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From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Sun Oct 10 2010 - 07:56:23 EDT
Sudan president warns of greater conflict with south
Sun Oct 10, 2010 7:29am GMT
* Southerners due to vote in referendum in 3 months' time
* Bashir regrets south Sudan president backed separation (Edits translation,
adds background)
By Andrew Heavens
KHARTOUM, Oct 10 (Reuters) - Sudan's president accused former civil war foes
in the south of going back on the terms of a peace deal, warning a worse
conflict could erupt if the sides did not settle disputes before a
referendum on secession.
The comments from President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, reported on state media,
raised the stakes in a war of words between Khartoum and the south's
dominant Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), five years after the
sides ended decades of conflict with an accord.
In three months' time, that peace deal is supposed to come to a climax with
a referendum giving the people of the oil- producing south the right to
decide whether to declare independence or stay part of Sudan.
Bashir told a conference in Sirte, Libya he regretted the fact that SPLM
leader and south Sudan president Salva Kiir had recently publicly come out
for separation. This was against the terms of the 2005 peace deal which said
both northern and southern leaders should try to make unity "attractive" to
southerners before the vote, Suna news agency reported.
Bashir said he was still committed to holding the vote but both sides first
had to settle differences over the position of their shared border and how
to share out oil revenues, debt and Nile river water.
"MORE DANGEROUS"
"He (Bashir) said a new conflict between the north and south will ensue if
there was a failure to address these issues before the referendum and that
such a conflict could be more dangerous than the one that took place before
the peace agreement" said Suna, reporting on the speech which Bashir gave on
Saturday.
Bashir spoke as envoys from the U.N. Security Council wrapped up a visit to
Sudan aimed at pressing both sides to hold the vote on time and avert a new
civil war.
Any renewal of conflict in Africa's largest country could spill into the
nine countries that border Sudan -- Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, the
Democratic Republic of Congo, the Central African Republic, Chad, Libya and
Egypt -- threatening the region's economic success stories and complicating
existing conflicts and allegiances.
Diplomats with the U.N. mission said Kiir last week asked them to deploy
peacekeepers and set up a buffer zone along the tense north-south border
before the vote.
Kiir, who is also first vice president of all of Sudan, angered Khartoum
when he said he would not vote for unity in the referendum during a speech
to supporters in the southern capital Juba earlier this month.
One of his senior aides later told Reuters Kiir had not meant to indicate
his personal voting preferences but just wanted to point out that the north
had failed to make unity attractive to the southern voter.
Northern and southern leaders have been locked in negotiations for months on
issues including how they would share out oil revenues after the vote. Most
of Sudan's oil is found in the south but runs through the north's pipelines
and port to get to market.
The SPLM has insisted lack of progress in the talks should not be used as an
excuse to delay the scheduled start of the referendum on Jan. 9, 2011.
(Editing by Matthew Jones)
C Thomson Reuters 2010 All rights reserved
S.Sudan president asks for buffer zone, peacekeepers
Sat Oct 9, 2010 4:59pm GMT
* Tension mounts as unity, separation backers clash
* Referendum timetable tight but still "doable"-envoy
(Recasts with request for buffer zone)
By Louis Charbonneau
KHARTOUM, Oct 9 (Reuters) - South Sudan's president has asked U.N. Security
Council envoys to send peacekeepers and set up a buffer zone along the
country's north-south border ahead of a southern vote on independence,
diplomats said on Saturday.
Sudan's oil-producing south is three months away from the scheduled start of
a politically sensitive referendum on whether to secede or stay part of
Sudan, a vote promised in a 2005 peace deal that ended decades of civil war
with the north.
Sudan's Muslim north and its south, where most follow Christianity and
traditional beliefs, have still not agreed on the position of their shared
border and analysts fear conflict could re-erupt in contested zones, some of
which contain oil.
In a sign of the tension over the vote, up to 40 pro-independence
southerners clashed with riot police and northern unity campaigners in
downtown Khartoum on Saturday.
The demonstrations were held to coincide with the visit to the capital of
the envoys of U.N. Security Council states, who also visited the
semi-autonomous south in recent days and met with its president, Salva Kiir.
"Salva Kiir asked for U.N peacekeepers to be deployed along the border
between the north and the south," one diplomat told Reuters, on condition of
anonymity, saying the request was made at a meeting in the southern capital
Juba on Wednesday.
The diplomat said the request would be considered but the envoys made no
promises to Kiir.
A second diplomat said Kiir had also proposed setting up a buffer zone along
the ill-defined border. The diplomat did not give details of location of the
proposed zone or its width.
A third member of the visiting Security Council delegation said a deployment
of peacekeepers on the frontier was not something explicitly called for in
the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement and would therefore require some
"adjustments".
The U.N. has 10,000 peacekeepers stationed in Sudan, not counting its joint
mission with the African Union in the western province of Darfur. Most of
the 10,000 are in the south and in three former civil war battle ground
areas along the border.
RIOT POLICE
Riot police beat the group of southerners after they turned up at a
2,000-strong rally in support of Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir,
timed to coincide with the Security Council envoys' visit to the foreign
ministry nearby.
Clad in orange caps, the southerners arrived at the rally shouting
pro-independence slogans, witnesses said. Pro-unity supporters approached
the southerners in downtown Khartoum, shouted at them to leave and pushed
towards them.
Police beat the southerners with fists and batons and arrested some of them,
witnesses said. Officials also hit three Westerners, two of them
journalists, after ordering them to leave the scene.
Karti told the U.N. delegation Khartoum was committed to holding the vote on
time but would not accept any southern "interference". Khartoum has accused
the south of cracking down on unity supporters, a charge dismissed by the
south.
Britain's ambassador to the U.N. Mark Lyall Grant later told reporters the
timetable for the vote was "very tight" but "doable" if the parties stuck to
their promises with backing from the international community.
Southerners, embittered by the conflict and perceived northern exploitation,
are widely expected to choose secession. Khartoum wants to keep Africa's
largest country united.
Troops from both sides have clashed since the accord, most recently in the
contested Abyei oil region. The two sides have also accused each other of
building up troops near their shared border as the referendum approaches.
(Additional reporting by Andrew Heavens and Khaled Abdel Aziz; Editing by
Peter Graff)
C Thomson Reuters 2010 All rights reserved
South Sudan independence backers clash with police
Sat Oct 9, 2010 12:27pm GMT
* Clashes underline fears ahead of independence referendum
* Southern Sudan president asks for peacekeepers on border
(Adds foreign minister comment)
By Khaled Abdel Aziz
KHARTOUM, Oct 9 (Reuters) - South Sudan independence supporters clashed with
riot police and northern pro-unity campaigners in Khartoum on Saturday as
tension increased in the countdown to a referendum on southern secession.
The confrontation, pitting police against a group of up to 40 southerners,
coincided with news that south Sudan's president had asked U.N. Security
Council envoys to deploy peacekeepers along the tense north-south boundary
before the vote.
The oil-producing south is now three months away from the scheduled start of
a referendum, promised as part of a 2005 peace deal that ended decades of
civil war with the north.
Saturday's clashes highlighted the risk that simmering tension over the vote
could boil over, prompting a new conflict between the Muslim north and the
south, where most of the population follow Christianity and traditional
beliefs.
Riot police beat the group of southerners after they turned up at a
2,000-strong rally in support of Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir,
timed to coincide with the visit of Security Council envoys to the capital,
a Reuters witness said.
Clad in orange caps and T-shirts, the southerners arrived at the rally
shouting pro-independence slogans, witnesses said. Pro-unity supporters
approached the southerners in downtown Khartoum, shouted at them to leave
and pushed towards them.
Police beat the southerners with their fists and batons and arrested some of
them, witnesses said. Officials also hit three Westerners, two of them
journalists, after ordering them to leave the scene.
Security Council envoys, including Washington's U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice,
met Sudanese Foreign Minister Ali Ahmed Karti in another district of
downtown Khartoum at the same time as the protest, but kept away from the
crowds, said officials.
Karti told the delegation Khartoum was committed to holding the vote on time
but would not accept any southern "interference". Khartoum has accused the
south of cracking down on unity supporters, a charge dismissed by the south.
PEACEKEEPER REQUEST
A diplomat with the U.N. delegation told Reuters earlier that Salva Kiir,
president of the semi-autonomous south, had made the request for
peacekeepers at a meeting in the southern capital Juba on Wednesday.
"Salva Kiir asked for U.N. peacekeepers to be deployed along the border
between the north and the south," the diplomat said on condition of
anonymity.
The diplomat said the request would be considered but that no promises had
been made. Another diplomat in the delegation said a deployment was not
something explicitly called for in the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement
(CPA) and would therefore require some "adjustments".
The United Nations has 10,000 peacekeepers stationed in Sudan, not counting
its joint mission with the African Union in Darfur, most of them in the
south and three former civil war battleground areas along the border.
Southerners, embittered by the conflict and perceived northern exploitation,
are widely expected to choose secession. Khartoum wants to keep Africa's
largest country united.
Troops from both sides have clashed since the accord, most recently in the
contested Abyei oil region. The two sides have accused each other of
building up troops near the border as the referendum approaches.
(Additional reporting by Louis Charbonneau and Andrew Heavens; writing by
Andrew Heavens; editing by Mark Heinrich)
C Thomson Reuters 2010 All rights reserved
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