Ethiopia, Sudan top diplomats and Riek Machar discuss peace in South Sudan

October 5, 2017 (KHARTOUM) – Ethiopian and Sudanese foreign ministers, Workneh Gebeyehu and Ibrahim Ghandour met with the leader of SPLM-IO in South Africa and discussed ways to achieve peace in South Sudan, said a statement released in Khartoum on Thursday.

The meeting with Riek Machar comes within the framework t preparation of the High- Level Revitalization Forum of all parties to the Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan (ARCSS).

“The meeting (..) was fruitful and positive, as It was agreed on the importance and urgency of achieving peace in South Sudan,” said a statement released by the Sudanese foreign ministry on Thursday evening.

The short statement didn’t develop on the matters discussed during the meeting or what was agreed by the two ministers and the former South Sudanese first vice president.

“The two ministers briefed the minister of foreign affairs and vice-president of South Africa who is President Zuma’s special envoy for peace in South Sudan on the details of IGAD’s efforts to revitalize the peace process in South Sudan,” further said the statement.

The statement indicated that Gebeyehu and Ghandour arrived on 4 October in South Africa but didn’t say when they met with Machar.

Last July the IGAD council of ministers held an extraordinary meeting in Addis Ababa to discuss the peace process in South Sudan and called on “all parties to the ARCSS including estranged groups to seize this opportunity to revitalize the ARCSS, renounce violence and to develop and submit concrete proposals for consideration at the revitalization forum in pursuit of peace in the Republic of South Sudan”.

(ST)