Sudan's army and ex-rebels clash

Publication Date: 12/1/2006

UNITED NATIONS, Thursday Hundreds of people may have been killed in the heaviest fighting between Sudan’s former north-south foes since they signed a peace deal last year, a senior former rebel officer said today. UN officials in New York said 240 civilian personnel had been temporarily evacuated after the clashes in the southern town of Malakal over the past three days. Terrified civilians reported looting and dead bodies in the streets. "More than hundreds have been lost. The Sudan army sustained very heavy casualties and civilians were caught in the crossfire," Mr Elias Waya Nyipuocs, a senior officer in the former southern rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), told Reuters. Nyipuocs said militias belonging to the northern Sudanese Armed Forces attacked the SPLA and the local commissioner of Malakal. The militiamen then took refuge in the SAF barracks near the airport and full combat began. "We were forced to overrun the barracks and the SAF fought side-by-side with the militia against the SPLA," he said. An SAF spokesman was not immediately able to comment on the fighting. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan called it "a serious violation" of the January 2005 deal which ended Africa’s longest civil war in south Sudan. SAF tanks then counter-attacked and also shelled the town, inflicting high civilian casualties, Nyipuocs said. An emergency meeting of the north-south ceasefire commission condemned the violence and expressed "deep shock at the heavy loss of lives and property", the United Nations said in a statement. The town was reported to be tense but calm on Thursday evening. UN assistance would be flown in on Friday from nearby medical facilities. "I have lost two relatives and my neighbour lost her son," one resident told Reuters, declining to be named. He said dead bodies could be seen in the streets. "People are desperate as the water was cut off and despite the gunfire they are still trying to go to the river to get water," he added. South Sudan’s president Salva Kiir cut his trip to South Africa short and returned to Khartoum on Thursday. Around 10,000 UN peacekeepers are monitoring the southern deal. The 2005 deal created separate north and south Sudan armies with joint units in major towns and an autonomous southern government. It also shared power and wealth between the north and south, but implementation has been slow on key issues such as the demarcation of borders and ownership of the oil fields. Malakal is the capital of the Upper Nile region, potentially one of the most oil-rich regions in Sudan, which produces at least 330,000 barrels per day of crude. Sudan said on Thursday it was considering joining the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). (Reuters)