Peace and Debt Deals in Sudan

By Emily Tholen

Some of the biggest news of the week came from Thursday as Sudan and South Sudan started signing peace deals after weeks of negotiations in Ethiopia. Under the terms agreed upon, South Sudan will be able to use the pipelines that flow through Sudan again, giving back South Sudan's its monetary mainstay. The currencies under each country will soon be able be able to exchange directly to each other and not through a dollar intermediate. This is a huge step forward with will call for Sudan and South Sudan to acknowledge banks from the other respective nation and will allow an ease of trade between the nations and help to dispel inflation which has been hitting both countries hard. In addition to the economic steps agreed upon, there has also been some forward movement with the border disputes. A demilitarized zone between Sudan and South Sudan has been approved by bother nations which should help dissipate some of the growing tension in whether or not fighting will resume. (Picture above: Negotiators Idris Mohammed Abdul Gadir (Sudan, Left) and Pagan Amum (South Sudan Right) after signing the deals) 

Despite all the headway Sudan and South Sudan made in the past week, the biggest issue of the deal talks, to which country Abyei will fall to, was not resolved. South Sudan's President Salva Kiir was quoted in a Reuter's article saying:

"'As for Abyei, it was very unfortunate that we could not agree. My government and I accepted unconditionally the proposal of the AUHIP (African Union panel) to the resolution of the conflict in Abyei'...'Unfortunetly, my brother Bashir and his government totally rejected the proposal in its totality.'"

The proposal drafted by the African Union (AU) was to ask the Abyei citizens to vote for which country they would like to be a part of. Decisions made by voting in the past have not worked well between Sudan and South Sudan as there is discrepancies on which part of the population should be allowed to vote. It is yet to see if any of the deals will hold true, as both countries have histories on not following through on their parts.

In the just over a year since South Sudan separated from Sudan, Sudan's national debt has now risen to forty billion dollars because of precious loss of oil resources. Sudan has now reached out to the United Nations (UN) to forgive the debts to help it recover, as Sudan will only require more money for importing necessities until oil will start flowing through their pipelines again. The International Monetary Fund has asked Sudan to talk to donors about taking off some of that debt, but nothing has been pushed through by the UN as of late.