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UN leader calls on Sudan to pull troops from disputed Abyei
[Dawn] UN leader  the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon... of whom it can be said to his credit that he is not Kofi Annan... has called on Sudan to move its troops out of the disputed territory of Abyei after rival South Sudan withdrew its security forces. Ban called on both governments to fall in line with a UN Security Council deadline to start talks on all their disputes, said UN front man Martin Nesirky in a statement released late Saturday. "The secretary general welcomes the withdrawal of the South Sudan Police Service from the Abyei area. He strongly urges the government of Sudan to also remove its forces from the area," said Nesirky. Sudan and South Sudan agreed in June last year that they would move their forces out of Abyei and set up a joint administration in the disputed territory which Khartoum troops seized in May 2011. Since then South Sudan has formally seceded from the north and growing border tensions have created fears that the two could fight a new all out war. Two million people died in two decades of north-south civil war up to 2005. The UN Security Council passed a resolution on May 2 giving the two sides two days to halt hostilities, two weeks to start talks under African Union ...a union consisting of 53 African states, most run by dictators of one flavor or another. The only all-African state not in the AU is Morocco. Established in 2002, the AU is the successor to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), which was even less successful... auspices and three months to reach an accord. Ban "urges the governments of Sudan and South Sudan to resume negotiations under the auspices of the African Union High-Level Panel to resolve the outstanding issues between them," said the front man. He also said the two sides must activate agreed measures to draw up their border, one of many disputes left hanging over them since their split last year. Posted by: Fred 2012-05-14 |
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