Burhan, Hilu Sign Declaration of Principles

Sudan's Sovereign Council Chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, South Sudan's President Salva Kiir, and Sudan's Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok after signing a peace agreement in Juba, South Sudan (File Photo: Reuters)
Sudan's Sovereign Council Chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, South Sudan's President Salva Kiir, and Sudan's Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok after signing a peace agreement in Juba, South Sudan (File Photo: Reuters)
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Burhan, Hilu Sign Declaration of Principles

Sudan's Sovereign Council Chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, South Sudan's President Salva Kiir, and Sudan's Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok after signing a peace agreement in Juba, South Sudan (File Photo: Reuters)
Sudan's Sovereign Council Chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, South Sudan's President Salva Kiir, and Sudan's Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok after signing a peace agreement in Juba, South Sudan (File Photo: Reuters)

Sudan's Sovereign Council chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan arrived in Juba Saturday for a meeting with South Sudan President Salva Kiir to discuss bilateral relations and the resumption of peace negotiations with Abdelaziz al-Hilu’s Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM-N al-Hilu).

Burhan and Hilu discussed in a closed session the declaration of principles which will help launch their formal peace negotiations.

Burhan was accompanied by the Justice Minister, Nasreldin Abdelbari, who participated in the closed session with Hilu and his accompanying delegation.

Kiir's security advisor Tut Gatluak said that the closed session was positive, and the dialogue advanced within the framework of the common understandings on the declaration of principles.

Gatluak announced that the government and the movement will sign the declaration of principles on Sunday, witnessed by Kiir who also sponsors the Sudanese peace talks.

He said that after signing the declaration, the mediation committee will set a schedule for the negotiations.

Official sources revealed that the talks between Burhan and Hilu failed to overcome the differences over the secular issues and security arrangements, which prevented SPLM-N from engaging in previous peace talks.

In March, Burhan and Hilu met in Juba and agreed on the need to resume negotiation to reach solutions accepted by all parties.

SPLM-N rejects the Sudanese government's proposal to separate religion from the state and adheres to its demand of a secular state and the right to self-determination for the Nuba Mountains and Blue Nile regions.

The sources indicate that the SPLM-N refuses to integrate its forces into the Sudanese army unless the issue of secularism is resolved.

Prime Minister Abdullah Hamdok and Hilu signed a joint agreement in September last year that included the separation of religion from the state in the constitution of Sudan.

The workshop between the government and the SPLM-N in October 2020 failed to yield positive results on controversial issues.

The SPLM accused the head of the government delegation, Shams El-Din Kabbashi of failing the workshop for rejecting the recommendations.

The Juba agreement was signed last October between the Sudanese government and representatives of armed movements within the Revolutionary Front, while the SPLM-N and the Sudan Liberation Movement led by Abdul Wahid Nouri (SLA-AW) in Darfur did not participate.



Israel Pounds Southern Lebanon and Beirut Outskirts, Killing Five Medics

Fire and smoke erupt from a building just after an Israeli airstrike in Beirut's southern Chiyah neighborhood on November 22, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and Hezbollah. (AFP)
Fire and smoke erupt from a building just after an Israeli airstrike in Beirut's southern Chiyah neighborhood on November 22, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and Hezbollah. (AFP)
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Israel Pounds Southern Lebanon and Beirut Outskirts, Killing Five Medics

Fire and smoke erupt from a building just after an Israeli airstrike in Beirut's southern Chiyah neighborhood on November 22, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and Hezbollah. (AFP)
Fire and smoke erupt from a building just after an Israeli airstrike in Beirut's southern Chiyah neighborhood on November 22, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and Hezbollah. (AFP)

Israeli forces pounded southern Lebanon and the outskirts of the capital Beirut on Friday, killing at least five medics, and ground troops clashed with Hezbollah fighters in the south.

Israel has pushed on with its intense military campaign against the Iran-backed armed group Hezbollah, tempering hopes that efforts by a US envoy will lead to an imminent ceasefire.

US mediator Amos Hochstein said this week in Beirut that a truce was "within our grasp". He travelled on to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz before returning to Washington, the news outlet Axios said.

His trip was aimed at ending more than a year of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah along Lebanon's southern border, which escalated when Israel ramped up its strikes in late September and sent ground troops into Lebanon on Oct. 1.

Israeli troops have fought Hezbollah in a strip of towns along the border and this week pushed deeper to the edges of Khiyam, a town some six km (four miles) from the border.

Hezbollah said it had fired rockets at Israeli troops east of Khiyam at least four times on Friday. Lebanese security sources told Reuters Israeli troops had also advanced in a string of villages to the west. They said Israel was most likely trying to isolate Khiyam before attacking the town.

Four Italian soldiers were lightly injured after two rockets exploded at a UNIFIL peacekeeping force base in southern Lebanon, a spokesperson for UNIFIL said on Friday.

Italian sources said an investigation was under way. Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani told Italian media that Hezbollah might be responsible for the attack.

Israeli strikes on two other villages in southern Lebanon killed five medics from a rescue force affiliated with Hezbollah, the Lebanese health ministry said.

The more than 3,500 people killed by Israeli strikes over the last year include more than 200 medics, the health ministry said.

EVACUATION WARNINGS AND STRIKES

Israel says its aim is to secure the return home of tens of thousands of people evacuated from Israel's north because of rocket attacks by Hezbollah, which began firing across the border in support of Hamas at the start of the war in Gaza in October 2023.

Israel also mounted more strikes on Beirut's southern suburbs, a once densely populated stronghold of Hezbollah.

Abeer Darwich, a resident of a building that was hit in Beirut southern suburbs on Friday, had to leave her apartment immediately after an evacuation warning from Israel's military.

She stood watching while an Israeli strike pounded the high rise building into dust.

"Do you know that most of the apartments' owners took credit to buy those houses? Life savings are gone, memories and safety ... which Israel decided to steal from us," Darwich said .

Evacuation orders were issued on X for several buildings in the area on Friday. Reuters footage showed one of the strikes appearing to pierce the center of a multi-storey building, which toppled in a cloud of smoke.