks with the Sudan People’s Liberation Army had stumbled on power sharing and fate of three regions, Abyei, the Nuba mountains and Blue Nile state.

He said the round of negotiations begun on February 18 in Kenya “should continue until March 18 at the least,” but promised no breakthroughs.

Sudan’s civil war erupted in 1983 between the south, where most observe traditional African religions and Christianity, and the Muslim, Arabised north. The conflict along with war-related famine and disease has claimed at least 1.5 million lives, mostly in the south.