KHARTOUM: Referring the flashpoint Abyei issue to the United Nations Security Council could spark a new war in the area, Sudan’s Foreign Minister Ali Karti warned yesterday, according to official media.
Sudan and South Sudan failed to meet an African Union deadline to reach an agreement on the final status of the contested oil-producing region by December 5.
An AU decision in October said that if the two countries could not settle the issue themselves, they would be bound by an AU proposal for a referendum in October next year. The AU said it would also seek UN Security Council endorsement of its proposal.
But Karti said a referral to the UN body “will complicate the issue and threatens a new conflict,” the official Suna news agency reported him telling the Chinese ambassador.
“Karti renewed Sudan’s demand that the difference between Sudan and South Sudan shall be settled within the African framework,” Suna reported.
Sudanese troops withdrew from Abyei in May after a year-long occupation that sent more than 100,000 people fleeing towards South Sudan. The area is now controlled by Ethiopian UN peacekeepers.
Under the proposal made by AU mediators, a referendum on whether Abyei joins Sudan or South Sudan would give members of the Dinka, a dominant South Sudanese tribe who live in the Abyei area, the right to vote along with Sudanese with “permanent abode”.
The nomadic Arab Misseriya tribe, who regularly graze their animals and move through Abyei, have objected to the plan.
El Shafie Mohammed El Makki, head of political science at the University of Khartoum, said that pushing through the AU plan without consideration of the Misseriya position will lead to violence.
“These tribes are very militant. They will fight,” he said.
An African diplomat said it would be a bad precedent for similar disputes in Africa and elsewhere if a settlement were imposed as written in the AU’s decision.
Meanwhile, a US official said yesterday that a peace deal for Sudan’s Darfur region had been hindered by a lack of funding, the failure to disarm militias, attacks on peacekeepers and other problems nearly a year and a half after it was signed.
Years of international efforts have failed to end a nearly decade-long rebellion in Darfur, where mostly non-Arab insurgents took up arms in 2003 to fight against what they called the Arab-dominated government’s neglect of the region.
Sudan’s counter-insurgency campaign mobilised troops and allied militias, unleashing a wave of violence. Human rights groups estimate hundreds of thousands of people died in the ensuing conflict. AFP/Reuters
