Al-Burhan in Juba to meet President Kiir
The leader of the Sudanese Sovereign Council, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, arrived Thursday evening in the capital, Juba, to push for the urgent implementation of the revitalised peace agreement,
General al-Burhan, who arrived from neighbouring, Uganda with his delegates, was welcomed at Juba International Airport by President Salva Kiir.
President Kiir’s Press Secretary, Ateny Wek Ateny, told the media that al-Burhan will meet with the Presidency and other senior government officials this morning to discuss the way forward to outstanding critical tasks.
“He came to Juba to talk to the President, Vice Presidents, and other government officials to acquaint himself with the progress [in the peace implementation]. He wanted to understand exactly where the parties went well and where the parties were stacked.
“And if necessary Sudan can provide help to ensure implementation of the Revitalized Peace agreement is done amicably, “said Ateny.
It was unclear what al-Burhan discussed with Ugandan President Kaguta Yoweri Museveni, but Ateny stated that President Kiir would be informed today.
Last month after meeting the Presidency, the Sudanese deputy Sovereign Council, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, proposed that a discussion be held on the status of the security arrangement implementation in front of the Ugandan President, but later cancelled until further notice.
Until now, parties to the agreement have yet to graduate the first batch of the necessary unified forces provided for in Chapter Two of the peace agreement due to complex challenges including financial, logistical, and a lack of consensus on the army’s joint command structure.
According to the September 2018 peace deal, forces were supposed to be registered, screened, trained, graduated, and redeployed within the six months of the signing of the agreement.
But, since the commencement of the transitional government in June 2020, parties have doubled the pre-transitional period and they are now left with less than eleven months to complete the outstanding tasks. Both the government and the opposition maintain parallel demands on the establishment of a joint arm command as a prerequisite for the forces’ graduation.
In September, armed parties –the SPLM-IG and SPLA-IO—rejected the IGAD’s proposed force contribution ratio, demanding a 50:50 percent ratio, which President Kiir objected to, maintaining that it should be 80:40 per cent.
