S. Sudan president, ex-rebel leader agree to delay unity government - Uganda
South Sudan’s president and a former rebel leader
agreed on Thursday to delay forming a unity government for 100 days
beyond the Nov. 12 deadline, Uganda’s presidency said, buying time after
concerns that war could resume if the two sides were pushed.
South Sudanese President Salva Kiir and opposition leader Riek
Machar met in Uganda in a last-ditch effort to resolve outstanding
disputes that were preventing the formation of a coalition government in
time for the deadline. Kiir and Machar signed a peace deal in September
2018, under pressure from the United Nations, United States and
regional governments to end a five-year civil war that devastated the
world’s youngest country. Both sides blame each other for not meeting
milestones stipulated by the peace deal, especially the integration of
different fighting forces. Thursday’s meeting “was held in a cordial and
friendly atmosphere”, the Ugandan statement said. Both sides agreed
that there were “critical tasks” related to the deal that were not yet
complete, particularly related to “security arrangements and
governance”, it added. A spokesman for Machar praised the new agreement.
This is good and will enable the security arrangements to be completed
if resources are availed as required”, spokesman Lam Paul Gabriel told
Reuters by phone after the meeting ended. There was no immediate comment
from Kiir. This avoids the worst, even if it falls short of providing a
clear path to resolving the outstanding issues,” said Alan Boswell, a
senior analyst with Brussels-based think-tank International Crisis
Group. The regional mediators must step up at the highest levels to move
the peace process forward,” he said. Oil-producing South Sudan, which
became an independent country in 2011, plunged into civil war in 2013
after Kiir sacked Machar as vice president. The conflict killed an
estimated 400,000 people, triggered a famine and created Africa’s
biggest refugee crisis since the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
SECURITY FORCES
Kiir and Machar had traded accusations ahead of the meeting hosted
by Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni, as concerns grew that the
ceasefire would not hold after Tuesday’s deadline. Nothing has been
done” by the government to implement the peace deal, Machar’s spokesman
Puok Both Baluang told Reuters by phone on Wednesday. But Kiir told
parliament on Tuesday the government had paid more than $30 million to
cover the costs of implementing the deal. It was not clear how the money
was spent. His spokesman, Ateny Wek Ateny, declined to say why the
government had not released the total $100 million it had pledged to
spend. The different security forces were supposed to be registered,
disarmed, retrained and integrated. But even registration is incomplete,
the chairman of the international body monitoring the peace deal told
Reuters on Wednesday. Many commanders say they have not received enough
forms to register the forces, the chairman of the Ceasefire and
Transitional Security Arrangements Monitoring Mechanism said in a phone
interview. There are also shortages of food and medicine, Major General
Desta Abiche Ageno said. “We are now observing many of those registered
forces leaving designated sites.” Both Kiir and Machar have been
demanding shared control of the capital, a problem that has triggered
war twice already, Crisis Group noted earlier this week. Thursday’s
statement did not include any details on security plans for Juba. It
said that the two sides, along with governments in the region that are
monitoring the deal, had agreed to meet to review progress in 50 days.