US ‘not spilling back’ support for peace process despite funding cut for peace mechanisms, says envoy

JUBA – A top United States United States envoy in South Sudan on Wednesday said that his country’s recent decision to cut funding for Ceasefire and Transitional Security Arrangements Monitoring and Verification Mechanism (CTSAMVM) and Reconstituted Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission otherwise known as (R-JMEC) does not mean the powerful South Sudan friend is spilling back it support for the peace process.

Last week, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) in a communiqué following a meeting of heads of state in the Kenyan capital Nairobi that the United States of America had ‘significantly scaled’ down its support for peace mechanisms affecting the work of CTSAMVM and the R-JMEC in monitoring the peace implementation.

The communiqué, a copy of which was obtained by Sudans Post, “appealed to key partners of the South Sudan Peace Process particularly the United States of America to reconsider their decision to significantly scale down their support to the peace process in South Sudan that is crippling the work of critical agreement mechanisms such as the Reconstituted Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission (RJMEC) and the Ceasefire and Transitional Security Arrangements Monitoring and Verification Mechanism (CTSAMVM); and agencies supporting the delivery of much-needed humanitarian assistance.”

In an interview with Radio Tamazuj, U.S. Chargé d’Affaires in South Sudan William Flens said the world power decided to suspend funding for peace mechanisms because his country provided millions in funding to the peace mechanism and has only seen disappointments given the delays by the parties to the government agreement to implement the peace deal.

“So we have been honored to provide support to both of those mechanisms since their inceptions and we funded them almost 145 million USD in funding since the beginning but what we have seen is that we have seen nothing but multiple repeated delays by the leadership of South Sudan in implementing the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan R-ARCSS and that has raised a lot of concerns within my government about the political will of the leadership of South Sudan to implement the peace agreement and to deliver the aspirations of the people of South Sudan,” Amb. Flens said.

The top United States diplomat further urged the unity government in Juba to redouble its efforts with urgency to complete the implementation of the revitalized peace agreement and reiterated the US government’s commitment to support restoration of peace in the country.

“So we are calling again on the government to redouble its efforts to show a sense of urgency to complete the implementation of the peace agreement that does not mean we are spilling back our support for the peace process I want to make that clear,” he said.

“I’ve seen that reported in recent days and that is a misconception of what our actual situation is. Even when we are scaling back support for these two mechanisms, we are not scaling back support for the peace process,” he added.