SUDAN-POLITICS: Breakthrough Reported in Stalled Peace Talks

By Moyiga Nduru Reprint | | Print |

Moyiga Nduru

NAIROBI, Sep 23 1997 (IPS) - Representatives of Sudan’s government and a rebel group fighting it since 1983 met here, actually signed a joint communique, and agreed to meet again in what one rebel official called a “breakthrough” in the long-stalled negotiations between the two sides.

The joint communique signed late Monday by the government and the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) stated that the next round of talks would resume in the Kenyan capital on Oct. 28 and that each side would “fully co-operate” to find a solution to Sudan’s 14-year conflict.

The meeting marked the relaunch of negotiations brokered by the Inter-governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) and which had collapsed in September 1994 when the Sudanese government delegation walked out. IGAD, chaired by President Daniel arap Moi of Kenya, groups Uganda, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia, D’jibouti, Kenya and Sudan.

Monday’s parley, attended by the foreign ministers of Uganda, Kenya, Eritrea and Ethiopia, was described by an SPLA official here as a “breakthrough.”

“I think it was a breakthrough, given the Sudan government’s past record of rejecting demands by Southerners for self- determination,” he told IPS on Tuesday. “But, now that they are willing to talk, we shall press for self-determination.”

Opening the one-day conference here on Monday, Kenya’s Foreign Minister Kalonzo Musyoka had urged Sudan’s belligerents to “avoid as much as possible all the pitfalls experienced in 1994 which led to the collapse of the talks.”

“The world is waiting to see that the IGAD Peace Initiative succeeds … We should find a lasting solution to the long-running conflict. A political settlement will enable the people of Southern Sudan to re-direct their energies and resources to economic development of their country,” he said.

More than one million people have died in southern Sudan since the SPLA launched its bush war in 1983, demanding greater autonomy for the non-Muslim population of the south — home to 35 percent of the 30 million Sudanese — from the Arabised Muslim north.

Ethnic rivalry within the SPLA led to the defection in August 1991 of three renegade commanders — Riak Machar, Lam Akol and Gordon Kong. The split weakened the rebel movement, prompting Khartoum to sieze territory previously held by the insurgents.

Five years later, Machar signed a peace charter with the Sudan government, and, in April 1997, that charter was upgraded into a peace agreement co-signed by six former rebel groups.

Machar now chairs the Southern Sudan Co-ordinating Council, whose brief under the agreement is to oversee the administration of the 10 states in the south of the country, and organise a referendum within four years to decide whether the Southerners want to secede or remain part of a united Sudan.

Garang refused to join the agreement, calling it a sellout. He charged that Khartoum was simply using Machar’s army to fight the SPLA on its behalf.

Even the fact that the Sep. 22 talks in Nairobi were actually held was something of an achievement given the wrangling between the government and the SPLA one month ago over their venue.

Khartoum wanted the talks to take place in South Africa, but the rebels rejected the idea of direct mediation by Nelson Mandela, preferring the South African leader to act only as a facilitator to IGAD.

In a statement signed last month by its spokesman here, John Luk, the SPLA said it “remains committed to the IGAD peace process under President Daniel Arap Moi and will not seek another alternative forum.”

To clarify the situation, Musyoka said Monday that South Africa’s peace initiative on Sudan was not a parallel effort to IGAD’s. He said Mandela had written to his Kenyan counterpart that they should not “duplicate efforts” on the Sudanese conflict.

Sudan’s strongman Lt-Gen Omar Hassan al Bashir early this month held talks with Mandela in South Africa in a bid to end the conflict in southern Sudan. The talks were also attended by Presidents Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda.

Later Garang met Mandela, and emphasised to him the need to continue the negotiations under IGAD’s umbrella.

Monday’s talks were a result of the sixth Extra-Ordinary Summit of IGAD, held in Nairobi in July. That conference, attended by Moi, D’jibouti President Gouled Aptidon, al Bashir, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi and Ugandan deputy Prime Minister Eriya Kategaya, mandated the Kenyan president to organise the talks on Sudan.