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South Sudan foes set to meet after two years
By Chris Stein
Addis Ababa (AFP) June 20, 2018

War-ravaged South Sudan at a glance
Juba (AFP) June 20, 2018 - South Sudan, the world's newest country, has been mired in a devastating civil war for more than four years, with tens of thousands of people killed, nearly four million displaced and its economy in ruins.

War broke out when President Salva Kiir accused his former deputy Riek Machar of plotting a coup just two years after the country gained independence from Sudan in 2011.

With the two men to meet on Wednesday in the latest international effort to stop the fighting, here is some background.

- World's youngest state -

Before independence, the south of Sudan was ravaged by two civil wars (1956-1972 and 1983-2005) that pitted mainly Christian and animist insurgents in the south against Khartoum's Arab-dominated government.

Millions died in the conflicts.

A peace accord signed in 2005 by the government and southern rebels exempted the south from Islamic Sharia law and granted it six years of self-rule ahead of a referendum on independence.

The 2011 referendum went nearly 99 percent in favour of secession from the north and on July 9 that year, South Sudan proclaimed its independence. Kiir was sworn in as the country's first president with Machar as his deputy.

The international community -- led by the United States, China, Russia and the European Union, as well as Sudan -- quickly recognised the new African state.

- Former allies turn enemies -

Kiir and Machar were on the same side in the push for independence from Khartoum, but were separated by ethnic and political rivalries.

Tensions spiked when Machar -- from the country's second-largest ethnic group, the Nuer -- was fired as vice president in 2013.

His sacking came after Kiir, from the majority Dinka people, accused him of a failed coup. Machar rejected the charge, in turn accusing the president of purging political rivals.

- Civil war erupts -

By December 2013 the new country had descended into civil war, including fighting within the national army, undermined by differences fuelled by the rivalry between Kiir and Machar.

The conflict spread to several states and was characterised by ethnic massacres, attacks on civilians, widespread rape, the recruitment of child soldiers and other forms of brutality and human rights violations.

A 2015 peace deal saw Machar reinstalled as vice president and return to the capital, but fighting broke out in the capital Juba in July 2016, and Machar and his forces fled.

In February 2018 the United Nations said there was sufficient evidence to charge at least 41 South Sudanese senior officers and officials with war crimes and crimes against humanity.

- Economy ruined -

Following more than four years of civil war, the Juba government is broke and hyperinflation -- which peaked at around 500 percent in 2016, decelerating to 155 percent in 2017 -- has sent prices soaring. The South Sudanese pound has collapsed.

Oil production -- from which South Sudan gained 98 percent of its revenues on its independence -- has plummeted to about 120,000 barrels a day from a peak of 350,000, according to the World Bank.

Juba, which inherited three-quarters of the former Sudan's oil reserves during independence, depends on its northern neighbour's oil infrastructure -- refineries and pipelines -- for its exports.

The conflict has also heavily disrupted agriculture, sparking a major food crisis. In 2017 South Sudan went through four months of famine, which affected around 100,000 people.

Seven million South Sudanese, more than half of the population, will need food aid in 2018, according to the UN.

The two figures at the centre of the civil war that has ravaged South Sudan are scheduled to meet on Wednesday for the first time in nearly two years.

Ethiopia, which has helped broker the meeting, says rebel leader Riek Machar, who fled South Sudan in July 2016, is expected to meet face-to-face with the country's president, Salva Kiir.

Machar arrived in the Ethiopian capital Wednesday morning for the talks, Menasseh Zindo, a senior official in his Sudan People's Liberation Movement-in Opposition (SPLM-IO) rebel group, told AFP. A foreign ministry spokesman confirmed his arrival.

The official scope of the talks is broad -- to build bridges between the two.

But analysts say the outcome remains unclear given their notoriously volatile relationship, and there is doubt whether the meeting will even take place.

Once comrades-in arms in the fight for independence, Kiir and Machar experienced a bitter falling out, a development that played a key part in the civil war that blights the future of the world's youngest state.

Tens of thousands of people have been killed and nearly a third of the 12 million population have been driven out of their homes, and many to the brink of starvation.

The two will meet at the invitation of Ethiopia's new prime minister, Abiy Ahmed, who also chairs the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) regional bloc that has taken the lead in thus-far fruitless peace negotiations.

Abiy "will call upon the two leaders to narrow their gap and work for the pacification of South Sudan and relieve the burden of death and uprooting of South Sudanese people," Meles Alem, Ethiopian foreign ministry spokesman, said.

Kiir's attendance has been confirmed by South Sudan's ambassador to Ethiopia, James Pitia Morgan.

A landlocked state with a large ethnic mix, South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011 after a long and brutal war.

The event was hailed around the world and by celebrity supporters such as George Clooney.

But in 2013, Kiir accused Machar, his vice president, of plotting a coup against him, and violence erupted between the two factions, feeding on brooding ethnic tensions.

- New fighting -

They have not met since July 2016, when heavy fighting in the capital Juba signalled the collapse of a 2015 peace deal and Machar fled to South Africa.

The renewed violence spread across the country, spawning numerous new armed opposition groups and further complicating peace efforts.

Despite the pressure, observers say Kiir has little incentive to make concessions to his rivals.

His soldiers are winning militarily, while the opposition is more fractured than ever before.

Efforts to revitalise the 2015 agreement resulted in a ceasefire in December which lasted just hours before warring parties accused each other of breaking it.

The meeting in Addis Ababa comes against a background of growing international frustration.

In May, the UN Security Council gave the two warring sides a month to reach a peace deal or face sanctions.

Washington was a critical backer of South Sudan during its separation from Sudan, and remains Juba's biggest aid donor.

But a top US official earlier this month threatened parties on both sides of the conflict with sanctions after a report from a US foundation, The Sentry, said South Sudanese elites were profiting from human rights abuses.


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OIL AND GAS
South Sudan's warring leaders to meet for talks in Ethiopia
Addis Ababa (AFP) June 19, 2018
Nearly two years after fleeing South Sudan's capital amid deadly fighting, rebel leader Riek Machar will meet face-to-face on Wednesday with the country's president, Salva Kiir. The rendezvous in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa represents the latest international effort to end more than four years of civil war in the world's youngest nation. Tens of thousands have been killed and millions have been driven out of their homes and into starvation. Kiir and Machar will meet at the invitation of E ... read more

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