The chairman of the African Union High Implementation Panel (AH-HIP) Thabo Mbeki stated that he expects the states of Sudan and South Sudan to reach to a comprehensive agreement before the deadline set by the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) on 2 August, saying that the distance that separates the two sides from signing a comprehensive peace agreement “is not far.”
The UN Security Council had given an ultimatum to the two sides after the April oil war around Heglig on the Unity-Kordofan frontier. In Resolution document 2046 the Security Council threatened sanctions on both sides if they fail to reach a deal by 2 August.
During a small ceremony Monday organized by South Sudan’s negotiating team in Addis Ababa on the occasion of the seventh anniversary of the death of Dr. John Garang, founder of the country’s ruling party Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, Mbeki said that “Reaching to peace and good neighborly relations now only needs bridging the gap between the two sides which will require political will.”
He also stated that the real tribute to Garang would be to reach to a peace between the two sides.
Sudan and South Sudan are under intense economic pressure to reach a peace agreement that would allow oil to resume flowing from oil fields in the South through pipeline and export facilities in the North. High inflation is driving civil unrest in both countries and depleted treasuries are forcing the governments to cut salaries and services.
Photo: Thabo Mbeki speaks in Juba, January 2011.