Neighbour agrees to reopen oil pipelines

SUDAN/SOUTH SUDAN

AFRICA’S newest nation reached a deal with its former rulers yesterday to reopen the oil pipelines that underpin their economies – after an eight-month hiatus pushed both countries to the brink of bankruptcy.

The presidents of Sudan and South Sudan also agreed to a 10km demilitarised zone along parts of their disputed border in what the African Union hailed as a ‘‘giant step forward’’.

The four-day meeting in Addis Ababa, which follows weeks of negotiations, failed to find a way of demarcating the disputed border areas.

Several hundred soldiers were killed this year when skirmishes around the oil-rich Heglig region spiralled out of control.

At least five oil-rich regions along the 1200-mile border remain contested.

Sudan’s president, Omar alBashir, was filmed embracing the South Sudanese leader, Salva Kiir, whom he had described as an insect at the height of the violence in April. Bashir, who has been indicted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes, said that signing the accords was a ‘‘historic moment for building peace’’.

President Kiir thanked him for his co-operation but blamed his northern neighbour for failing to reach a deal on Abyei, the South Sudanese name for Heglig.

‘‘Unfortunately, my brother Bashir and his government totally rejected the proposal on Abyei,’’ President Kiir said.

South Sudan won independence from its northern neighbour last year in a referendum agreed as part of a 2005 peace accord. The treaty ended two decades of civil war in which almost two million people were killed.

However, peace remains a hope rather than a reality.