The U.S. and the United Nations are preparing to make more peacekeeping troops available for the growing conflict in South Sudan, as President Salva Kiir opened the door to talks with his deposed vice president.
U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon asked the Security Council for 5,500 soldiers to add to the peacekeeping mission of 7,000 already there. The U.S. is positioning troops in the Horn of Africa region to assist in any additional evacuations in South Sudan, Pentagon spokesman Colonel Steve Warren said yesterday.
At an emergency meeting yesterday in New York, all 15 members of the U.N. Security Council showed a "positive reaction"to Ban’s request for the troops, plus 423 police personnel, said Gerard Araud, French Ambassador to the United Nations and president of the council this month. The council may authorize the boost today, he said.
The military maneuvering underscored what Ban called the "mounting urgency"in South Sudan, where fighting that began Dec. 15 has killed at least 500 people. About 100,000 have been internally displaced and about 45,000 are seeking protection in and around at UN camps in the country, Araud said.
U.S. special envoy Donald Booth, who met yesterday with Kiir in the capital, Juba, said the president expressed a willingness to begin talks with former Vice President Riek Machar "without preconditions, as soon as his counterpart was willing.”
"The United States emphasizes the urgency of the situation and stands ready to support these efforts as necessary," Booth told reporters on a conference call.
Rebel Leaders
Fighting broke out in South Sudan when gunmen attacked the presidential palace in Juba. The violence has been largely along ethnic lines, with Machar’s Nuer group pitted against the Dinka people of Kiir.
Machar, who is being hunted by government security forces, has demanded that Kiir step down for failing to unite the nation. Kiir fired Machar and the rest of his cabinet in July. The two sides agreed to an offer by neighboring Kenya to host peace talks, Kenyan Foreign Ministry Principal Secretary Karanja Kibicho told reporters yesterday in Nairobi.
Booth said he also met with 11 members of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement who are detained in Juba. He said they expressed a readiness "to play a constructive role in ending the crisis through peaceful political dialogue and national reconciliation.”
Rebel forces loyal to Machar said they captured crude-producing Unity state as the government evacuated some oil workers and plans a partial shutdown of facilities.
Oil-Area Tensions
Fighters led by General James Kong Chol seized Bentiu, the state capital, and other parts of the northern region on Dec. 21 and have aligned themselves with Machar, Chol said in a phone interview Dec. 22. It was the second state to fall to anti-government forces after Kiir’s administration lost control of Bor, the capital of Jonglei province, to a group headed by General Peter Gatdet Yak on Dec. 18. Chol and Yak previously headed government forces in the two states.
"We’re controlling the area of Unity state," Chol said from Bentiu. "My government planned to kill me and I have nowhere to go. I decided to join Riek Machar."
South Sudan’s oil-producing Upper Nile state is also facing tensions after gunmen attacked government forces in Nasir county, Philip Aguer, a spokesman for the national army, said by phone Dec. 22. He said he had no further information.
Kiir said yesterday he agreed to a request by the six- nation Intergovernmental Authority on Development to help mediate an end to the crisis.
Japanese Bullets
"We’re ready for any dialogue, but Dr. Machar must come to the table without any preconditions," he told lawmakers in Juba. "Through dialogue I think we can resolve this misunderstanding very quickly.”
South Sudan seceded from neighboring Sudan in July 2011 and took three-quarters of the formerly united country’s oil output. The landlocked country exports all its crude, about 220,000 barrels a day, through pipelines across Sudan. The oil provides more than 95 percent of government revenue.
South Sudan has sub-Saharan Africa’s biggest oil reserves after Nigeria and Angola, according to BP Plc data. Its low- sulfur crude is prized by Japanese buyers as a cleaner-burning fuel for power generation. Japan will supply 10,000 bullets for UN peacekeepers in South Sudan, marking the first exemption under the Asian nation’s self-imposed curbs on arms exports, Kyodo News reported, without citing anyone.
South Sudan’s crude is pumped mainly by China National Petroleum Corp., Malaysia’s Petroliam Nasional Bhd. and India’s Oil & Natural Gas Corp.
‘No Interruption’
ONGC repatriated its 11 employees and the company’s joint venture has shut down oilfields in South Sudan that were producing about 40,000 barrels per day, Finance Director S.P. Garg said in a phone interview.
Chol said there is "no interruption to oil"production in the country. "Oil is still flowing,"he said.
Petroleum Minister Stephen Dhieu Dau said on Dec. 22 the evacuation of oil workers from the country is temporary and oil output from Upper Nile is flowing normally.
UN Assistant Secretary-General Toby Lanzer estimated the country will need $1.1 billion of humanitarian aid in 2014 after 62,000 people were displaced in the past week’s violence.
Four U.S. service members suffered gunshot wounds on Dec. 21 while on flights to evacuate Americans from Bor. The UN had previously sent helicopters to evacuate staff from South Sudan, and one was hit and forced to land on Dec. 20, according to the Associated Press.
Evacuation Requests
The U.S. military is positioning forces to respond to any requests from the State Department to evacuate personnel, said Warren, the Pentagon spokesman. He offered no details on troop numbers or whether any U.S. troops were entering South Sudan.
Three of the four U.S. troops injured earlier were stable enough to be taken to the military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany, he said. The fourth will continue to receive care from U.S. forces in Nairobi, he said.
About 380 U.S. officials and private citizens have been evacuated to Nairobi and other locations, along with about 300 others, U.S. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in an emailed statement Dec. 22.
President Barack Obama sent a letter to Congress Dec. 22 saying he "may take further action to support the security of U.S. citizens, personnel, and property, including our embassy" in South Sudan.
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