Sudan peace parties agree on demilitarization of oilfields in south
November 1, 2007 (KHARTOUM) — The Sudanese government and the former rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM)reached an agreement on Thursday on a demilitarization of oilfields in southern Sudan.
The agreement came in a meeting of the Ceasefire Political Commission (CPC) between the two sides, the official SUNA news agency reported.
According to the arrangements, the oilfields in southern Sudan will be patrolled by joint units after the government and SPLM withdraw their forces from there.
"In today’s meeting, CPC has taken a series of decisions including the decision on the demilitarization of the oilfields by Jan. 9, 2008," CPC member al-Dardiri Mohammed Ahmed was quoted assaying.
He said that the SPLM should pull its forces out of those oilfields before the appointed time so that the joint units could be deployed at the defined positions to safeguard the oilfields.
The CPC, formed by the Sudanese government and the SPLM following the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) on Jan. 9, 2005, is mandated to monitor the implementation of the permanent ceasefire and security arrangements worked out by the two sides in the CPA.
The commission also decided that the government and the SPLM redeploy their forces respectively to the north and south of the1956 line by the third anniversary of the CPA signing, Ahmed said.
Under another decision taken in the CPC meeting, the cities in the south should be cleared out of all forms of military existence except bodyguards for important persons, Ahmed noted, adding that a UN team would go to southern Sudan to check the redeployment.
During the CPC meeting, the two sides reiterated their commitments to the arrangements relative to the ceasefire as well as what was stipulated in the peace agreement, according to Ahmed.
The latest decisions of the CPC can be helpful to remove a current political crisis in the Sudanese government, which was caused by a decision announced by the SPLM on Oct. 11 to suspend the participation of its ministers in the central government.
This is the most serious crisis for the Sudanese Government of National Unity since it was established in September 2005, in which the political power is shared mainly between the National Congress Party led by President Omer al-Bashir and the SPLM.
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