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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Sudan rebels, government sign pre-pact

Maggie Farley Los Angeles Times

UNITED NATIONS – Sudan’s government signed a preliminary peace deal Friday with rebels from the country’s south, edging one step closer to a comprehensive accord to end Africa’s longest running civil war.

But the continuing violence in the western region of Darfur cast a shadow over celebrations.

Delegates from the warring sides initialed the two final chapters of an eight-part pact that spell out a power-sharing agreement and a permanent cease-fire.

The deal, three years in the making, gives the southern rebels seats in the government, and guarantees them a stream of revenue from the country’s oil wealth to spur development. It integrates the militaries and grants the southern region a chance to opt for self-determination after six years.

A final peace accord is set for Jan. 9 in Nairobi, Kenya, where rebel leader John Garang and Vice President Ali Osman Mohamed Taha will sign all eight parts of the peace deal. In November, the two leaders promised the U.N. Security Council and Secretary-General Kofi Annan during a special session in Nairobi that they would end the war by the end of the year as, they said, “a New Year’s present” to the Sudanese people.

The 21-year-long war began when national leaders in Khartoum, the capital, tried to impose Islamic law on the largely Christian and animist south. The conflict was complicated by disputes over oil and governance. An estimated 2 million people have died, mainly through starvation and disease, and about 4 million have been displaced.

People who helped negotiate the peace know that it will be even harder to implement it.

“This is very important for the future of Sudan and a major accomplishment,” said John Danforth, U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Danforth helped launch the peace talks in 2001 and orchestrated the special Nairobi session last month. “But there’s more work to be done,” he said.

The peace accord does not cover a separate conflict in the western region of Darfur, which has caused what the United Nations has called the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. Khartoum retaliated against attacks by the western rebels in February 2003, using proxy militias to root them out.

But the offensive escalated out of control and entire villages were wiped out in the process. Thousands of black African farmers were killed, women raped and nearly 2 million displaced from their land by the attacks that the U.S. government has called genocide.

Critics have accused the United States and United Nations of focusing on the north-south peace talks to the detriment of solving the Darfur crisis.