UN Confirms Bashir’s Visit To South Sudan

This article was last updated on May 25, 2022

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Menkerios confirmed Bashir’s visit after holding talks with the South Sudanese President Salva Kiir on the Addis Ababa agreement reached between the two countries in September on the post secession issues.

“The President – Salva Kiir has again confirmed that President Bashir has intended to come to visit South Sudan,” Menkerios told the press shortly after the meeting with the President yesterday at Kiir’s palace in Juba.

Menkerios who did not state the date of the visit by Bashir to Juba described his visit to South Sudan as imperative. 

“I think it is a positive gesture after they have made agreement and considering on how to resolve the remaining issues. President Bashir’s intention to visit can only be taken as a positive move,” commended Menkerios. 

He re-assured South Sudan the UN support in ensuring for the full implementation of the agreements and efforts resolution on the remaining issues on the Abyei and disputed areas.

He pointed out that the remaining challenge on the post secession issues the leadership of the two countries should focus on are the implementation of the reached agreements and how to resolve the remaining issues.

He underscored the efforts of the two countries in reaching agreements on the issues and called for more efforts to resolve the remaining issues.

Last month, Sudan and South Sudan agreed to end hostilities, restart southern oil exports through the north and revive cross-border trade.

Bashir was last in Juba at South Sudan’s independence ceremony on July 9, 2011. Both leaders had planned to hold a summit in Juba in April but Sudan cancelled it after fighting broke out at the border and South Sudan briefly seized an oil field key to Sudan’s economy.

The African Union is trying to mediate a lasting peace between the two countries. It last week gave them six more weeks to reach an agreement on the disputed border region of Abyei which is highly symbolic to both sides.

South Sudan shut off oil production, the lifeline of both economies, in January after failing to agree with Sudan on export fees. Exports are expected to flow again at the end of December or the start of January after last month’s deal.