/ 27 May 2011

Border dispute threatens Sudanese peace

Border Dispute Threatens Sudanese Peace

Sudan’s army has seized an oil-rich border region in what southern Sudan described as a declaration of war, the biggest threat yet to a peaceful separation of north and south. About 5 000 northern troops with tanks swept into the contested town of Abyei, killing civilians and soldiers, the southern army claimed.

Almost the entire population of 20 000 fled the fighting and the United Nations said its base had been hit by mortars.

Control of fertile Abyei has been the main point of dispute between northern and southern Sudan ahead of plans for the south to become an independent state on July 9. The north’s taking of the town follows several days of fighting and bombing. A southern army spokesperson, Colonel Philip Aguer, told the Associated Press: “We didn’t declare war. The [Sudanese ruling] National Congress party and the Sudan armed forces declared war on us.”

Aguer said southern troops stationed in Abyei were overrun and scattered after two days of aerial bombardments by the north, focusing on a bridge where southern reinforcements would have entered. Several members of the Abyei government were missing, he said.

Aguer called for the UN mission in Sudan to protect the people of Abyei, saying the northern government intended to “displace civilians and commit human rights violations as they did in Darfur”, Sudan’s western region, where a civil war broke out in 2003.

The southern army will maintain the status quo, he said, while it waits for the decision of the southern ­government on how best to respond.

President Omar al-Bashir’s northern government claimed it acted after 22 of its personnel were killed in an ambush by southern armed groups last week. Amin Hassan Omar, a minister of state for presidential affairs, said in Khartoum: “The Sudanese armed forces control Abyei and they are cleansing it of illegal forces.”

Southern Sudan fought the north for more than two decades in a ­brutal war that claimed more than two million lives and forced more than four million people to flee their homes. A peace deal in 2005 offered the south the chance of independence and it overwhelmingly voted to secede in a referendum in January.

It is due to become the world’s newest country in less than two months, but the Abyei violence threatens to further destabilise an already volatile region.

Barnaba Marial Benjamin, the southern Sudanese information minister, said: “There has been a fighting mood in Khartoum. We cannot accept this fighting mood to continue … the event is a long-term plan done by the government of Khartoum to disrupt and carry out an invasion.”

The escalation came as the UN Security Council began a four-day visit to Sudan. The council’s planned visit to Abyei was cancelled because of the violence. Mortars hit the UN compound at the weekend, preventing its forces from patrolling the town, where at least 15 northern tanks were present, said a spokesperson. One of the mortar rounds exploded but there were no casualties among UN personnel.

The aid agency Médecins Sans Frontières, which runs health clinics in Abyei and nearby Agok, said the entire population of Abyei had fled the city after bombing raids, gunfights and mortaring. Its clinic in Agok had received 42 wounded ­people by Saturday evening.

The fighting earned swift international condemnation. William Hague, Britain’s foreign secretary, said: “These incidents are clear violations of the CPA [comprehensive peace agreement] and cannot be justified.

“I call on all sides to cease hostilities immediately. All unauthorised forces should be withdrawn from the entire area of Abyei in accordance with past agreements by the parties. I remind the parties of their responsibility to protect civilians.”

The United States said last Thursday’s attack by southern forces on UN peacekeepers was deplorable and the north’s response was “disproportionate and irresponsible”. “The actions being taken by the government of Sudan are blatant violations of the comprehensive peace agreement and threaten to undermine the mutual commitment of the CPA parties to avoid a return to war,” the White House said in a statement.

It called on Sudan’s military to cease its offensive in Abyei and withdraw its forces. Failure to do so could set back the process of normalising American-Sudanese relations, the US warned.

Residents of the Abyei region were meant to have a referendum in January over whether to join the north or the south. Disputes over who could vote derailed that ballot and talks about the status of the region have stalled.

North and south have yet to agree how to share oil revenues and other assets in the break-up. The north supports the Arab Misseriya tribe that grazes its cattle in Abyei, and the south backs the Dinka Ngok tribe that lives there year round. —