African mediators departed this morning from the venue of the Addis Ababa talks on South Sudan’s crisis in order to meet opposition leader Riek Machar, leaving the negotiations stalled for now.
Ethiopian diplomat Seyfoun Mesfin is leading the mediation on behalf of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), a regional bloc of East African countries. His delegation is said to have traveled to meet Machar today.
Yohannis Musa, the assistant spokesman of the Machar delegation, said at 10:00 a.m. today, “IGAD failed to convince the government to release the detained politicians and chose to continue separately with the rest of the agenda including the ceasefire.”
IGAD has pointed out that the political detainees themselves insisted their release should not be a precondition for a cessation of hostilities.
“Today the negotiations stopped temporarily because the IGAD delegation will travel to the place of the deputy head of the SPLM Dr. Riek Machar Teny, so that the delegation will consult with the deputy head of SPLM on the current issues here,” explained Musa.
“The international community asked us to sign a ceasefire agreement and from our party we think that we should handle all the issues together, for example the release of the detainees,” noted Musa.
Mediators left this morning at 7:00 a.m. and they are expected to return by evening. It is not disclosed where they are heading, since the whereabouts of Machar are hitherto unknown.
Michael Makuei, in a statement at 1:00 p.m. said “as soon as they come back we will continue with the negotiations on the cessation of hostilities and we are optimistic that we will sign the cessation of hostiliteies agreement as soon as the envoys come back from their mission.”
He called the mission to Machar “a matter of courtesy” since the diplomats had earlier also paid a visit to the head of the other party, President Salva Kiir.
Photo: Shoes of the negotiators at the opening of the Addis Ababa talks on 4 January 2014 (AP)