May 21, 2012 (JUBA) - Hundred of citizens from the contested region of Abyei demonstrated across South Sudan and in the United States on Monday, according to an official from the area, in protest at the failure of the Sudanese government to withdraw troops from the area.
A resolution from the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) on May 2, as per a roadmap laid out by the African Union, called for both Sudan and South Sudan to withdraw armed forces from the area.
May 21, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – Sudanese government is expecting to get an important Arab support in a ministerial meeting to be held next month to discuss ways to boost peace and development in the troubled east African country.
Last March the Arab summit held in Bagdad decided to convene a special meeting at the level of foreign minister to discuss how the states members can support Sudan which is facing economic and political crisis.
21 May, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – Sudan’s Interior Minister Ibrahim Ahmad Mahmoud has revealed that their estimates on the number of Sudanese refugees in neighboring countries are vastly different from those of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR).
Speaking at a session of the council of states in the capital Khartoum on Monday, Mahmoud said that his ministry estimates the number of Sudanese refugees in neighboring countries to be in the region of 244,000.
May 20, 2012 (JUBA) - South Sudan on Sunday said it is time the international community imposes "steep sanctions" on the government of neighbouring Sudan for its "deliberate" failure to comply with a UN Security Council (UNSC) resolution calling for an end to hostilities and the immediate withdrawal of troops from the contested region of Abyei.
May 18, 2012 (BENTIU) - Recent fighting along the South Sudan-Sudan border has disrupted the education of many children in Unity State, which was bombed by the Sudan Armed Forces during the clashes in April.
Khartoum denies bombing its neighbour, despite the bombardment being reported by the United Nations, international and local media, as well as the South Sudanese authorities.
Mary Ayen left Port Sudan in May 2011 and reached Bor on July 18, 2011 but she is yet to get a plot to settle on or a shelter to cover her head and those of her five children. The same fate awaits 15,000 returnees Jonglei state is expected to receive in the next few weeks.
The Sudanese government will not recognize humanitarian surveys conducted by foreign aid groups in rebel-controlled areas of South Kordofan State, an official announced on Wednesday.
Khartoum has been blocking humanitarian assistance from reaching areas held by the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement North (SPLM-N) since the conflict in South Kordofan broke out in June last year.
Speaking in Juba after talks with South Sudan’s president Salva Kiir on Monday, Thabo Mbeki, the chair of African Union High Implementation Panel (AUHIP) said the resumption of negotiations would allow the two sides to take practical steps in implementing the African Union Peace and Security Council’s (AUPSC) roadmap agreed on last month.
The pan-African body’s timetable was endorsed by a United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolution in early May which threatened both sides with non-economic sanctions if they are found in non-compliance with the decision.
May 14, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – The ruling National Congress Party (NCP) in Sudan announced the formation of a committee that would review a resolution adopted by the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) earlier this month.
The resolution by the world body came in response to a breakdown in ties between Khartoum and Juba which led to the most serious military confrontation that erupted since Sudan’s breakup into two last July.
South Sudan army managed to briefly control Sudan’s oil-rich town of Heglig last month before Khartoum reclaimed it.
May 14, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – South Sudan’s decision to include disputed border regions such as Heglig in its new map is lacking in evidence, a Sudanese official argued on Sunday.
Earlier this month, the newly independent Republic of South Sudan revealed its new official map which incorporated territories whose ownership is also claimed by neighboring Sudan.
May 11, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – Continued insecurity in Sudan’s border regions of South Kordofan and Blue Nile has created an additional refugee population in neighboring South Sudan and Ethiopia, the UN reported on Friday.
UN has already estimated that more than 418,000 people have been displaced since fighting between Sudanese government forces and indigenous rebels erupted in South Kordofan in June last year and later spread to Blue Nile in September.
May 11, 2012 (BOR) - Three people have been killed and three others injured in attacks allegedly conducted by Murle tribesmen in Jonglei, local officials say, days after a "comprehensive peace deal" was signed between the state’s communities.
On Thursday 10 May a car belonging to the South Sudan Ministry of Roads and Bridges was traveling from Juba to Jonglei when its was attacked near Panwell village of Bangachorot. Two policemen were wounded and the driver was killed, according to Jonglei police.
May 10, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – Thousands of South Sudanese citizens stranded in the capital of Sudan’s White Nile State, Kosti, will be moved as of Saturday to Khartoum and flown to Juba afterward, an official has said.
White Nile’s governor, Yusuf al-Shambali, told Sudan’s official news agency (SUNA) on Thursday that the 12,000 South Sudanese stranded in Kosti for the last few months are now due to be moved to the capital Khartoum on Saturday 12 May.
May 10, 2012 (JUBA) - The Sudan Revolutionary Front (SRF), a coalition of the Sudanese rebels, on Thursday said it is seeking international support for “inclusive settlement” for the conflicts in Darfur, South Kordofan and Blue Nile and that it would not accept “selective” settlement.
UN Security Council on 2 May endorsed a road map prepared by the African Union to end the disputes between Sudan, South Sudan and the SPLM-N. The Resolution 2046 urged all the parties to comply with the decision and threatened to impose sanctions if they refuse to negotiate.
May 11, 2012 (KHARTOUM) - Darfur internally displaced persons (IDPs) warned of deteriorating humanitarian situation in western Sudan stressing that only 10% among them receive food rations.
Humanitarian agencies have been providing assistance to displaced people since the conflict began in 2003. However many were thrown out of the country in 2009 after Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir was indicted for war crimes, crimes against humanity - and the next year genocide - in the western region by the International Criminal Court (ICC).
May 10, 2012 (JUBA) - South Sudan said on Thursday it has withdrawn a significant number of its police forces from the contested border region of Abyei, apparently in compliance with the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolution endorsing African Union recommendations.
As well as calling on both sides to remove their armed forces from Abyei, the UNSC resolution also demanded that Juba and Khartoum return to the negotiating table to resolve a number of issues that arose from South Sudan’s independence last year.
May 10, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – South Sudan said it is prepared to immediately resume stalled negotiations with Sudan on the basis of the African Union (AU) roadmap that was endorsed this month by a Chapter VII United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolution.
The resolution orders the two countries to resume talks that were suspended following military clashes between the armies of Khartoum and Juba which started in late March. South Sudan also managed to briefly occupy the oil-rich region of Heglig inside Sudan’s South Kordofan state.
May 9, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – A Sudanese official announced on Wednesday that the government has started releasing fund to Darfur Regional Authority (DRA) after its chairman, Tijani el-Sissi, voiced frustration with Khartoum’s slowness in upholding its financial commitments.
The minister of state at the presidency of the republic, Amin Hassan Omer, revealed that a meeting chaired by first Vice-President Ali Osman Mohammed Taha and the finance minister Ali Mahmoud had formed committees to handle arrangements to secure releasing of fund owed by the government to the DRA as scheduled.
May 10, 2012 (JUBA) - South Sudan parliamentary official said on Wednesday it would attack the oil contested area of Panthou/Heglig if Sudanese armed forces continues to assault its territories.
South Sudanese troops occupied Heglig from 10 to 20 April but it pulled out from the area after international pressure and clashes with the Sudanese army.
May 9, 2012 (ADDIS ABABA) – Exiled Eritrean opposition group, the Red Sea Afar Democratic Organization (RSADO) on Wednesday alleged that hundreds of Eritrean refugees who fled to Yemen due to political oppression by the regime in Asmara are being kept in Yemeni prisons, where they are being deprived of their rights.
