President Isaias Afwerki arrived in Juba city to participate in the official celebrations marking the declaration of the Republic of South Sudan due to take place today.

The President was accorded warm welcome by senior officials and Commanders of the Government of South Sudan and that of the Sudanese People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM).

Earlier, an Eritrean government delegation headed by Foreign Minister Osman Saleh that included Mr. Yemane Gebreab, Head of Political Affairs at the PFDJ, and Mr. Abdala  Jabir, Head of Organizational Affairs at the Front arrived in Juba on July 6 to take part in the celebrations.

It is to be recalled that 98.8% of the people of South Sudan voted for secession from North Sudan in the referendum conducted on 9 January 2011 in line with the comprehensive Naivasha peace agreement signed in 2005.

Shabait

Based on the recent news, South Sudan is set to secede with a 99.57 percent vote. For NBD, this means that we have to prepare ourselves to amend our constitution and start the preparatory work of opening an office in Southern Sudan. Our Board has expressed their support and commitment to the establishment of another office in Southern Sudan.

To foster Nile Cooperation it is imperative that Southern Sudan is brought on board as soon as possible, as one of the Nile Basin riparian countries. There is much gained by involving all the riparian countries in the Nile Cooperation Programmes and Processes. A link that has its roots in the community at the national level is critical to the success of all NBD Programmes and Interventions.

NBD is a powerful civil society force and voice that positively influences Nile Cooperation programmes and processes. More support from development partners to enable us to effectively discharge our mandate, in relation to Southern Sudan, will be highly appreciated.

Opening up an office in Southern Sudan enables NBD to improve service delivery. Best value requires NBD to provide services that are cost effective, of a good quality and meet the demands of the local community.

NBD embraces the current opportunity and will utilize it to raise public consciousness and encourage debate on Nile Cooperation issues, enhance education and lifelong learning for all members of the community and explore potential socio-political, economic, environmental and cultural benefits of cooperation.

ABOUT NBD

NBD Vision

Nile Basin Discourse’s (NBD) vision is of a Nile Basin where there is sustainable social and economic development for all peoples of the Nile Basin, free of conflict, leading to achievement of justice, human rights, good governance, poverty eradication and protection of the environment.

NBD Mission

NBD transforms lives by ensuring that a fully informed and basin-wide civil society develops and plays a key role in achieving the vision, through pro-active and critical influencing of projects, programmes and policies of the Nile Basin Initiative and other development processes.

What NBD Does

NBD enables the civil society organizations working on Nile Basin Cooperation and Development issues to add value to the inter-governmental programmes and processes. NBD is a network of civil society organizations with its secretariat base in Entebbe, Uganda. NBD works with national partners, its membership understand national issues, and provide NBD with the skills and support to help it set up and manage practical and sustainable projects that meet the real needs of the communities. The national members are the National Discourse Forums in the ten riparian states (Burundi, DRC, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda). NBD also works regionally and internationally to change policy and practice and ensure that issues of Nile Cooperation and Development are brought to fore and play a vital role in reducing poverty in the Nile Basin.

Together with a growing number of development NGOs, NBD is committed to carrying out advocacy work in order to maximize the impact of its programme activities and to meet regional Nile Cooperation and Development needs. NBD therefore aims to influence the policies and practice of the main decision-makers, donors and public, to gain their commitment to Cooperation and Development of the Nile Basin.

London – Band members from Pink Floyd, Radiohead and Snow Patrol have teamed up to call an end to the ongoing conflict in Sudan.

Drummers from the groups are taking part in the Beat for Peace campaign, a film which calls for an end to conflict in the African country after millions died in the civil war there, which ended in 2005.

The documentary, which is part of the wider Sudan 365 campaign, features other artists from Sudan, Australia and Japan as well.

“I wanted to be involved in this project because I think music is such a powerful way of bringing people together,” the Daily Express quoted Radiohead’s Phil Selway as saying of the drive created by Faithless drummer Jamie Catto.

“Of course, I’m biased in thinking that what’s underpinning it all is always the beat – always drummers!

“Hopefully this film will show that together people can make a huge noise and through this film I hope people’s focus will be brought back to what is happening in the Sudan over this very important next year,” he added.

A referendum is due to be held next January (11) on independence for the south of the country, but campaigners fear there could be a return to conflict this year. Source: (ANI)

KHARTOUM — Sudan’s leaders have settled their differences Sunday over the hotly disputed 2011 referendum on southern independence, the official news agency reported, clearing a main hurdle facing the fragile four year-old north-south peace deal.

The referendum bill has been straining relations between the former rivals for months.

Northern officials have demanded at least 75 percent of registered southern voters turn out in order for the referendum results to be valid. The south insists on a lower threshold.

Senior southern official Pagan Amum said President Omar al-Bashir and the southern President Silva Kiir met with their political advisers and finally agreed on the bill.

The two sides also agreed on the referendum rules for three areas laying on the yet undemarcated north-south border, including the oil-rich region of Abyei.

“We announce with this agreement the end of the disagreement between the (northern) National Congress Party and the (southern) Sudan People Liberation Movement over the three laws (on the referendum for the border areas). We will present them to the Parliament in two days,” Amum said, according to the official SUNA news agency.

He didn’t explain how the differences were settled. Southern officials said they are holding a party meeting to discuss the agreements.

The 2005 peace deal ended more than 20 years of civil war in which 2 million people perished.

The peace deal also created a national unity government and a semiautonomous south. It provides for nationwide parliamentary and presidential elections to be held in April 2010, and a referendum in 2011 to determine whether the south wanted to secede from the northern Arabized north.

As part of the peace deal, the two parties agreed to work to make unity attractive. But southerners, increasingly frustrated at the lack of peace dividends, have openly favored independence.

Many northerners fear the secession of the oil-rich south would deprive their government of the much prized oil revenues.

Last month, Kiir called on his people to vote for secession in the referendum if they do not want to end up as second class citizens. His call, the first ever favoring a split, angered his northern partner and was described as a violation of the spirit of the peace deal.

Southern officials complain the north is reneging on many elements of the peace deal, including power and resource sharing and abolishing laws that violate freedoms of expression and religion.

The partners are still bogged down in disagreement over the law regulating the responsibilities of the powerful national security services. Southerners and other opposition groups say the law in place grants the security agencies wide-sweeping powers, and undermines free and fair elections scheduled for April 2010.

Amum and other southern officials were briefly detained last week for participating in a rally demanding changes to the law. Source: (AP)

Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved

The Egyptian government called on African nations to provide support to the semi-autonomous South Sudan during a regional summit that was concluded today.

The Egyptian state media said that foreign minister Ahmed Aboul-Gheit met with his counterparts from Kenya, Uganda, Senegal, Liberia, Eritrea, Chad and Niger on the sidelines of the fourth Forum of China-Africa Cooperation at the Red Sea resort city of Sharm al-Sheikh.

The foreign ministry spokesperson Hossam Zaki told reporters that Aboul-Gheit discussed the Sudan issue during these meetings and his government’s efforts with the Sudanese parties aiming to reconcile differences between the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) and Sudan People Liberation Movement (SPLM) in the framework of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA).

Zaki quoted Aboul-Gheit as stressing the need to tackle the issue of the standards of living in South Sudan and tribal conflicts there. He urged his African counterparts to lend a hand to South Sudan in different areas.

Cairo is growing increasingly worried over the growing probability of South Sudan opting for independence in the 2011 referendum warning that this will further deepen poverty and ethnic violence in the new state.

South Sudan president Salva Kiir paid a visit to Cairo where officials there expressed hope that his citizens to vote for unity.

But Kiir told reporters after his meeting with Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak that Southern Sudanese will likely vote for independence because unity has become “unattractive” and blamed the NCP for stalling on CPA implementation.

Sources at the Government of South Sudan (GoSS) told Sudan Tribune that Kiir cut short his visit to Egypt “after feeling uncomfortable with the level of pressure exerted by Egyptian officials on the issue of preserving Sudan’s unity”.

Egypt is likely concerned over the its share in the Nile water if the South chooses to secede even though legal experts say that the water agreements are still binding to the new state.

The Egyptian government have stepped up its presence in South Sudan inaugurating projects in the health and education sector saying they hope it will make the unity choice more attractive. Source: (Sudan Tribune)

September 15 2009 (ASMARA) – Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki declared yesterday his support to southern Sudan rights and aspirations.

Sudanese First Vice President and President of Southern Sudan government paid a two day visit to Asmara where he had been arrived yesterday for talks with President Afwerki. The two leaders agreed to enhance bilateral relations between Eritrea and southern Sudan. Kiir returned today to Juba.

Following their meeting on Monday the Eritrean President “asserted the Eritrean government’s firm and enduring pledge towards ensuring the rights and aspirations of the people of South Sudan,” the official Shabait website reported.

Kiir’s visit to Asmara, in response to an invitation extended by the President Afwerki came months after unprecedented attack on the SPLM by the Eritrean leader who had accused the southern Sudan ruling part of corruption.

In his last May statements Afwerki also demanded the SPLM to declare a clear view on the future of Sudan.

According to the Eritrean information ministry website, President Isaias “pointed out that at the present delicate juncture in which the Sudan finds itself, the SPLM under the leadership of Mr. Salva Kiir Mayardit is expected to play a leading role.”

During the past years, Asmara which had bad relations with Khartoum supported the SPLM and the rest of the Sudanese opposition groups who had their headquarters in the Eritrean capital.

“Eritrea is one of the close friends of the people of South Sudan” said Salva Kiir who reaffirmed the SPLM’s willingness to boost relations with Eritrea, particularly in exchanging views on developments in the Sudan and enhancing mutual cooperation.

Kiir also discussed with Afwerki political developments in southern Sudan and expressed SPLM’s stance on Sudanese issues including Darfur conflict.

Further SPLM delegation headed by deputy chairman, Malik Agar held a meeting with an Eritrean delegation led Yemane Gebreab, head of Political Affairs at the Eritrean ruling part PFDJ where they agreed to strengthen relations between the PFDJ and the SPLM, as well as the ties between the two governments.

The two parties also discussed the CPA implementation and the ongoing discussion between the two peace partners over the border demarcation, elections and referendum bill.

President Afwerki also accepted an invitation extended by GOSS President Salva Kiir to visit southern Sudan. (SudanTribune)