Africa

Response by the Sudan Liberation Movement to statement by the United States, United Kingdom & Kingdom Of Norway on cessation of violence in Darfur

By Abdul Wahid al-Nur

Dear President Trump, Prime Minister May and Prime Minister Solberg:

Abdel Wahid Al-Nur (ST)

The leadership of the SLM appreciates the concern voiced by the US, UK and Norway over the desperate plight of the civilian population of Darfur enduring continued, genocidal violence and state terror by the military and paramilitary forces of the Sudanese dictatorship. We further embrace your call for Khartoum to end the embargo on sorely needed humanitarian aid reaching the region, and to cease impeding access to the combined AU and UN peacekeepers in UNAMID. We have long called for both and not merely urged such measures but begged the international community to intervene decisively to lift the humanitarian blockade long used as a tool of subjugation and to strengthen the UNAMID mission, thus reforming its weak and severely constricted operational posture that barely qualifies as peacekeeping, while repeatedly appealing for the adoption of a more appropriate and muscular peace enforcement mandate that better corresponds to reality.

However, our sharply divergent understanding of what this reality constitutes, far away from the opulence of the White House, No.10 Downing Street and Inkognitogata 18, as we endure the horrors you are not witnessing to nor could ever imagine occurring on a daily basis in Washington, London and Oslo despite your own experience of terror, determines that we equally reject and decry the false equivalency in culpability for the most recent upsurge in bloodletting posited in your joint communique of June 19th.

In particular, we take exception to your assertion that the SLM's refusal to participate in the so-called peace process is the key obstruction to the resolution of the crisis in Darfur and that we are antagonists responsible for callously prolonging the suffering of the civilian population. On the contrary, despite our limited means and isolation, where we fight with little more than our will to resist annihilation and dispossession, the refusal of the Sudan Liberation Army to capitulate, forms the only line of defense protecting the civilian population from the regime's well established policy of extermination and ethnic cleansing that now includes the proven use of chemical weaponry, a subject you remain entirely mute towards, while condemning chemical warfare in Syria. SLA held liberated territory is the only sanctuary available to civilians in Darfur, imperfect as it is in the face of overwhelming government firepower that subjects non-combatants and combatants alike to routine artillery and aerial bombardments, gas attacks and as prevalent large scale incursions by government ground troops and the routine raiding, abductions, summary executions, gang rapes, torture sessions and razing of villages, that give weight to the charges brought by the International Criminal Court against President Omar al Bashir, as you are well aware, the sole sitting head of state indicted for War Crimes, Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity.

But then the Sudanese tyrant enjoys a process of rehabilitation overseen by the US, UK and the European Union, while the Arab League, African Union and Organization of Islamic Cooperation, as the UN itself dithers, also avert their eyes and ignore his crimes against his own people. But they remain visible to us, as we are his victims. Your passive complicity is deeply painful to us when anchoring our liberation struggle is a desire to free not only Darfur but the whole of Sudan. The crushing irony is that the dream we die for is to forge a pluralist and secular democracy in your own example.

When we are as committed as you are to confront Islamist extremism, we are incredulous you embrace a hardline Islamist dictatorship as a credible ally, that has not stopped fostering Salafist terror nor ceased its own state terror. In light of Russia's aggressive stance towards the whole of the West, efforts to undermine both American and European democracy, clear menace to NATO, and key role in Syria antithetical to Western aims in the Middle East, it is as bewildering to witness your nations whitewash Khartoum when al Bashir is deepening his military ties to the Kremlin and Russian mercenaries now have a presence in Sudan.

Western democracy is failing the people of Darfur and Sudan as a whole and betraying its own values and strategic aims in so doing. It neither gives us much cause for optimism that the United States has walked away from the UN Human Rights Council and earlier the US State Department closed its War Crimes Office, just as the UN Security Council has not seen fit to reverse the decision to dramatically reduce the size of an already understrength and under-resourced UNAMID mission, against all logic.

Your selective criteria ignore that we are defending our ancestral lands from expropriation and that those of us that have taken up arms come from the very same families subject to slaughter and starvation. The people are the SLM and the SLM is the people. To equate our actions with those of the regime is akin to labelling the Jewish partisans in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943 as morally equivalent to the Nazi SS storm troopers sent to liquidate them. We will not acquiesce to being compared to genocidaires, especially when the US has eased sanctions on the regime, the UK is quietly training members of the security services and the EU is funnelling hundreds of millions of Euros to active genocidaires. We remain as baffled that you insist we join a patently false and purely cosmetic peace process, where we find ourselves unable to register egregious human rights violations, a deliberately created humanitarian crisis and a scorched earth policy as good faith measures to foster constructive dialogue.

We urge all of you to better acknowledge that you are backing the wrong partner and the tide of history is against you. The Sudanese regime is in a state of growing collapse, the coherence of its institutions, like its social fabric, ruinous economy, dysfunctional government and even restive elements in the armed forces and ruling party all point to a looming failed state. The ferocity of the regime in Darfur and widespread repression across the country, seeking to quash the anger of a citizenry that has not seen the light of freedom since 1989, is not a display of strength but instead desperation, in the twilight of a doomed dictator seeking to avoid his Gaddafi moment.

We are not your enemy. We long instead for peace, prosperity and a free society to flourish, where with your aid in achieving this goal, you would find in us a lucid and faithful ally and partner in securing stability in Sub-Saharan Africa and the greater region. But browbeating us into submission and asking us to willingly go to our own execution, this betrayal of our own people, when we have buried more than half a million of them, though the UN inexplicably stopped counting the dead in 2008, is not something we will ever countenance.

In closing all we may offer in good conscience is for SLA troops to observe a ceasefire and return to their bases, if indeed international pressure will be brought to bear to concretely allow UNAMID to effectively protect civilians, patrol and uphold a clear demarcation line between ourselves and government forces and for unhindered humanitarian aid to flow into affected areas, displaced civilians having the right of return without fear of reprisal, the proposed dismantling of IDP camps be abrogated and all of Darfur opened to unfettered access to international media and human rights investigators. We have nothing to hide and would welcome such steps. But unless such conditions can be met, we will adhere to our God-given right of self-defence if attacked and government aggression against us or the civilian population will not go unanswered militarily nor see us lay down our arms.

We sincerely doubt were it 1941 that the United States would have readily surrendered to Imperial Japan after Pearl Harbor, nor that Britain would have capitulated during the Blitz in 1940 when it stood alone against Nazi Germany after the defeat of the British Expeditionary Force and the fall of France or that the Free Norwegian Forces and resistance members would have ever given up their struggle against occupation after the valiant sacrifice of the Royal Norwegian Armed Forces against the same Nazi juggernaut. The Sudanese regime is also composed of fascists, militarists, butchers and ideological zealots, do not ask us to do what you would not do yourselves faced with the same circumstances.

* The author is the Chairman Sudan Liberation Movement & Commander in Chief Sudan Liberation Army

The BBC gains rare access to the world's youngest nation, torn apart by five years of civil war.

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June 19, 2018 (JUBA) – All the warring parties involved in the conflict in South Sudan must immediately halt using sexual violence as a tactic of war, which is happening on an appalling scale in the country and with impunity, various European heads of missions said Tuesday.

President Salva Kiir addresses the nation at the South Sudan National Parliament in Juba, November 18, 2015. (Photo Reuters/Jok Solomon)

The message was contained in a statement jointly issued by the Heads of Mission of Canada, Denmark, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, Britain and the United States (US).

“The use of sexual violence as a tactic of war is totally abhorrent, and sadly continues today unabated. We are shocked by the recent rape and gang-rape of over one hundred women and girls, some as young as four years-old, according to a number of reports,” partly reads the joint statement.

It added, “We condemn in the strongest terms these heinous acts and support the UN's [United Nations] call for the immediate end to attacks against civilians.

Expressing their solidarity with the survivors of conflict-related sexual violence, the various head of missions also recalled the ongoing plight of the many civilians affected by violence in South Sudan.

“We are horrified by brutal attacks around Leer and Mayendit in Unity State, as well as in Equatoria. Since the start of 2018, and despite the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement (COHA) and ongoing peace process, we have witnessed the deliberate targeting and killing of civilians, including children, disabled people and the elderly; with some civilians being burned alive in their homes; abductions and mass displacement of populations; and attacks on medical and humanitarian personnel and facilities,” further noted the statement.

Fighting broke out in South Sudan in 2013 after President Salva Kiir (a Dinka) sacked his deputy, Riek Machar (a Nuer), pitting the country's two largest ethnic groups against each other in a deadly struggle for supremacy. Since then fighting has taken place across multiple fronts, as rebel groups have spread across Africa's youngest nation.

According to UN humanitarian affairs agency (OCHA), conflict and insecurity have now forcibly displaced 1 in 3 of the country's population, either within South Sudan or across borders. As such, however, the UN has projected that the number of refugees could cross the 3 million mark by the end of this year, making South Sudan Africa's largest refugee crisis since the 1994 Rwanda genocide.

(ST)

June 19, 2018 (KAMPALA) – Ugandan Police have deployed at Rhino Camp settlement in the West Nile district of Arua after three South Sudanese refugees were killed in a football World Cup game fight.

South Sudanese refugees attend independence day celebrations at Kirayandongo resettlement camp 9, July 2017 (ST)

The West Nile Regional Police spokesperson, Josephine Angucia said they discovered a body dumped in the bush on Tuesday.

She identified the body as that of 32-year-old Aleu Anei Aleu.

On Sunday night, two Dinka tribesmen identified as Nabuk Jimak, 50, and his son Majok, 18 were killed in the fight, Police authorities said.

Violence, according to eyewitnesses, broke at a video hall in Tika zone, where a group of South Sudanese refugees were watching Sunday's World Cup game played between Brazil and Switzerland.

Police investigations show violence ensued following a disagreement among the refugee youths who were supporting the different teams.

"Before the fight, police dispersed the crowd but they went and reorganized, resulting into some of the Nuer youths attacking the Dinka community," the Regional Police Commander, Jonathan Musinguzi told Daily Monitor Tuesday.

Police said youth from the two rival tribes were found hiding with pangas, clubs in bushes as they planned to retaliate, adding that three refugees were picked from the bush where they were hiding.

Ugandan officials have appealed to the members from the two communities to seek dialogue and urged them to live in harmony.

Meanwhile, the Arua military brigade commander, Col. Bernard Tuhame said acts of violence will not be accepted in the camps.

"Why should you kill just because of football? We will investigate why the matches were organised to be watched in the camps because these people still have tribal grudges,” Tuhame was quoted saying.

Last month, violence broke up in Omugo settlement camp after South Sudanese refugees protested delay by relief agencies to deliver food supplies to them, destroying computers and looting several items.

(ST)

June 19, 2018 (JUBA/KHARTOUM) - The European Commission announced on Tuesday a €68 million in humanitarian assistance for vulnerable communities in both Sudan and South Sudan.

European flags are seen outside the European Commission headquarters in Brussels (Reuters Photo)

The funding, the Commission said, comes as millions of people across both countries are in need of assistance, with the conflict in South Sudan triggering an influx of refugees into neighbouring Sudan.

"The EU is stepping up its support as many people in Sudan and South Sudan face massive humanitarian needs. Our aid will provide essential supplies such as food and healthcare and allow our partners to continue their lifesaving work on the ground,” said Christos Stylianides, the Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management.

“Above all, it is crucial that humanitarian workers can deliver aid safely so they can help those most in need. Aid workers are not a target,” he added.

In South Sudan, according to the Commission, €45 million will primarily target internally displaced persons and host communities, providing emergency food assistance, health, nutrition, shelter, water and sanitation as well as protection from gender based violence. Funding will also support measures to protect aid workers.

Tens of thousands of people have been killed and millions displaced by the conflict in South Sudan. Also, an estimated up to 101 aid workers have been killed since the conflict started in December 2013, and violent attacks on humanitarian workers are still on the rise.

However, despite the increasing impediments on the delivery of humanitarian assistance, the European Union (EU) is among the biggest donors of humanitarian aid in the world's youngest nation.

On the other hand, it said, at least €23 million will ensure protection of displaced communities, treatment of under nutrition in the most affected areas, as well as food assistance and improved access to basic services such as health, shelter, water and sanitation in Sudan.

Meanwhile, to date, the Commission has reportedly mobilised over €412 million in humanitarian aid for South Sudan since fighting erupted in December 2013. Since 2011, the EU has reportedly also provided almost €450 million in humanitarian aid in Sudan for those affected by conflict, natural disasters, food insecurity and malnutrition in the country.

(ST)

June 19, 2018 (KHARTOUM) - The Troika countries have denounced the ongoing fighting between the Sudanese army and the rebel Sudan Liberation Movement -Abdel Wahid in Jebel Marra area of Darfur saying this "unnecessary violence" affects only the civilians.

Since last March, the two warring parties resumed clashes in different parts of the mountainous area. As a result of the government gradually began massing troops and intensified the fighting.

last week, a military source said the government mobilize more than 2,000 troops including the Rapid Support Forces to retake several positions in Jebel Kali and Badia areas claiming the rebel captured taking advantage of the unilateral cessation of hostilities.

"The civilian population continues to bear the brunt of this unnecessary violence, which has led to the burning down of villages, causing high numbers of civilian injury and death, and the displacement of nearly 9,000 people," the Troika countries (Norway, the United Kingdom and the United States) stressed in a statement on Tuesday.

Regarding the Sudanese government, the three countries condemned the denied of humanitarian access to the conflict zones and "strongly urges the Government of Sudan to immediately provide unfettered access to both UNAMID and humanitarian actors.

CALL FOR SANCTION

The statement further pointed to the refusal of the rebel SLM-AW to take part in the peace process saying its position "obstructs the achievement of sustainable peace in Darfur and unnecessarily prolongs civilian suffering".

The Troika, also, said the government military operations undermines the efforts to end the conflict through a negotiated solution.

"There can be no military solution to the conflict in Darfur and the international community should consider imposing sanctions against those who continue to act as spoilers," stressed the statement.

The United Nations Security Council is set to vote a resolution drafted by the penholder on Darfur, United Kingdom, extending the mandate of the UNAMID for one year. This resolution further provides to close 14 peacekeeping sites in the whole region but maintains 13 sites in Jebel Marra.

The statement called to allow unfettered humanitarian access and to "meaningfully engage" with the African Union High-Level Implementation Panel (AUHIP)-led peace process in order to reach a permanent ceasefire.

Two holdout armed groups, SLM-Minnawi and Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) are engaged in peace talks with the government. The mediators hope to finalize a pre-negotiation agreement and to start peace talks before the end of December 2018.

The SLM-AW boycotts any peace talks with the government and refuses to declare a unilateral cessation of hostilities. The SLM-MM and JEM from one side and the government are committed to a unilateral ceasefire in Darfur.

(ST)

June 19, 2018 (JUBA) - The South Sudan Opposition Alliance (SSOA) has rejected the IGAD Revised Bridging Proposal to end the four-and-half year conflict in the country, saying it avoided considering crucial outstanding issues.

On Monday, the IGAD mediation closed the Intensive Interlinked Consultations (IICs) and decided to refer the outstanding issues in the power-sharing chapter to the IGAD Council of Ministers to resolve and then submit it to the IGAD head of states and governments summit on Thursday 21 June.

In parallel, the regional block counts on a meeting on Wednesday between President Riek Machar and his main rival Riek Machar to reach a compromise on three disputed issues: the composition of the government, le parliament, and the state governments.

Feeling that they are marginalized in the process, the SSOA said concerned about the way outstanding issues were "glossed over" by the mediation; stressing that their positions were not considered in all the mediation's proposals for the resolution of issues pertaining to Governance and security arrangements.

The opposition alliance further exposed their different positions for a lean government, de-concentration of powers of the President, technocrats' government during the Transitional Period, restoration of the ten (10) States, and devolving power and the requisite resources to the States and Local governments.

The alliance stressed that their propositions are the prerequisites for a sustainable peace and rejected the Revised Bridging Proposal which takes into consideration only the government's positions.

"We shall never be part of a deal that carries the seeds of its own failure because that failure costs lives, resources and disrupting social fabric. Only a transparent and inclusive negotiated agreement can deliver a sustainable peace to South Sudan," said the SSOA in a statement extended to Sudan Tribune on Tuesday.

The mediation says the purpose of the final IICs meeting was to "to identify possible compromises and build consensus on the bridging proposal”.

Government spokesperson Minister Michael Makuei Lueth said the outstanding issues would be discussed in the face-to-face meeting between Kiir and Machar on Wednesday.

Following what and based on its outcome the IGAD Council of Minister will formulate a position that to be referred to the heads of state and government for consideration.

However, the SSOA called on the "IGAD Summit of heads of State and Government to ensure that the root causes of the problems are addressed in order to achieve a just and sustainable peace".

(ST)

June 19, 2018 (KHARTOUM) - Ahead of major decisions to further downsize the African Union-United Nations Mission in Darfur (UNAMID), Human Rights Watch (HRW) called on the UN Security Council to ensure that human rights monitoring is ensured in the whole region.

On 11 June, the Security Council was briefed on a report on the UNAMID strategic review providing to close the remaining 14 protection sites in Darfur and to concentrate its activities in the Greater Jebel Marra which will host also the operation headquarters, until its definitive closure in 2020.

This decision is based on the end of violence in the region, except in some parts of the mountainous area of Jebel Marra, and the deployment of the government troops in the region. However, reports from the region point to persisting disputes over land ownership as the returnees find their villages inhabited by other groups.

“The UN's proposed cuts would effectively end the peacekeeping mission's core human rights and protection role in most of Darfur, which would be a mistake,” said Mausi Segun, Africa director at Human Rights Watch.

“The Security Council needs to ensure that UNAMID will continue monitoring and reporting publicly on abuses throughout Darfur or it will share responsibility for pushing Darfur off the world's agenda,” he further stressed.

In a regular report to the 15-member body on 1 June, the UN Secretary-General admitted that the reconfiguration “would no longer allow UNAMID to continue the monitoring, verification and reporting of protection of civilians' issues outside the greater Jebel Marra area”.

The African Union Commission's special report proposes that the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights opens an office in Sudan.

However, HRW said “The Sudanese government's long practice of intransigence and obstruction leaves little hope that the office would be able to fill the vacuum left by UNAMID”.

Also, the human rights group recalled that the UN special representative of the secretary-general on sexual violence in conflict last February raised concerns about continued reports of sexual violence against displaced women and girls in Darfur.
For his part, the UN independent expert on human rights in Sudan last April said that government security forces committed sexual violence against women and girls in the western Sudan region.

“Everything we know about Darfur indicates a pressing need for human rights monitors to continue their work (…),” said Segun before to emphasize that “The Security Council shouldn't adopt this shortsighted proposal, but instead should keep a spotlight on Darfur.”

The Security Council will finalize its discussions on the UNAMID downsize and the adoption of a new resolution extending its mandate for another year on 28 June.

(ST)

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June 18, 2018 (KHARTOUM) - An advocacy group for the promotion of press freedom worldwide Monday called on the Sudanese security service to halt censorship of news outlets, questioning journalists, and revoking reporters' accreditation.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)'s call comes the recent seizure for several times of the entire run-prints of two dailies Al-Tayyar and Al-Youm Altali, and the interrogation of two journalists Shamael al-Nur of Al-Tayyar and Ahmed Younes, the correspondent for the London-based paper Al-Sharq al-Awsat.

In a statement released on Monday, the CPJ said they sent the request by email to the Sudanese authorities

The made its call in an email sent to the National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS) adding they did not yet get a response from them.

"Sudanese authorities cannot hide behind the censor every time a journalist expresses a critical opinion or exposes harsh realities," said CPJ Middle East and North Africa Program Coordinator Sherif Mansour.

"Sudanese authorities must stop harassing the independent press, and let the media work and publish freely," he further added.

Ahmed Younes who was interrogated early this month told Sudan Tribune that the (NISS) withdrew his licence and stopped him from reporting to his London based newspaper. While al-Nur said she had been ordered to stop writing negatively or positively about President Omer al-Bashir.

The two journalists wrote recently about the al-Bashir's candidature for the elections of 2020 which is not yet official but raise heated debate in the country as many call for his departure after 30 years of rule.

(ST)

June 18, 2018 (JUBA) - After days of competition between the IGAD countries fuelled by Juba hesitation, the face-to-face meeting between Riek Machar and Salva Kiir will be held in Addis Ababa next Wednesday.

Mrs Hirut Zemene, Ethiopian State Minister of Foreign Affairs was the first to confirm that Addis Ababa will be the venue of the crucial meeting. Also, several rebel officials including SPLM-IO deputy director of information and public relations Puok Both Baluang, confirmed that Machar will fly to Addis Ababa.

Officials in Juba, also, confirmed that finally, Juba has opted for Addis Ababa, pointing to the role recently the Ethiopian government played at the level of the UN Security Council to foil a the vote on a draft resolution imposing sanctions on South Sudanese officials.

Juba, last Friday called to hold the meeting in South Africa saying Addis Ababa, Khartoum or Nairobi have competing interests. But rebel officials said it was simply because Juba wants him to remain far from the region.

Sudan, which sought to mobilize regional support for its initiative to host the meeting, didn't issue any statement on the rejection of the South Sudanese officials for Khartoum.

The meeting will discuss three outstanding issues on the power-sharing chapter in the 2015 peace agreement: 1-the percentage of each party in the composition of the cabinet, 2-ratios of every party in the National Legislative Assembly and the state governments.

Machar will arrive on Tuesday to Addis and will meet Ethiopian officials before to meet President Kiir on Wednesday.

The Ethiopian officials will seek to convince the two leaders to make the needed concessions for a successful meeting and to avoid its failure.

The face to face meeting will be followed by two meetings on 21 June, the first by the IGAd Council of Ministers and the second for the head of States and Governments.

(ST)

Children fetch clean water from ICRC water points in Muglad, Southern Kordofan State (ICRCJ. Guitter/file Photo)

June 18, 2018 (KHARTOUM) - Heavy rain and strong winds on Sunday have caused varying injuries among residents and destroyed 120 houses at Nabota area in the locality of Al-Tadamon, South Kordofan State.

The official news agency SUNA on Monday said 50 houses have been destroyed completely while 70 others were damaged partially; adding dozens of cattle have perished.

According to the agency, the commissioner of Al-Tadamon Abdallah Abdel-Samad visited the area and instructed to form a committee to assess the damage.

Abdel-Samad stressed his government's commitment to address the situation and provide the necessary support to the affected in coordination with the national aid groups.

(ST)

June 18, 2018 (ADDIS ABABA) - South Sudanese parties concluded the IGAD brokered round of Intensive Interlinked Consultations (IICs) on Monday without an agreement on the governance chapter, and it was decided to refer the outstanding issues to the face-to-face meeting of the rival leaders.

The IGAD Council of Ministers, last May, decided to hold the IICs to assist South Sudanese parties to reach a common ground on the outstanding issues of security arrangements and governance.

The 16-18 June discussions, which are part of the High-Level Revitalisation Forum (HLRF), are based on the IGAD revised Bridging Proposal prepared by the mediation after the failure of the parties to ink the initial version last May.

Speaking to reporters after the three-day meeting, Information Minister Michael Makuei Lueth said the parties have reached an agreement on security arrangements but he denounced the opposition, saying it stuck to its positions on the governance because of the face-to-face meeting.

"On the security arrangements, the (negotiating) teams managed to make progress and the provisions which have been agreed upon are now being prepared in their final form and will be initialled by the generals tonight," said Lueth.

The minister who is also the government spokesperson added that despite the additional concessions they made the opposition continued to make "impossible demands".

Accordingly, he said, it was decided that the outstanding issues on the governance chapter will be addressed by President Salva Kiir and SPLM-IO leader Riek Machar in their meeting on 20 June in Addis Ababa.

"I believe this face-to-face meeting that made the opposition to be rather adamant and not ready to listen to the voice of peace," he said.

The outcome of the IICs will be submitted to the IGAD Council of Ministers which will meet in the morning of 21 May. It will be followed by a Summit of Heads of State and Government, which will be held on the same day in the afternoon in Addis Ababa.

The initial Bridging Proposal on the power-sharing had been refused by the opposition but also the government strongly resisted several matters particularly the dissolution of the National Legislative Assembly and percentage of the opposition at the State governments.

Speaking about main three issues that led to the failure of the consultations, the minister who is also a member of the government negotiating team disclosed that the differences are related to the composition of the executive, the parliament and the state governments.

The government rejected the dissolution of the parliament and the appointment of 400 legislators as it proposed in the IGAD Bridging Proposal saying "this is a red line".

Makuei said his government only accepts to increase the membership of the existing parliament during the transitional period by adding 100 lawmakers. The SPLM-IO will be given 70 seats and the 30 remaining seats will be allocated to the other opposition groups.

For the cabinet, he said they have made a "very serious concession" accordingly the all the opposition groups including the SPLM-IO will be allocated 30% of the government 32 portfolios.

The IGAD proposed to increase the portfolios to 42 ministers and 15 deputy ministers.

Regarding the state governments, the government delegation brushed aside the IGAD proposition to which provides that 55% of the governorship will go to the government, 25% to the SPLM-IO and 20% to the other opposition groups.

"In the states, we said the power-sharing will be 80% for the government and 20% for the opposition groups even in the states where the opposition has no presence," said the government spokesperson.

He added this these ratios will apply only for the executive but do not include the state legislative assemblies or the local governments.

In the IGAD Bridging Proposal, the power-sharing applies to apply to governorships, the executive councils of the States, and, the legislative assemblies of the States.

The minister expressed hope that after "the face-to-face meeting, we will be in a position to probably to better straights towards achieving peace in South Sudan".

South Sudanese government officials told Sudan Tribune that they expect that Kiir-Machar meeting would not make a tangible difference in the positions of the two sides.

They hope the IGAD mediation would continue to improve the text in a way that a compromise can be possible between the two main rivals in the near future.

(ST)

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