US steps up pressure, outlines incentives on Sudan ahead of independence referendum
By Desmond Butler, APTuesday, September 14, 2010
US steps up pressure, incentives for Sudan
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is offering the prospect of restoring full diplomatic relations with Sudan if it improves conditions in the Darfur region and doesn’t an undermine a referendum that could lead to the secession of the southern part of the country.
Ahead of a referendum on independence for Southern Sudan scheduled for January, the Obama administration is intensifying its diplomacy. President Barack Obama hopes to focus attention on the referendum when he attends a U.N. meeting on Sudan Sept. 24
Special envoy Scott Gration said Tuesday that in recent meetings in Khartoum he has outlined a list of incentives that include returning an ambassador to Khartoum, debt relief and economic aid. He said he also described possible negative repercussions for backsliding by Khartoum, but would not elaborate in an interview.
“I made sure that they understand that there are consequences,” Gration said.
Gration said that the administration is worried that time is running short to resolve multiple issues for the organization of the referendum and possible consequences.
“We are all concerned that there are a lot of moving parts that have to come together to make it happen,” he said.
The referendum was agreed to in a 2005 accord that ended decades of north-south civil war that killed more than 2 million people. The threat of renewed violence has loomed over the process of setting up the referendum. Officials in the South have charged that the North has deliberately delayed the process.
A central dispute is whether the contested, 1,300-mile (2,100 kilometer) border must be demarcated before the referendum and how it will be drawn.
Gration said that Obama hopes to raise Sudan up the list of international priorities when he attends the conference in New York.
