“Sudan, a member of the Arab League, is facing the threat of division. No Arab League member can justify its neutral stand on the issue. We have to support Sudan to overcome these dangers,” Prince Saud told an emergency meeting of Arab League.
Prince Saud opposed the division of Sudan, saying it would not serve the interests of any party. “In our opinion neither the interest of Sudan nor those of the rival parties can be achieved by the dangerous move of division,” he pointed out.
Sudan's Foreign Minister Ali Karti, meanwhile, assured the UN Security Council that his government is committed to holding a referendum on the independence of the south. “We are fully committed to holding the referendum on time,” Karti told the visiting members of the Council.
“We want it on time, but it must be arranged properly ... We do not want any interference in the referendum, this is the only condition.”
Underlining the tensions surrounding the vote, clashes erupted between southern pro-secession demonstrators and pro-unity northerners staging a rally in Khartoum, witnesses said. Some 70 southerners were arrested, and at least five people were wounded, according to witnesses.
Preparations for the Jan. 9 referendum have proceeded haltingly amid political and logistical obstacles, and the southerners have accused their northern compatriots of stalling, warning of violence if the vote is delayed.
The referendum is required by a 2005 peace agreement that ended the 21-year civil war between Sudan's predominantly Arab and Muslim north and rebels in the largely Christian-animist south. The vote is open to all southerners whether they live in the north or the south, but determining who is eligible to vote has also been a source of tension.
Aside from Sudan, the Arab League meeting discussed the Palestinian-Israeli peace talks. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas sought Arab League backing for possible alternatives to the troubled talks, including urging the Obama administration to unilaterally recognize a Palestinian state, an Abbas aide said.
The Arab League has given the US another month to try to salvage the negotiations, but has also begun to consider fallback options in case the talks collapse.
The US-backed Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, which began last month at the White House, have hit an impasse over Israel's refusal to extend a 10-month-old slowdown on settlement construction that expired in late September.
Abbas has said he will not resume talks without such an extension, and won Arab League backing for his position. Israel has refused to extend the moratorium, though it is considering compromises.
On Saturday, Abbas asked Arab leaders to consider alternatives to the negotiations, said Saeb Erekat, a top aide to the Palestinian president. He said Abbas asked Arab leaders "to press the American administration to recognize an independent Palestinian state within the borders of 1967." If the Americans reject the request, the Palestinians might take up the issue with the Security Council, nonetheless, Erekat said.
Palestinian officials have said in the past that if peace talks fall through, they might ask the UN Security Council to recognize a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem — territories Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast War. However, in such a scenario, a US veto at the Security Council seems likely.
France welcomed Saturday the Arab League decision to "leave the door open" to a resumption of US-sponsored direct peace negotiations. "Every effort must be made now to find a way to ensure the continuation of the process started on Sept. 2 in Washington by the Americans, which we fully support," said Foreign Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero in a statement.
