SPLM SUGGESTS DELAY IN CONFERENCE WITH DPA

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 KHARTOUM 000953

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR AF A/S FRAZER, AF S/E NATSIOS, AND AF/SPG
NSC FOR PITTMAN AND SHORTLEY
ADDIS ABABA ALSO FOR USAU

E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/14/2012
TAGS: PREL PGOV AU UN SU
SUBJECT: SPLM SUGGESTS DELAY IN CONFERENCE WITH DPA
NON-SIGNATORIES

KHARTOUM 00000953 001.2 OF 004


Classified By: CDA A. Fernandez, Reason: Sections 1.4 (b) and (d)

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Summary
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1. (C) The Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) will
most likely postpone the second and third phases of their
conference in Southern Sudan because key leaders of the
Darfur rebel movements have not agreed to attend. The first
phase of the conference--focused on civil society groups,
traditional leaders, and representatives of the Arab
tribes--will proceed on June 18. Though welcoming UN and AU
participation in the conference, First Vice President Salva
Kiir and members of the SPLM Darfur Taskforce were positive
but vague in their support for the United Nations and African
Union to lead mediation efforts, during a meeting with the
Darfur Partners Group in Khartoum. The French Ambassador
claimed that Paris had pressured Abdulwahid al-Nur to be a
constructive player in the political process, with no
success. End summary.

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Darfur Partners Demarche Kiir
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2. (C) Representatives of the Darfur Partners Group,
including the United Nations (UN),African Union (AU),
European Union (EU),European Commission (EC),U.S., UK,
Norway, Germany, France, Canada, and the Netherlands, met
with First Vice President Salva Kiir and members of the SPLM
Taskforce for Darfur (TFD) on June 15 to discuss the upcoming
conference in Southern Sudan. The Partners emphasized that
the focus of the SPLM conference should be on facilitating
common negotiating positions among the Darfur Peace Agreement
(DPA) non-signatory factions. They expressed their concern
that the first phase of the SPLM conference--focused on civil
society groups, traditional leaders, and Arab tribes--risked
detracting from the goal of preparing the non-signatories for
negotiations and that several rebel leaders were not prepared
to attend the conference in Southern Sudan. They suggested
that the second and third phases of the SPLM conference be
postponed by two weeks in order to de-link the first phase
and to re-focus the SPLM's efforts. (Note: Please see para.
10 for the complete text of the talking points delivered by
UN and AU representatives. End note.)


3. (C) Referencing the Tripoli Consensus, the UN and AU
stated that both parties should be "involved thoroughly" in
each component of the political process. While reiterating
the UN and AU's support for the SPLM conference, they said
that the UN and AU hoped to announce a venue for final talks
by the end of July and begin negotiations in August. The
ambassadors from the UK and the Netherlands voiced their
support for the SPLM conference while underscoring the UN/AU
"umbrella" for the Darfur political process and a "visible
role and position for the UN and AU" at the conference in
Southern Sudan. CDA commended the SPLM's leadership in help
to end the suffering of the people of Darfur. He urged the
SPLM to distinguish between "the good and the crucial" and to
focus its efforts on the non-signatories.

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Focus Still on Rebel Factions
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4. (C) According to Kiir, the first phase of the SPLM would
not include the non-signatory representatives and would
concentrate on assessing civil society and tribal leaders'
views on the Darfur conflict. The SPLM would then
communicate the priorities of these groups to the Darfur
movements during phases two and three. He said that the
focus, however, remained on preparing the rebel movements for
negotiations. Reflecting on the SPLM's own history of
division, he said that the movements must be united with a
single negotiating position before the political process
could continue. He said that the SPLM would not serve in a
mediation role and repeated several times that it would leave
negotiations to "whoever has the file." He did not specify
that the UN and AU should fill this role.

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Phases Two, Three Likely Postponed
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5. (C) Kiir acknowledged, however, that key rebel leaders had

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rebuffed invitations to the Southern Sudan conference at
present. He said that it was important for the conference to
be inclusive and implied that the phases dealing with the
non-signatories would be postponed until all factions could
be represented. "On our side, if people don't come, we won't
hold the meeting," said Kiir. "We need all these people,
whether today, tomorrow, next week, or next year. We
consider everyone to be important. Even someone carrying a
gun in a bush, even one person, should not be ignored; he
could become important tomorrow."


6. (C) Kiir said that he had spoken to Sudan Liberation Army
(SLA) leader Abdulwahid al-Nur on June 13, who had two
pre-conditions for his attendance: 1) Kiir come to Paris to
speak to al-Nur directly, and 2) The SPLM declare its "clear
support" for al-Nur. Kiir said that if al-Nur's security
concerns about returning to Sudan were legitimate, Kiir would
be happy to meet him during a one-day visit in the region but
that offer was rejected. Kiir also said that he had met with
rebel faction leader Ahmed Abdulshafi in Juba earlier on June
15, who had also refused to attend. Kiir did not have any
indications that Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) leader
Khalil Ibrahim would participate. "It has become clear that
the leaders of the movements themselves are not ready," said
Kiir.

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Need for Collective Pressure
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7. (C) The UN representative suggested that the SPLM and the
international community needed to "collectively work out some
kind of timeline" rather than allowing the political process
to languish. He encouraged the SPLM to consider a mid-July
start date for the second and third phases of its conference
and for the international community to exert "collective
pressure" on the parties to participate.


8. (C) Kiir agreed that the rebel factions could not be
allowed to delay but acknowledged the danger in setting
unrealistic timelines, particularly as the international
community was giving the movements conflicting signals. He
also noted that many in Darfur believed that delaying the
peace process until the arrival of UN forces would strengthen
their hand. He said that both the SPLM and the international
community needed to "do their homework" and press the
non-signatories to join the process. TFD member Edward Lino
noted the disconnect between the rebel factions in the field
and their political leaders outside of Darfur. Highlighting
the urgency of defusing the conflict, Lino also warned of the
ramifiations of "60 percent" of Darfur's population
remaining displaced in camps over the long term and the
creation of a new generation of fighters that will carry on
the war.

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French Role
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9. (C) The French Ambassador said that her government had
pressed al-Nur to be a constructive actor in the political
process, with no success. "The intensity and pressure
exerted on him have clearly increased since the formation of
the new French Government," she said. "But unfortunately at
this stage it has not been successful." She said that the
June 25 ministerial-level meeting in Paris was not an attempt
to involve the representatives of the rebel movements outside
of the Tripoli Consensus but that it would focus on the "P-5,
the G-8, and some others" to reinforce the importance of the
UN/AU process, garner support for the African Union Mission
in Sudan (AMIS),and "open up the perspective" on
reconstruction and development in Darfur.

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Text of the UN/AU Talking Points
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10. (SBU) The following is the text of the UN/AU talking
points used in the meeting with Kiir:

(Begin Text)

Greetings from the Special Envoys. They reiterate their
support for SPLM initiative and continuously highlight the
important role that SPLM can play in the Darfur peace process
given its experience and history.

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We appreciate the cooperation we have had so far with the
SPLM Task Force. Thank you for the meeting last Monday in
Juba, we were positive about the progress that has been made
in the planning of the conference.

As the Special Envoys emphasized in their meeting with you in
Juba on 9 May, we are particularly interested in capitalizing
on the strength of the SPLM to bring together non-signatories
and facilitate a common negotiating position. We continue to
believe that the most important use of your expertise and
efforts is a small political gathering of this constituency.

After reviewing the programme of events, we remain concerned
that the civil society component of the event is tied into
the meeting with the non-signatories. Originally, we were
under the impression that the two meetings would be held
separately but would be designed to feed into one another.
This would be the ideal format given the fact that some of
the non-signatories are currently unprepared and unwilling to
enter into discussions with civil society. We fear that this
would detract from the focus of the meeting to bring the
non-signatories together and may risk the success of the
conference as a whole.

We support the SPLM's initiative to involve civil society
groups so that they can act as pressure groups on the
non-signatories is an important element to exploit. We must
ensure that their voices are channeled into the political
process. We believe that this can be best achieved by having
this meeting separate from the meeting with non-signatories.
We believe that resources and capacity of the DDDC can be
further utilized for this purpose and we will encourage the
Preparatory Secretariat of the DDDC to work with the SPLM and
other stakeholders towards this end.

Separating the two meetings would also allow the
non-signatories to further prepare their positions ahead of
the meeting. As you know, there is a group currently in
Asmara and another group that will soon be in Kenya,
preparing the ground for common negotiating positions.
Lessons from Abuja have proven that our ultimate objective is
best served if we allow these groups to fully prepare
themselves ahead of such meetings. Given these circumstances
and the fact that the civil society are able to be mobilized
to begin their proceedings next week, it would be advisable
to postpone the non-signatory portion of the SPLM conference
by a two weeks.

As you know, we have been in contact with many of the
non-signatory groups and have discussed the SPLM initiative
with them. Despite our support of the SPLM conference, it is
clear that at this moment few are prepared to take part, as
they are still attempting to resolve internal issues. As
Your Excellency will recall, the earlier discussions held
with the Special Envoys emphasized the importance of an
inclusive process. In this connection, we would appreciate
receiving an update on those political leaders and
non-signatory groups that you have been in touch with and
have accepted to attend the SPLM conference. (We have
indications that neither Khalil Ibrahim nor Abdul Wahid are
intending to come.)

As always, we are ready to assist in both utilizing our joint
leverage on the non-signatories to encourage them to attend,
as well as provide financial and logistical assistance to
facilitate the meeting. In the finalized roadmap for the
political process which was presented at the UN Security
Council last week by Special Envoy Eliasson, and to the AU
leadership by Dr. Salim Salim, the SPLM conference is listed
as an essential step in the political process. We are
counting very much on your success in order to facilitate the
next steps. As you will recall from your meeting with the
Special Envoys and the consensus from the meeting in Tripoli
in April, it is crucial that the AU-UN is involved thoroughly
in each step of the process. The international community
supports this role and is interested in our full involvement
in the SPLM conference.

Furthermore, we would like to take this opportunity to inform
you of what the Special Envoys envision for the next steps of
the process. Following the SPLM conference, the
pre-negotiation phase will begin. AU-UN consultations that
are currently ongoing will be intensified in July in an
effort to bring the positions of the parties closer together.
We will have discussions on the key thematic issues as well

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as on the format, venue and agenda of the renewed talks. On
a separate but related track, we will conduct intensified
consultations with civil society, IDP representatives, tribal
leaders and others to ensure that their concerns are taken
into consideration in the final negotiations. We hope to
announce the venue for final talks in July and proceed with
the start of negotiations in August.

Thank you for your attention.

(End Text)


11. (U) Tripoli minimize considered.
FERNANDEZ