By William Madouk
President Salva Kiir Mayardit urged Sudanese warring parties to honour the cessation of hostilities agreement.
He made this call on Saturday after a meeting with the commander of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Daglo, in Kampala, Uganda.
“President Salva Kiir Mayardit has called for an immediate cessation of hostilities between the warring parties in the neighboring Sudan,” partly reads the statement from the office of the president.
The Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group have been fighting for nine months in a war that has killed thousands of people and displaced more than seven million.
The head-of-state also appealed for the immediate opening of humanitarian corridors for basic services to reach the Sudanese people.
He reiterated his government’s commitment to supporting the IGAD-led peace process towards the resolution of the Sudanese conflict through dialogue.
The president appealed to the RSF leader to accept dialogue in order to find an amicable solution to the crisis in Sudan.
Mr. Kiir met with Daglo at the sideline of the extraordinary summit of the IGAD Heads of State and Government and the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit.
On Saturday, the government of Sudan stated that it has halted its participation in the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), the regional organization in East Africa that has been attempting to facilitate negotiations between warring parties.
The announcement was made by the foreign ministry, which is loyal to Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the army chief and Sudan’s de facto leader.
In a statement, the foreign ministry said Burhan sent a letter to President Ismail Omar Guelleho of Djibouti, the current chair of IGAD, “to inform him of the Sudanese government’s decision to suspend its membership in this organization.”.
The government had announced this week that it was freezing its relations with the bloc in advance of a meeting in Uganda on Thursday after it invited RSF head Mohamed HamdanDagalo.
Sudan suspects the bloc of “violating Sudan’s sovereignty” and setting a “dangerous precedent.”.
At its summit on Thursday, IGAD reiterated its call for “an immediate and unconditional ceasefire” in the “unjust war affecting the people” of Sudan.
The bloc also expressed “continued readiness to offer its good offices to facilitate an all-inclusive peace process” and again called for a face-to-face meeting between the two sides.
In a final communiqué from the extraordinary assembly, the generals were given two weeks to meet.