Sudan Complains to UNSC Against Republic of South Sudan (NEWS BRIEF)

(HN, August 30, 2011) Sudanese Foreign Minister Ali Ahmed Karti has sent a message of complaint to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), accusing the South Sudan government of violating the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), the official SUNA news agency reported Tuesday.

"I'm committed to send you a complaint concerning violations by South Sudan's government during the past period. The Republic of South Sudan has adopted hostile stances towards the mother state ( the Republic of Sudan), starting from the negative signals embodied in the speech of Salva Kiir Mayardit, president of South Sudan, on the day South Sudan was declared independent," SUNA quoted Karti as saying in the message to the UNSC chairman.

The South Sudan president's "negative signals" included his reiteration to support the Darfur rebel movements, together with his remarks about the South Kordofan and Blue Nile areas, which belong to north Sudan, Karti said.

 The complaint came shortly after Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch released a joint statement saying that their researchers led a week-long mission to the area in late August and were able to establish that SAF had carried out 13 air strikes in Kauda, Delami and Kurchi areas where at least 26 civilians were killed and more than 45 others injured since mid-June.

“The relentless bombing campaign is killing and maiming civilian men, women and children, displacing tens of thousands, putting them in desperate need of aid, and preventing entire communities from planting crops and feeding their children,” said Daniel Bekele, Africa director at Human Rights Watch.

“The Sudanese government is literally getting away with murder and trying to keep the outside world from finding out” said Donatella Rovera, Amnesty International’s Senior Crisis Response Advisor. “The international community, and particularly the UN Security Council, must stop looking the other way and act to address the situation”.

Karti went on to say that South Sudan has hosted the Darfur armed movements and provided them with shelter, training and arms, and it is still supporting them.

 Martin Majut, an official with South Sudan’s ruling Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, told Bloomberg News, that the Sudanese charges were “baseless.”

The Sudanese minister went on to  reiterate commitment of the Republic of Sudan and its keenness to achieve a political settlement and stability, saying that the government's commitment to peace was represented in its signing and implementation of the CPA, including its recognition of the referendum results as well as of the newly-born South Sudan state.

Despite the violations by the government of South Sudan and its continuing support of the Darfur rebel movements to undermine security in Sudan, the Sudanese government has initiated a unilateral ceasefire for two weeks, Karti said, adding that the South Sudan government was still instigating the SPLM/northern sector to launch a war in South Kordofan.

The minister urged the UNSC to use its powers and means to push the government of South Sudan to commit to the agreements signed between the two countries and to immediately stop training, supporting and instigating the armed groups, whether in South Kordofan or Darfur.

He also called on the UNSC to urge the rebel groups in Darfur and South Kordofan to respond to the ceasefire declared by the government and sit directly with it to reach a peaceful solution through dialogue and negotiations.

Southern Kordofan is Sudan’s only oil-producing state, accounting for 115,000 barrels a day, according to the energy ministry. South Sudan assumed control of 75 percent of the country’s former daily crude output of 490,000 barrels a day.

 - HUMNews Staff