EU restores ties with Sudan, offers quick aid

BRUSSELS, Jan 25 (Reuters) – The European Union restored ties with Sudan on Monday and offered 50 million euros ($65 million) in aid to help boost a peace agreement in the African country, plagued by civil war in the past two decades.

European Union Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid, Louis Michel, center, gestures while talking to the media during a joint press conference with the Sudan People’s Liberation Arm, southern Sudan representative Nhial Deng Nhi, right, and Sudan’s First Vice-President Ali Osman Taha, left, following the signing of a cooperation agreement at the EU Commission headquarters in Brussels, Tuesday Jan. 25, 2005. (AP).

Senior EU and Sudanese officials signed a cooperation agreement, which the European Commission said would launch an immediate aid package of 25 million euros for the northern region and a further 25 million for the south of the country.

“This meeting is the starting point of normal relations between the European Union and Sudan,” EU Development and Humanitarian Aid Commissioner Louis Michel told reporters.

The EU, the world’s leading aid donor, suspended cooperation with Sudan during the war in 1990. It resumed political dialogue with Khartoum in 1999 but did not relaunch cooperation.

Normal relations between Khartoum and Brussels will mean that Sudan now also has access to a 400 million euro development aid package from the EU’s executive Commission.

Rebels in the south and the Khartoum government signed the peace deal on Jan. 9, ending 21 years of north-south war. Two million people, mostly civilians, have died in the south from violence, disease or famine in the oil-rich region.

Sudanese Vice-President Ali Osman Mohamed Taha pledged to implement the peace pact, which in turn could help end the Darfur conflict in which over 1.2 million people have been left homeless by rampaging militia and Sudanese security forces.

“We are committed to use the same drive and to draw from our experience in resolving the conflict in southern Sudan to bring a prompt and fair answer to the conflict in Darfur,” Taha said.

But Tajeddin Nyam, an official of the Darfur rebel group the Justice and Equality Movement, appealed to the European Union not to release any money to the government as long as the conflict in the western region of Darfur continues.

“This money will be used to finance the Janjaweed. Do not release this money to someone who is killing our people. It means funding for genocide,” he told Reuters from Chad.

The Janjaweed are the Arab militias who have attacked Darfur villagers, helping to drive some two million of them out of their homes.