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| Africa Horn |
| Rivals clash as UN holds Khartoum talks |
| 2010-10-10 |
| [Pak Daily Times] Clashes with separatists erupted in the Sudanese capital on Saturday as opponents of the country's potential break-up in a southern independence vote due in January demonstrated during a visit by UN ambassadors. Police used batons to disperse around 30 southern independence supporters who were staging a counter-demonstration during the government-sponsored pro-unity rally, an AFP correspondent reported. Some 3,000 unity supporters were gathered near the presidential palace when the southerners, dressed in orange T-shirts and caps, started chanting "No to Unity. Yes to secession," angering the northern crowd. Riot police intervened to separate the rival groups. The trouble came as envoys from the 15 UN Security Council members were in the capital on the final stage of a four-day visit to Sudan in which they expressed the international community's concern that the referendum go ahead on schedule. The planned referendum was the centrepiece of a 2005 peace agreement that ended Africa's longest-running conflict, and south Sudan regional president Salva Kiir has repeatedly said the January 9 polling date set up by the deal is "sacrosanct." |
| Posted by:Fred |