Sudanese leaders gather in Juba for 2-day consultative meeting in a bid to end deadly war

JUBA, OCTOBER 24, 2023 (SUDANS POST) – Representatives of the Sudanese parties who signed the Juba Peace Agreement in 2020 convened in the South Sudanese capital on Tuesday to discuss ways to end the ongoing brutal six-month-old conflict between the army and the rebellious paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

The two-day consultative meeting – which brought together at least 14 political organizations and armed groups – aims at reviewing the 2020 peace agreement signed by the then Transitional Military Council and several rebel movements in a bid to find a way to resolve the current war.

Speaking during the opening session of the high-level peace gathering, Tut Gatluak Manimeh, South Sudan’s presidential security advisor and head of the country’s mediation committee on the Sudanese transition, said the consultative meeting aims to seek way to resolve the ongoing war.

“Now we want peace and stability in Sudan. The [Sudanese] government initiated this peace, and we don’t want to see any group splint and we want all of you to support restoration of stability in Sudan,” he told the meeting.

For his part, deputy chair of Sudan’s Transitional Sovereign Council and leader of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement North (SPLM-North) Malik Agar called on the parties to find solution to the ongoing crisis in Sudan noting that the war is affecting the region.

“The war in Sudan is affecting the region and Horn of Africa and ending this war depend on how we can address our internal issues by turning to the table to discuss ways to resolve them,” the senior Sudanese official said.

Agar accused the civilian component of the defunct transitional government led by Abdallah Hamdok of cooperating with regional and international forces in advancing foreign interests through the Framework Agreement which he said resulted in the ongoing conflict.

“The ongoing armed conflict in Sudan was fueled by the fact that the civilian component, represented by Freedom and Change, supported the regional and international community, and ignored national initiatives in the context of the pressures they exerted against the military component through street agitation and others,” he said.

“The result was ‘poor quality goods’ represented in the framework agreement, which contained within it a set of contradictions, fears, ambitions, and goals. These international regional parties that supported the framework agreement aim to achieve their goals, not the goals of Sudanese society,” he added.

The Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) has been fighting its former ally, the paramilitary RSF, since April. Fighting begun after the RSF attacked government and army positions in the capital Khartoum on April 15, with head of the army and de facto leader of the country narrowing escaping death.

Thousands of people, mostly civilians, have been killed and more than five million people displaced, according to UN estimates. On Sunday last week, the brutal conflict marked six months. The parties to the conflict are currently gathering for a US-Saudi talks in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in an attempt for a ceasefire.