KHARTOUM, 15 October 2006 — The Sudanese government signed a peace deal yesterday in Eritrea with a group of rebels from the mountains of eastern Sudan ending a deadly strife that has been overshadowed by the conflict in Darfur.
“I tell you that we will abide by this agreement,” Sudanese President Omar Bashir said in a speech before the deal was signed. The ceremony was held in the city of Asmara in neighboring Eritrea.
Bashir and First Vice President Salva Kiir had traveled to Eritrea to sign the deal with leaders of the Eastern Rebel Front under supervision of Eritrea’s government.
Among those attending the ceremony were Eritrean President Isaias Afeworki and Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa.
Negotiations have been going on steadily for three weeks in Asmara. Early this week, the two sides announced that an agreement had been reached on three issues: wealth sharing, division of power and security arrangements.
Bashir promised yesterday that all the money that were being spent on war will be paid for development.
The final peace deal was set to call for a cease-fire, the lifting of a state of emergency in Sudan’s east and the deployment of Sudanese forces to the region, according to the official Sudanese news agency, SUNA. Some $600 million also would be allocated to health and water programs in the area over the next five years, SUNA reported.
The conflict in Sudan’s east bore some similarities to the more-publicized strife in Darfur, located in western Sudan. In 2005, the UN World Food Program said the malnutrition rate in the east had grown worse than in Darfur. Some Darfur rebels also have fought in the east, and Eritrea has a history of supporting both the eastern and western Darfurian rebels.
Before the signing, Bashir repeated his rejection to allowing UN peacekeepers in Darfur.
