Sudan calls on UN to be 'neutral'

The Sudanese Foreign ministry yesterday called on the United Nations Integrated Transition Assistance Mission in Sudan (UNITAMS) to be “neutral with all parties.”

The demands were made by the ministry’s undersecretary, Dafa-Allah Al-Haj Ali, during his meeting with the head of the UN mission, Volker Peretz.

“The UN must commit to its neutrality and actively engage in facilitating the transition process to achieve the desired goals,” Ali said, stressing that the mission should investigate its “accuracy and cautiousness in its official statements.”

Referring to the so-called tripartite mechanism, Ali pointed out that the UN’s recent statement did not include a “road map for the resumption of initial talks.” The tripartite mechanism is an initiative launched in cooperation between the UNITAMS, the African Union, and Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), with the aim of facilitating negotiations between different parties in Sudan to resolve current disputes.

On Wednesday, the tripartite mechanism noted that the relevant formula for dialogue between the military and civilian parties was negated following the army’s recent decision not to participate in the talks. On the same day, the Forces of Freedom and Change said that the tripartite mechanism had informed them “to halt the dialogue to resolve the political crisis in the country after the withdrawal of the military.”

The head of Sudan’s Transitional Sovereignty Council, Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, announced on Monday that the army would not participate in the national dialogue “to make a room for the political and revolutionary forces to form an independent government and complete the transition period.”

Since October, Sudan has been witnessing popular protests against Al-Burhan’s coup and exceptional measures. Al-Burhan has repeatedly said that the measures were aiming at “correcting the course of the transitional period,” pledging to hand over power through elections or national dialogue.

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