Sudan’s ruling party hails Addis National Dialogue agreement

(Updated 16 Sept 01:30) The ruling National Congress Party (NCP) welcomed the agreement on the National Dialogue principles signed by the Sudan Revolutionary Front (SRF), the National Umma Party (NUP) and representatives of the Dialogue’s Steering Committee, in Addis Ababa on 4 September. “The signing of the National Dialogue document by the opposition forces has restored hope for a comprehensive Sudanese dialogue process. It has broken the barrier of mistrust between the Sudanese government and the SRF”, Mustafa Osman Ismail, Political Secretary of the NCP, told the press after the meeting between President Omar Al Bashir and Thabo Mbeki, chairman of the AU High-Level Implementation Panel (AUHIP) on Wednesday. “Mbeki briefed President Al Bashir on AUHIP’s plan and working programme for the coming period”, he explained. The AUHIP chairman informed Al Bashir that the Darfur cease-fire agreement will be finalised in Addis Ababa, and that the partners in Doha have approved this initiative. “The remaining point for a conducive climate to convene the National Dialogue is the stoppage of the wars, which could also be settled by the AU.” “President Al Bashir guaranteed to Mbeki that representatives of the rebel movements are welcome to Khartoum to “safely take part in the National Dialogue,” Ismail added. Darfur peace negotiations were brokered by Qatar in the past, and resulted in the signing of the Doha Document for Peace in Darfur by the Sudanese government and the Liberation and Justice Movement (LJM) in 2011, and by a dissident faction of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) in 2013. The main Darfur rebel movements abstained. The AUHIP chairman told the press in Khartoum on Thursday that peace talks with the main Darfuri armed movements will start in Addis Ababa on 15 October 15. The NCP official, however, denounced the Paris Declaration, signed by the SRF and the NUP leaders in the French capital on 8 August. He considered the Declaration “a humiliation of the Sudanese government and the NCP, as it holds the regime responsible for the wars, the political violence, and the secession of South Sudan”. “ ‘Regime to keep to agreement’ In response to the statements by NCP’s Political Secretary, Minni Minawi, co-deputy chairman of the SRF, and leader of a faction of the Darfuri Sudan Liberation Movement, said that the Paris Declaration “indeed represents a condemnation of the regime and the ruling party”. He stressed to Radio Dabanga that the SRF has been able to “break through the monopolist platform of the Doha negotiations”. “The allied rebel movements have now direct contact with the mediators. This is a large step forward for the Sudanese people.” “The Sudanese regime is now prepared to sit with the armed movements. It is not on the government or the NCP to decide where the negotiations will take place. They will have to attend the sessions in Addis Ababa.” Concerning the National Dialogue principles document, signed in the Ethiopian capital, Minawi commented that “the three main points of the document, cease-fire, restoration of freedoms, and the release of political detainees, will not benefit the Khartoum regime, but the Sudanese people. It is on the Sudanese government now to keep to the agreed principles.”Read the entire Communiqué of the 456th Meeting of the Peace and Security Council File photo: Thabo Mbeki (C) with Malik Agar, chairman of the SRF, on his left at the signing ceremony of an agreement with the National Dialogue committee on 4 September in the Ethiopian capital Related:Sudan’s Dialogue parties call for release political detainees; peace talks to resume (12 September 2014) Sudan committee, opposition agree on National Dialogue (5 September 2014)Renewed calls for Darfur rebels to join DDPD (12 March 2014)