Khartoum, Juba set deadlines over rows

AFP/Khartoum

South Sudan President Salva Kiir talks with Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir as he leaves Khartoum yesterday

North and South Sudan have set deadlines to resolve their disputes, President Omar Hassan al-Bashir said yesterday, as a top-level southern delegation wrapped up its first visit to Khartoum since independence. “We have agreed to have committees and have given them deadlines to reach a solution on all the pending issues,” Bashir told a news conference, standing alongside South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir. Failure of the two sides to resolve key issues, including oil and borders, and the ongoing conflict in Sudan’s border region, where the army is battling rebels with historic ties to the south, have badly strained north-south ties. No breakthrough deals were announced before Kiir’s team departed for Juba. But the two presidents reaffirmed their intention to work together for peace and stability, and to put the years of conflict behind them. “My government is ready to discuss any final solutions on all outstanding issues, be it on the economy, security, borders and Abyei’s status,” Kiir told reporters. “My brother al-Bashir and I myself are committed to ensure that none of these issues will take us back to war. “There might be some elements on both sides that would like to take us back... to war. But I repeat, we left the war station behind in 2005.” Fighting in Sudan’s ethnically-divided border states of South Kordofan and Blue Nile has aggravated the lingering mistrust between the two sides, with Khartoum accusing Juba of supplying the rebels, claims strongly denied. The south has also accused the Sudanese government of supporting the different rebel groups within its borders in a bid to destabilise the country, as it did during the 1983-2005 civil war, charges dismissed by the north. In a joint statement yesterday, carried by the official Suna news agency, the two parties said they would work together to prevent hostile action against the other country. “It was agreed that any hostile action by one country against the other would be prevented and that the security units in the two countries would investigate the mutual allegations now, and stop those activities immediately,” the statement said.