Sudan: Towards an Incomplete Peace
Nairobi/Brussels |
11 Dec 2003
Just as a peace deal promises to end Sudan’s twenty-year civil war, a separate, intensifying war in the west threatens to undermine it.
The International Crisis Group’s latest report, “Sudan: Towards an Incomplete Peace”,* recognises the immense progress made on resolving the main conflict, that between the Sudanese government and the insurgent Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army (SPLA), but warns that the situation in the western province of Darfur is rapidly deteriorating, threatening to replace one conflict with another.
“If there is a peace agreement between the government and the SPLA without addressing the situation in Darfur, the potential for continued instability and conflict in Sudan remains high”, says Stephen Ellis, Africa Program Director at ICG.
Sudan is finally on the brink of a peace agreement to end the devastation that has afflicted Africa’s largest country for an entire generation. The current progress toward addressing the fundamental grievances of the south and other neglected areas has been historic. For the first time, the parties, not the mediators, are leading matters, setting the agenda and driving the compromises through the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) process.
It is important that final agreement not be rushed to satisfy artificial deadlines. Some kind of overall framework agreement is likely very soon, but in the time remaining before an end-of-year recess, it will not contain the critical details necessary for a comprehensive settlement. The international community will need to contain its satisfaction over such a document and keep pressure on the parties to return quickly to the negotiating table.
In particular, there should be no payout of the political or economic inducements the IGAD mediators and the observer countries (U.S., UK, Italy, Norway) and the EU hold as leverage until a comprehensive final agreement is achieved.
Many outstanding issues remain, such as ceasefire modalities, wealth and power-sharing arrangements, and the status of contested areas outside the south. However, ICG Special Adviser John Prendergast notes, “The spirit of compromise is powerful at the negotiating table, and the expectation for peace throughout Sudan is unprecedented. An agreement is imminent, but the nature of that agreement and the process which produces it will go a long way towards dictating whether it is implemented”.