UN-led talks on Western Sahara end with plans to meet again in 2019

Horst Koehler said it is clear to me that nobody wins from maintaining the status quo. (AFP)
Updated 07 December 2018
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UN-led talks on Western Sahara end with plans to meet again in 2019

  • Koehler spoke after two days of talks involving a top Polisario envoy and the foreign ministers of Morocco, Algeria and Mauritania over the country.

GENEVA: The UN secretary-general’s envoy for Western Sahara on Thursday wrapped up the first talks in six years over the future of the territory mostly controlled by Morocco, saying the sides have agreed to meet again early next year.

Former German President Horst Koehler hailed “a first, but an important, step” toward resolving a decades-old standoff between Morocco and the independence-minded Polisario Front.

He spoke on Thursday after two days of talks involving a top Polisario envoy and the foreign ministers of Morocco, Algeria and Mauritania over the country.

“From our discussions, it is clear to me that nobody wins from maintaining the status quo,” Koehler said, expressing hopes for the emergence of “environment in the region that is conducive to strong growth, job creation and better security.”

“My conviction remains that a peaceful solution to this conflict is possible,” he said in prepared remarks, declining to take questions from reporters after the talks at the UN in Geneva. “I look forward to inviting the delegations to a second round-table meeting in the first quarter of 2019.”

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said: “Discussions that took place in an atmosphere of serious engagement, frankness and mutual respect, and the fact that the delegation agreed with Mr. Kohler to come back for a second round is something that is clearly a positive step forward.”


US condemns RSF drone attack on World Food Programme convoy in Sudan’s North Kordofan

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US condemns RSF drone attack on World Food Programme convoy in Sudan’s North Kordofan

WASHINGTON: The US has condemned a drone attack on a World Food Programme (WFP) convoy in Sudan’s North Kordofan state that killed one person and injured three others.

“The United States condemns the recent drone attack on a World Food Program convoy in North Kordofan transporting food to famine-stricken people which killed one and wounded many others,” US Senior Adviser for Arab and African Affairs Massad Boulos wrote on X.

“Destroying food intended for people in need and killing humanitarian workers is sickening,” the US envoy wrote.

“The Trump Administration has zero tolerance for this destruction of life and of U.S.-funded assistance; we demand accountability and extend our condolences to all those affected by these inexcusable events and terrible war,” he added.

 

 

Since April 2023, the conflict between Sudan’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has killed tens of thousands, displaced 11 million and which the UN has described as one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.

An alert issued by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), confirmed famine conditions in El-Fasher and Kadugli, the capital of South Kordofan, about 800 kilometers to the east.

The IPC said that 20 more areas in Sudan’s Darfur and neighboring Kordofan were at risk of famine.

The Sudan Doctors Network said the convoy was struck by RSF drones in the Allah Karim area as it headed toward displaced people in El-Obeid, the state capital, Anadolu Agency reported.

The network described the attack as a “clear violation of international humanitarian law,” warning that it undermines efforts to deliver life-saving aid to civilians amid worsening humanitarian conditions across the country.

There was no immediate comment from the rebel group.

Of Sudan’s 18 states, the RSF controls all five states in the western Darfur region, except for parts of North Darfur that remain under army control. The army holds most areas of the remaining 13 states across the south, north, east and center of the country, including the capital, Khartoum.

The conflict between the army and the RSF, which erupted in April 2023, has killed thousands of people and displaced millions.