President Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya and Ethiopian Prime minister Hailemariam Dessalegn visited Juba on Thursday where they meet with President Salva Kiir and a number of his detained political opponents.
Michael Makuei, Minister of Information, said “They came today to understand the situation first hand and to report tomorrow to the IGAD summit,” which is scheduled for today in Nairobi.
Ethiopian Foreign Minister Tedros Adhanom said that Uhuru, Kiir and Dessalegn had a ‘very constructive and very candid’ meeting, after which they met with the cabinet members of the council of ministers of the government of South Sudan.
Adhanom said that the issues discussed included a potential cessation of hostilities, the immediate start of talks, the detainees who are accused of the coup attempt, and the humanitarian crisis.
He noted that the “leaders also have underlined that the unconstitutional means to remove the democratically elected government should be condemned and they have condemned that and any solution to this crisis should be through political dialogue and the IGAD countries and the two leaders who are here will do their best to solve this problem amicably.”
The outcome of the meeting yesterday is to be presented at the IGAD summit in Nairobi today. IGAD, the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development, is an association of East African states.
Minister of Foreign Affairs in Kenya Amina Mohamed said “our interest is in ensuring that the political process be started as quickly as possible, that also that violence should stop.”
She also called their visit “a show of encouragement, a show of support and understanding and hopefully of encouragement to ensure that we move forward on this issue.”
South Sudan’s foreign minister likewise called the visit of the two heads of state ‘very constructive’. He added that South Sudan is ready to participate in the IGAD summit on Friday, though he did not specify who would represent the government at the talks.
Barnaba Marial said that that the crisis “will be solved politically and indeed we believe that the people of South Sudan truly thank the neighbours for having taken this initiative so it has been a wonderful day of meeting.”
Few details of the meeting with the opposition leaders emerged, but the government allowed some reporters to take photographs of the event. A photo released by BBC Africa shows the Kenyan president and Ethiopian prime minister meeting outside with alleged coup plotters Oyai Deng, Gier Chuang, Kosti Manibe, Majak D’Agoot, Pagan Amum, Peter Adwok Nyaba, Chol Tong, Deng Alor, John Luk and others.