South Sudanese stranded in Khartoum in legal row
Sudan Stops South Sudanese Leaving As Border Clashes Resume
–Fighting was continuing Tuesday along the poorly defined border
–The countries are haggling over how much South Sudan should pay for using Sudanese oil pipelines and ports
–This is latest in a string of rows between the two countries
KAMPALA, Uganda (Dow Jones)–Sudanese authorities have prevented hundreds of South Sudanese citizens from returning to their country as clashes along the nations’ oil-rich border resumed Tuesday, underscoring deteriorating relations between the former civil war foes.
Sudanese war planes pounded the South Sudan oil town of Teshwin overnight Monday and fighting was continuing Tuesday along the poorly defined border, South Sudanese army spokesman Col. Philip Aguer said by telephone from Juba, the South Sudan capital.
“Fighting is still going on but our forces have managed to repulse them” he said. “Their aim is to damage our oil facilities.”
According to Aguer, Sudanese troops started the attack from the oil town of Heglig, which is located along the disputed border region with South Sudan. The 60,000 barrels-a-day Heglig oil field currently under the control of Sudan has become a major battle ground in recent days as the two forces vie for its control. A Sudanese government spokesman couldn’t be reached for an immediate comment.
The countries have yet to agree on a proper demarcation of their 1,800-kilometer, oil-rich border, and are haggling over how much South Sudan should pay for using Sudanese oil pipelines and ports.
Meanwhile, thousands of South Sudanese have remained stranded at Sudanese airports since Monday after being denied permission to board flights over a dispute over their status in Sudan.
Rabie Abdelaty, the Sudanese government spokesman, told Dow Jones Newswires the southerners have to legalize their status in Sudan because they are no longer Sudanese citizens.
“Their existence in our country isn’t legal,” he said.
(This story and related background material will be available on The Wall Street Journal website, WSJ.com.)
According to Abdelaty, up to 500,000 southerners in Sudan are required to have passports to be allowed to leave, following the expiry of an April 9 deadline. South Sudan has no embassy in Sudan.
South Sudan interior ministry officials traveled to Khartoum Monday for talks with Sudanese authorities in a bid to ease the standoff, a South Sudan government spokesman said.
“Our officials are in Khartoum to sort out the issue” he said, adding Sudanese officials would start producing travel documents and passports mainly for students and officials working with international organizations and diplomatic missions in Sudan. Southerners wishing to stay in the north must obtain resident visas as foreigners, according to Sudanese officials.
Analysts have said Khartoum’s decision could be a negotiating ploy to push South Sudan for concessions on some of the unresolved post secession issues such as border demarcation, oil-transit fees and sharing Sudan’s external debt.
This is the latest in a string of rows between the two countries, in which South Sudan has shut in 350,000 barrels a day of oil exports on a disagreement over fees paid to move the oil through Sudan to export terminals.
In recent weeks, armies of the countries have been engaged in the most deadly clashes since the country divided last year. South Sudan also recently accused Sudan of attempting to build an illegal pipeline across the border to access oil fields in its Unity state.
The presidents of the countries were due to meet last week to sign a deal on the protection of each other’s citizens and the demarcation of their border, but the summit was canceled following an escalation of border clashes.
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20120410-712090.html
Southerners turned away at Khartoum airport for using Sudanese passports
April 9, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – The Sudanese authorities at Khartoum airport on Monday prevented around 200 southern Sudanese from boarding their planes saying they can only do so now using travel documents issued by Juba.
- A South Sudanese arrives to register for a passport or a temporary travel document at the South Sudanese Embassy in Khartoum April 9, 2012 (Reuters)
Paul Madut, a southerner at the airport, said he was surprised to find out in the early morning hours that the flight to Juba was moved to the international terminal. Upon inquiring, he was told that his booking is cancelled and that he cannot leave using a Sudanese passport.
“We don’t know what to do now,” one young woman also told Reuters, sitting next to a pile of suitcases and plastic bags outside the heavily guarded front gate of the international terminal.
South Sudan became an independent state last July and this week Khartoum declared that they are now officially considered foreign nationals and will be treated as such. They were given 30 days to register with Sudanese authorities.
The issue of citizenship has been a contentious item in the post-independence negotiations between north and south Sudan. Khartoum rejected any talk of dual citizenship and insisted that all 500,000 southerners in the north should make arrangements to adjust their status or depart to new state.
The two sides signed a ’Four Freedoms’ pact last month declaring their intention to given each others’ citizens’ residency, ownership, work and movement rights. The implementation was contingent upon agreeing on details and resolving separate security issues.
After learning of the new requirement for traveling, hundreds of southern Sudanese flocked to their semi-operational embassy in Khartoum to obtain new travel documents.
“They need passports to board flights,” a Sudanese police officer told Reuters from inside the terminal.
The deputy charge d’affaires Martin Essa told Sudan Tribune that all southerners who want to fly south can do so in two days after receiving their new passports. He said that priority would be given to those wanting to travel immediately and then all other categories who want to obtain passports as well as documentation proving their southern citizenship.
Essa said that southern students need not worry because there is a memorandum of understanding signed between the ministries of higher education in both countries.
The southern diplomat stressed that they are also focused on those working in private or international organizations, IDP’s , students and those living in rural areas. He denied that that Juba took similar measures against northerners in the south.
He warned that Khartoum’s decision is now a reality and has to be dealt with accordingly.
Until Sunday flights to the southern capital Juba had been conducted at the domestic terminal without passport controls.
With almost no passengers to check in, state-owned Sudan Airways and other local carriers suspended their Juba flights.
“We are ready to fly but wait for a political decision,” said an official at Sudan Airways.
(ST)
http://www.sudantribune.com/Southerners-turned-away-at,42188
Thousands Of South Sudanese Marooned In Sudan
Alsanosi Ahmed | Khartoum
One day after Sudan’s April 8TH deadline expired, the government began registering Southern Sudanese as foreigners. Majority of them have been stripped of their identity cards and other documents, and most of them don’t have the money to pay the hefty registration fees. Several months ago, after South Sudan declared its independence from Sudan, Sudanese authorities issued an ultimatum to South Sudanese to either become Sudanese citizens, register as foreigners, or leave the country.
The director of foreigners’ registration in Sudan said today only ten South Sudanese arrived at the center yesterday and registered as foreigners. A Brigadier General, who has been instructed not to speak to reporters, said he doesn’t not expect more southerners to show up because registration requires a valid South Sudan passport and a visa, two things most South Sudanese citizens do not own.
Sudanese Information Minister Abdallah Masar said South Sudanese citizens are now considered foreigners. “From today, all South Sudanese are foreigners and they must regularize their status as happens to every foreigner, and we are working on this now, our registration centers are going on” he said.
South Sudan has asked Sudan to extend the deadline, but the government has refused. The spokesperson in the Sudanese Ministry of Information Sana Hamad said South Sudanese wwere given enough time to put their papers in good order. “We will not push the date because we gave them nine months which was enough to reconcile their status, but the government of South Sudan was not serious; all we asked the South Sudanese government to do was to give them necessary documents, now all their Sudanese passports and identity cards are no longer valid”.
The Interior Ministry has asked police stations to register Southerners in various neighborhoods, but scores of police stations told VOA they have never received such orders. Most of the South Sudanese living in Sudan view the registration process as a major obstacle, with little money for passports or traveling back home. Sana said the government has opened a national registration center for Abyei citizens, who live along the border of the two Sudans.
Meantime, international organizations said they are trying to fly elderly and sick people back to South Sudan who have no chance of making home alone.
http://www.voanews.com/english/news/africa/South-Sudanese-Stranded-In-Khartoum-146697495.html
By Ulf Laessing
KHARTOUM | Mon Apr 9, 2012 11:29am EDT
(Reuters) – Scared and confused, hundreds of South Sudanese were stranded at Khartoum airport on Monday after being denied permission to board their flights to the south in a dispute over their legal status.
“We don’t know what to do now,” said one young woman, sitting next to a pile of suitcases and plastic bags outside the heavily guarded front gate of the international terminal.
The unclear legal status for South Sudanese in the north is one of many unresolved issues between the former foes since the South gained independence in July under a peace agreement.
Khartoum has ruled out dual citizenship for more than 500,000 southerners who have lived in the north for decades and started treating of them as foreigners on Monday after the end of a grace period.
Until Sunday flights to the southern capital Juba had been conducted at the domestic terminal without passport controls.
But many are now stuck in limbo, since South Sudan has failed to open an embassy in Khartoum that can issue passports.
At the airport, hundreds of South Sudanese tried checking into their flights to Juba early on Monday but immigration officials denied them entry.
“They need passports to board flights,” a Sudanese police officer said inside the terminal.
Both presidents were meant to sign agreements last week to allow citizens free residency but Sudan’s President Omar Hassan al-Bashir called off a summit with his southern counterpart Salva Kiir after border fighting broke out.
With almost no passengers to check in, state-owned Sudan Airways and other local carriers suspended their Juba flights.
“We are ready to fly but wait for a political decision,” said an official at Sudan Airways. The Sudanese foreign ministry could not be reached for comment.
Around 500 South Sudanese queued outside the embassy building but were unable to get passports or temporary travel documents since it is not yet fully functional. Khartoum has ruled out dual citizenship.
GOING HOME
More than 370,000 southerners, who are mostly Christians or animists, have gone home since October 2010. Tens of thousands more are now packing up, feeling they no longer have a future in the mainly Muslim north.
Bashir has said Sudan will adopt an Islamic constitution, while other officials have said the country needs to cut down on foreign workers to create jobs to fight an economic crisis.
Tensions erupted into direct clashes in disputed border regions last month, prompting the United Nations, United States and other global powers to warn of the possibility that full-blown conflict could renew between the former civil war foes.
On Monday, Bashir has called on South Sudan to halt aid to rebel groups north of the shared border, saying security was the key to resolving disputes that have raised global concerns the two countries could return to war.
“Despite everything that has happened, we will try to resolve the problems with South Sudan through negotiations through the … African Union,” he said.
Both are also arguing over how much the South should pay to export crude through Sudan, prompting Juba to halt its entire output to stop Khartoum seizing oil in lieu of “unpaid fees”.
They also need to mark their 1,800 km (1,200 mile) border and find a security arrangement for the frontier regions, where they accuse each other of supporting rebels in their territory.
The African Union managed to bring them to the negotiating table this week after the border fighting, but talks were adjourned on Wednesday with no progress.
(Reporting by Ulf Laessing and Khalid Abdelaziz Editing by Maria Golovnina)
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/09/uk-sudan-southerners-idUSLNE83801I20120409
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| South Sudanese stranded in Khartoum in legal row Reuters By Ulf Laessing | KHARTOUM (Reuters) – Scared and confused, hundreds of South Sudanese were stranded at Khartoum airport on Monday after being denied permission to board their flights to the south in a dispute over their legal status. |
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