From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Sun Apr 25 2010 - 16:34:23 EDT
Clashes in Sudan kill 58, raise tension on border
Sun Apr 25, 2010 9:48am GMT
* 85 hurt in clashes as election results released
* Tension raised along the north-south border
* South Sudan to vote on independence in January
By Opheera McDoom
KHARTOUM, April 25 (Reuters) - Clashes between south Sudan's army and
Darfuri Arab tribes killed 58 people, raising tension along the north-south
border as results of the first open elections in 24 years are released,
officials said on Sunday.
Sudan's oil-producing south was allowed to keep a separate army and form a
semi-autonomous government in a 2005 peace deal ending more than two decades
of civil war with the north.
Southerners will vote in a referendum on Jan. 9, 2011 on independence.
"There was movement from the Rizeigat (tribe) and from the SPLA (the
southern Sudan People's Liberation Army). I can't tell you who attacked who
first but they clashed," Rizeigat Arab tribal leader Mohamed Eissa Aliu told
Reuters from South Darfur.
"It happened on Friday and those killed from the Rizeigat were 58 and 85
injured," he said, adding the attack was in Balballa, South Darfur, which
borders Western Bahr al-Ghazal in the south.
The SPLA said they were attacked by the northern army (SAF) in Raja, a
remote part of Western Bahr al-Ghazal state, near where at least 5 officials
from the dominant northern National Congress Party (NCP) and four others
were killed by an SPLA soldier during five days of voting which began on
April 11.
"Our company came under attack from the SAF forces yesterday afternoon,"
SPLA spokesman Malaak Ayuen said late on Saturday. "The SAF was using four
land cruisers with mounted machine guns." He could not give further details.
A SAF spokesman denied any involvement but confirmed the SPLA attack on the
Rizeigat in Darfur, calling it "a clear violation of the (peace deal)."
Results of the elections, marred by boycotts in the north and opposition
accusations of fraud, are slowly being announced after days of delays.
The NCP and the ex-southern rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM)
are expected to form a coalition government as both parties look set to
maintain their respective dominance in the north and the south.
The international community is concerned that only 8 months before the 2011
plebiscite on independence, issues like the demarcation of the north-south
border, grazing rights of nomadic tribes and citizenship have not been
agreed.
The north-south civil war, Africa's longest, has raged on and off since
1955. It claimed 2 million lives mostly through hunger and disease and
destabilised much of east Africa.
The south, which follows mostly Christianity or traditional religions,
fought the mainly Muslim north over issues including oil, ethnicity and
ideology. (Additional reporting by Skye Wheeler in Juba; Editing by Janet
Lawrence)
C Thomson Reuters 2010 All rights reserved
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