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Sudan, South Sudan conflict: relations warming?
(Reuters) – Sudan President Omar Hassan al-Bashir said on Sunday he would not allow conflict with South Sudan to overshadow “strategic relations” with its people, striking a less confrontational tone over a crisis that has raised fears of war.
After South Sudan seized the contested Heglig oilfield last month, Bashir vowed to free the South’s citizens from the ruling Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) whom he called “insects”.
During a month of conflict, the United Nations condemned Sudan’s air strikes on South Sudan’s territory and international pressure forced the South to withdraw from Heglig.
The fighting prompted the U.N. Security Council to pass a resolution threatening sanctions if they did not follow an African Union (AU) roadmap to stop fighting and return to talks.
On Sunday Bashir said South Sudan government’s “infringements” on Sudan’s territory “and their muddying of the neighborly, brotherly relations between the two countries in a blatant way will not deflect us from our view of the future and our strategic relations with the people of South Sudan”.
“… We look with wisdom and foresight to well-established relations between us and the people of South Sudan,” said Bashir, speaking in an uncharacteristically mild manner, at a conference to discuss a five-year national strategic plan.
Khartoum and Juba say they have accepted the resolution. But Sudan has said it could find difficulty in implementing “parts” of it while South Sudan troops were still inside its territory and reserved the right to defend its land. South Sudan says these areas are its own.
