The U.S. State Department on Tuesday in Washington accused the South Sudan’s government of refusing to give landing permission to planes carrying Riek Machar, saying such action was inimical to peace deal. It also accused both sides in South Sudan’s two-year conflict of blocking peace efforts.
The department said Mr. Machar had obstructed arrangements by arbitrarily asking for more forces and heavy weapons to precede his arrival. Mr. Machar’s return to join a unity government with his foes, originally scheduled for early last week, was meant to seal a peace deal signed in August to end fighting that has killed thousands and forced a million to flee their homes.
Washington said it has been a major player in the accord that eventually secured South Sudan’s secession from Sudan in 2011 and has been a donor ever since. It insisted that its future engagement would depend on the leaders’ involvement in the peace process. Meanwhile, Mr. Machar’s Chief of Staff, Simon Dual, flew into Juba on Monday, accompanied by the 195 soldiers and the weapons the rebel leader had asked for.
Mr. Dual, who did not say when Mr. Machar would come into the country, expressed his happiness to be back in the country. “I am happy that I am in Juba. “Our coming is to implement the peace process and we are not going back to war,” he said. William Ezekiel, spokesman for Mr. Machar’s SPLM-IO group, said the U.S. decision to withdraw funding for a charter flight would delay the return for yet another day. “Right now, we are still working on the issue and probably by tomorrow the first vice president will arrive in Juba,” he added.
(Reuters/NAN)
