Sudan’s main foes say peace deal imminent

NAIROBI, Nov 17 (AFP) — As the UN Security Council prepares to hold a rare meeting in Nairobi focussing on Sudan’s main civil war, both sides in the devastating conflict said Wednesday a comprehensive peace deal is likely to be signed within days of high level talks resuming next week.

Sudanese vice president Ali Osman Taha and SPLM leader John Garang

In a phone conversation Tuesday, Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army leader John Garang “told (US President George W.) Bush it is a matter of days (after talks resume on November 26) before we reach a final peace agreement,” rebel spokesman Yasser Arman told AFP, speaking by satellite phone from south Sudan’s Equatoria state.

“I do concur. I don’t think that we have a kind of problem that we cannot solve in a matter of days or a week,” Said al-Khatibu, the spokesman for Khartoum’s delegation in the two-year-old peace talks, told AFP.

“We hope that the international community and especially the UN Security Council will help in the resolution it will pass to achieve this objective,” al-Khatibu explained.

Garang and his negotiating counterpart, Vice President Ali Osman Taha, are Thursday expected to sign a pledge to conclude their talks by the end of the year, according to diplomats in Nairobi.

On Tuesday, the White House announced that Bush had called both Garang and Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir on this issue.

Bush told Garang that “the US remained focussed and committed to realise peace in Sudan” and that a “final peace settlement remains a top priority of his new administration,” Arman said.

“He said the US would help Sudan to reconstruct and develop,” the spokesman added.

In Addis Ababa, the African Union’s Peace and Security Council (PSC) on Wednesday urged AU delegates at the talks in Kenya to “seize the chance for consultations with Security Council members on ways and means of strengthening and formalising ties” between the two bodies, with “appropriate channels for interaction.”

The PSC mandated Congo, as the current chairman of the body “to join the UA delegation which should take part” in the talks. This team already includes UA vice-chairman Patrice Mazimpakha and the commissioner for peace and security, Said Djinnit.

At the instigation of the United States, the UN Security Council is holding the meeting on Thursday and Friday, principally to put pressure on Khartoum and the SPLM/A to finalise a deal to end a war that has claimed 1.5 million lives and displaced more than four million people since 1983.

It is hoped that such a deal would also help to resolve a separate conflict in Sudan’s western region of Darfur, where tens of thousands of people have been killed and some 1.6 million displaced since February 2003, when two rebel groups rose up against Khartoum.

The government responded with major aerial and ground assaults and by coopting militia forces widely accused of commiting serious war crimes and crimes against humanity.

High level discussions between Taha and Garang broke up for the Islamic holy month of Ramadan on October 16 and junior delegates are due to resume talks on November 26.

Since Garang and Taha, who will rejoin the talks on December 11, first began meeting in Kenya more than two years ago, half a dozen protocols, covering issues such as power and wealth sharing, have been signed.

They are both due to address the UN Security Council on Thursday.

The remaining part of the talks is aimed at consolidating these deals into a permanent accord, ironing out the details of a comprehensive ceasefire, and reaching agreement on security arrangements — essentially the positioning of various forces in the wake of a settlement.

“The new situation created by a final peace agreement … will impact positively on the problem in Darfur and bring peace and stability to Sudan,” Arman reported of what the rebel leader told Bush.

Last year, both sides failed make good of their commitment to outgoing US Secretary of State Colin Powell to reach a final deal by the end of 2003.