Kingdoms South Sudan fighters recommit to the peace agreement

Addis Ababa – warring government forces and rebels in southern Sudan on Monday signed a commitment to address key security sections of a peace agreement, despite having broken the pact multiple times.
The agreement is hoped to relaunch negotiations stalled since key sections of a military agreement on August 26, including the demilitarization of the capital Juba, troops from the positions of both sides and not towards creating a unified army .
“This signature by the opposition is a breakthrough, peace is now a reality,” said Peter Bashir Mandi, Deputy Foreign Minister of the government after the signing of neighboring Ethiopia.
The army and rebels have repeatedly traded blame, accusing each other of breaking the ceasefire negotiated internationally, the eighth such agreement.
Fighting continues
“This is a commitment and firearms are now going to be silent,” said Mandi. “The real monitoring of the ceasefire will happen. All the institutions established by the peace agreement will be in place. ”
The civil war began in December 2013, when President Salva Kiir accused his former deputy Riek Machar of planning a coup, triggering a cycle of murders committed in retaliation across the country that divided the poor, landlocked country along ethnic lines.
Tens of thousands of people were killed, and the UN-backed experts have warned against the “concrete risk of starvation” before the end of the year if fighting continues and the aid arrives not to the most affected areas.
The demilitarization of government-held Juba for the return of rebel leader Riek Machar and his entourage rebel is a key provision of the peace agreement.
But the rivals have disagreed on the composition of these troops allowed to stay in the city.
“What is important is to unify the forces, starting with the presidential guard and the military stationed in Juba,” said rebel negotiator Taban Deng.
“We agree that we will continue to discuss and implement the agreement.”