Sudanese goods to leave Khartoum for Unity, Upper Nile states tomorrow – Tutkew

JUBA – South Sudan’s Presidential Security Advisor Tutkew Gatluak who is in the Sudanese capital Khartoum has just told Sudans Post that trucks loaded with Sudanese goods are set to leave Khartoum tomorrow heading to South Sudan’s Unity and Upper Nile states.

Last month, Sudanese Prime Minister Abdallah Hamdok and President Salva Kiir Mayardit agreed during a meeting in Juba to the reopening of cross-border trade between the two countries which was brought to halt almost immediately following South Sudan’s independence in 2011.

“As I am speaking to you, I have been informed by Sudanese traders and traders from the state of South Sudan that they have goods already loaded and they will start to leave tomorrow from Khartoum, the capital of Sudan,” Gatluak told a Sudans Post reporter.

“The goods will enter South Sudan in three directions, one will enter Unity state through Kaikang of Mayom, and the other will enter through the border in Rubkona County and the last one will enter the country through Renk County in Upper Nile state.

Separately, Gatluak is quoted by Sudan Tribune as saying that “Preparations are complete so that on Friday, God willing, the seven border crossings will be officially opened. The security teams on both sides of the two countries are on the ground already.”

Borders between Sudan and South Sudan were shut up in 2012 following the Heglig crisis which saw South Sudan armed forces, the SPLA-IO, taking over Heglig, a disputed border town near Unity state, for almost one week in April that year.

In September the same year, the two countries signed the Cooperation Agreement in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, providing for the reopening of the two countries’ borders, but the agreement has never been implemented.

Following the outbreak of South Sudanese civil war in December 2013, hundreds of South Sudanese civilians fled to Sudan to seek refuge.

In October last year, Sudan’s President of the Transitional Sovereign Council General Abdel Fattah al Burhan said during the signing of the Sudanese peace agreement in Juba that South Sudanese will no longer need visas to visit Sudan.

This is in line with the cooperation agreement which guarantee Four Freedoms: “freedom of residence, freedom of movement, freedom to undertake economic activity and freedom to acquire and dispose property.”

President Salva Kiir has also ordered the implementation of the four freedoms.