JUBA: US Secretary of State John Kerry said yesterday that South Sudan’s president would hold direct talks with the rebel chief to end the brutal civil war, as pressure mounted on the insurgents to attend.
After talks in Juba with President Salva Kiir, Kerry said the four-month-old war could not be allowed to rage on amid warnings of a slide towards genocide and famine.
Kerry spoke by telephone late yesterday with rebel commander Riek Machar, who has always said he was open to talks to end the conflict, but he has yet to officially confirm attendance.
“I told President Kiir that the choices that he and the opposition face are stark and clear,” Kerry told reporters. “The unspeakable human costs that we have seen over the course of the last months are unacceptable to the global community,” he added. “There could be major famine in the course of months ahead.”
Officials said Kerry has brandished the threat of targeted sanctions against Kiir and Machar, and the top US diplomat said he was hopeful the two sides would for the first time sit down for face-to-face talks in neighbouring Ethiopia. Kerry said Kiir was “willing to travel to Addis Ababa... hopefully in order to engage in a discussion with the (Ethiopian) prime minister and hopefully with Riek Machar”.
“President Kiir was very open... to take forceful steps in order to end the violence and implement the cessation of hostilities agreement and to begin to engage with respect to a transitional government,” he said.
Kerry urged Machar “to participate in a meeting as early as next week... to discuss bringing an end to violence,” a US State Department official said. Machar “expressed openness to participating”, the official added.
The conflict started on December 15 with Kiir accusing Machar of attempting a coup. Machar then fled to the bush to launch a rebellion, insisting the president had attempted to carry out a bloody purge of his rivals.
Kerry’s unannounced visit has been the most determined push yet for an end to the war, which has seen the world’s youngest nation collapse amid a brutal cycle of war crimes by both sides including ethnic massacres, rape and child soldier recruitment.
Last month hundreds of people were massacred by rebels in the northern oil-hub of Bentiu, including in churches, mosques and hospitals, while a pro-government mob shot dead dozens of unarmed civilians sheltering in a UN base in the town of Bor.
The violence has left thousands dead — and possibly tens of thousands — with at least 1.2 million people forced to flee their homes, many living in appalling conditions in overstretched UN bases.
Aid agencies are also warning that South Sudan is on the brink of Africa’s worst famine since the 1980s, with the United Nations demanding at least a one-month-long truce so that crops can be planted and food stocks boosted.
The United States has also been under pressure to intervene, having been a key backer of South Sudan’s push for independence from Khartoum and having poured in billions of dollars in aid to the country since it split from Sudan in 2011.
Speaking before his meeting with Kiir, Kerry signalled that Washington had lost patience, saying on Thursday that he was “frankly disappointed” by the conduct of both Kiir and Machar, whose bitter rivalry has sparked a wave of ethnic killings between their respective Dinka and Nuer tribes.
AFP
