Sudan ceasefire talks end without deal as violence increases
Tue Dec 9, 2014 6:31pm GMT
CAIRO Dec 9 (Reuters) - The Sudanese government and rebels said they failed
to agree on a ceasefire as three weeks of negotiations to end a
three-year-long conflict concluded on Tuesday amid an uptick in violence.
Khartoum has been fighting an insurgency in the southern provinces of Blue
Nile and South Kordofan since 2011, mounted mostly by former civil war
fighters who were left in Sudan after South Sudan seceded that year.
Talks collapsed largely because the rebels insisted that a ceasefire in the
two regions be negotiated in conjunction with one in neighbouring Darfur,
where a conflict that saw the government accused of genocide a decade ago
has rumbled on.
"We see these as separate issues from each other, and each region has its
specific needs," said Hussein Karshoum, a member of the government
delegation.
He said the talks, which took place in the Ethiopian capital under the
auspices of an African Union panel headed by former South African President
Thabo Mbeki, were expected to resume in January.
On Monday, both sides reported clashes in South Kordofan.
The rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North Sector (SPLM-N) also
wanted to link the talks with political developments in Khartoum.
President Omar al-Bashir, who has ruled the country for 25 years and is a
candidate in April elections, announced a "national dialogue" in January,
but little progress has been made.
The political deadlock has prompted opposition politicians to symbolically
join forces with the armed groups. A broad array of groups signed a unity
agreement last week that they hoped would strengthen the negotiating
position of the SPLM-N.
But the government warned political leaders would pay a price for tying
their fate to the rebels, and arrested two of them days after the deal.
"The government is not serious about the national dialogue and is just
buying time for the re-election of a president who is wanted by the
International Criminal Court," said Yasir Arman, secretary-general of the
SPLM-N, in a reference to the ICC's indictment against Bashir for war
crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity.
"The regime has no solutions for the two areas except war and starvation,"
Arman said. (Reporting By Khalid Abdelaziz; Writing By Shadi Bushra; Editing
by Mark Trevelyan)