Violence-hit Sudan gets support from arch enemy South Sudan

S. Sudan’s Oil Minister Ezekiel Lul Gatkuoth, right, and Sudan’s Oil Minister Azhari Abdel Qader arrive for a ceremony marking the restarting of crude oil pumping at the Unity oil fields in S. Sudan, on Monday. (Reuters)
Updated 25 January 2019
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Violence-hit Sudan gets support from arch enemy South Sudan

  • South Sudan has just emerged from its own five-year civil war

UNITY OILFIELD, S. SUDAN: Embattled Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir is receiving words of support from some unlikely places as he faces deadly protests calling for him to step down.

South Sudan won independence from Sudan in 2011 following decades of brutal fighting marked by the mass abduction and enslavement of children, scorched earth ethnic cleansing and famines.

Yet now the former arch-enemies describe themselves as the best of friends, bound together by a desperate need for oil revenues and peace to allow them to flow.

“When your interest is so intertwined, you are like a conjoined twin,” South Sudan’s Oil Minister Ezekiel Lul Gatkuoth told Reuters in the capital of Juba. “For us, the solution is not to remove Al-Bashir, the solution is to improve the economy.”

On Monday, Gatkuoth and his Sudanese counterpart jumped over a slaughtered cow, part of a traditional ceremony of welcome marking the start of increased production at Unity Oilfield near the two nations’ joint border, where less than a decade ago they fought tank battles against each other.

Some buildings were still pockmarked with bulletholes, and a large dark stain marked a place where a pipeline had been hit.

The north-south rapprochement comes as violent protests ripple across Sudan, demanding an end to soaring prices and Al-Bashir’s 30-year rule. But although South Sudan spent decades fighting Al-Bashir, the idea that he might fall worries many of his former foes.

South Sudan has just emerged from its own five-year civil war. Some from the south fear chaos in the north could derail their own peace deal, which Sudan helped broker and guarantee.

In return for peace, Sudan gets money. Landlocked South Sudan has most of the oil, but Sudan has the pipeline and port it needs to export it.

Anti-Al-Bashir protests

Video clips circulating online show thousands of people out at several locations in Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, calling on the country’s longtime ruler to step down.

Thursday’s demonstrations are the latest in the unrest that began Dec. 19 across most of Sudan, first to protest worsening economic conditions but soon to demand an end to Al-Bashir’s 29-year rule.

The latest demonstrations began in residential neighborhoods, a departure from gathering at central Khartoum as was the case over the past weeks. In response, security forces sealed off the city’s main roads, keeping the protesters on side streets.

Activists say protesters chanted what has become the uprising’s main slogan — “Just leave!” — as well as “Freedom, peace and justice.”

Al-Bashir says change could only come through the ballot box.

South Sudan’s civil war broke out two years after independence and has been punctuated by atrocities, famine and failed peace deals. But the latest agreement, signed in September, is largely holding.

That’s partly because Khartoum persuaded South Sudanese rebels it had previously backed to sign.

East Africa needed the civil war to end. More than a million South Sudanese refugees have fled to Uganda, and more than 850,000 live in Sudan.

Bashir moved the peace talks from Ethiopia to Khartoum, then midwifed an agreement that called for demobilizing, retraining and integrating fighters from all sides.

“Talks went on day and night for three months and the Sudanese were always with us trying to break the deadlock,” said Puot Kang Chol, who heads the youth league of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-In Opposition, which has just been fighting South Sudan’s government.

Oil diplomacy

Now, for the first time, South Sudan’s leaders trust the north: They know Bashir needs their oil. Sudan even helped fix the south’s broken wells, said oil minister Gatkuoth.

“Before, Sudan sought to take advantage of our vulnerabilities,” said Majak D’Agoot, who was deputy head of Sudan’s intelligence service before independence and then served as South Sudan’s deputy defense minister. “But we are now on an equal footing.”

Sudan has long battled rebels on its peripheries — in Darfur and elsewhere. But protests igniting the heart of the nation are an existential threat, D’Agoot said.

“If you shore up Bashir, the protests will not stop,” he said. “Push him out, and the Islamists will move in.”

That worries southerners, given Sudan’s borders with Egypt and Libya and its proximity to Yemen, all countries where Islamic State has been active, D’Agoot said. South Sudan is largely Christian; Sudan is mostly Muslim. Bashir’s attempt to impose Islamic sharia law was one reason the south seceded.

The protests have gathered pace over the past month, but their organizers are not holding out much hope for support from their southern neighbors.

“While Bashir may be their enemy in the past, a lot of changes took place for him to be closer now,” said Amjed Farid Eltayeb, activist and spokesman for the Sudan Change Now movement, which is involved in the current protests and seeks democratic transformation in Sudan. “I don’t think they will really support his removal from power.”

Mindful that a new government in Khartoum might be less friendly, the South Sudanese authorities are careful not to offer any sign of encouragement to the protesters.

The government-run Media Council warned local journalists in a letter this month that the protests are “internal issues affecting a friendly nation” and said “the media in South Sudan should not write or broadcast instigative statements and comments about it.”

South Sudanese President Salva Kiir sent a high-level delegation to Sudan to express solidarity.

“Relations between Sudan and South Sudan are at their most cordial since independence,” presidential spokesman Ateny Wek Ateny said. “We look forward to continuing to partner with Bashir.”

But if Bashir goes, officials were keen to say, the South Sudanese government will work with whoever the Sudanese people choose to lead them.

The first thing Juba will watch for is whether the powerful intelligence chief, Salah Abdallah Mohamed Saleh, also known as Salah Gosh, remains.

Gosh was even more central to South Sudan’s peace deal than Bashir himself, Boswell said.


Pentagon watchdog to review Hegseth’s use of Signal app to convey plans for Houthi strike

Updated 4 min 42 sec ago
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Pentagon watchdog to review Hegseth’s use of Signal app to convey plans for Houthi strike

  • Hegseth and other members of the Trump administration are required by law to archive their official conversations

WASHINGTON: The Pentagon’s acting inspector general announced Thursday that he would review Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s use of the Signal messaging app to convey plans for a military strike against Houthi militants in Yemen.
The review will also look at other defense officials’ use of the publicly available encrypted app, which is not able to handle classified material and is not part of the Defense Department’s secure communications network.
Hegseth’s use of the app came to light when a journalist, Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic, was inadvertently added to a Signal text chain by national security adviser Mike Waltz. The chain included Hegseth, Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and others, brought together to discuss March 15 military operations against the Iran-backed Houthis.
“The objective of this evaluation is to determine the extent to which the Secretary of Defense and other DoD personnel complied with DoD policies and procedures for the use of a commercial messaging application for official business,” the acting inspector general, Steven Stebbins, said in a notification letter to Hegseth.
The letter also said his office “will review compliance with classification and records retention requirements.”
Hegseth and other members of the Trump administration are required by law to archive their official conversations, and it is not clear if copies of the discussions were forwarded to an official email so they could be permanently captured for federal records keeping.
The Pentagon referred all questions to the inspector general’s office, citing the ongoing investigation.
President Donald Trump grew frustrated when asked about the review.
“You’re bringing that up again,” Trump scoffed at a reporter. “Don’t bring that up again. Your editors probably — that’s such a wasted story.”
In the chain, Hegseth provided the exact timings of warplane launches and when bombs would drop — before the men and women carrying out those attacks on behalf of the United States were airborne.
The review was launched at the request of Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Mississippi, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Rhode Island Sen. Jack Reed, the committee’s top Democrat.
In congressional hearings, Democratic lawmakers have expressed concern about the use of Signal and pressed military officers on whether they would find it appropriate to use the commercial app to discuss military operations.
Both current and former military officials have said the level of detail Hegseth shared on Signal most likely would have been classified. The Trump administration has insisted no classified information was shared.
Waltz is fighting back against calls for his ouster and, so far, Trump has said he stands by his national security adviser.
On Thursday, Trump fired several members of Waltz’s staff after far-right activist Laura Loomer urged the president to purge staffers she deemed insufficiently loyal to his “Make America Great Again” agenda, several people familiar with the matter said.
In his Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday, Trump’s nominee for chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Lt. Gen. Dan Caine, would not say whether the officials should have used a more secure communications system to discuss the attack plans.
“What I will say is we should always preserve the element of surprise,” Caine told senators.


Enzo Fernandez grabs winner as Chelsea beats Tottenham to climb to 4th in Premier League

Updated 18 min 36 sec ago
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Enzo Fernandez grabs winner as Chelsea beats Tottenham to climb to 4th in Premier League

  • Chelsea climbed above Newcastle and Manchester City into fourth place in the Premier League

Enzo Fernandez sent Chelsea back into the Champions League qualification positions with a second-half header that secured a 1-0 win over Tottenham in a typically feisty Premier League derby between the London rivals on Thursday.
The Argentina midfielder got in between defenders to nod home Cole Palmer’s cross in the 50th minute at Stamford Bridge.
Chelsea climbed above Newcastle and Manchester City into fourth place in the Premier League, which should have five spots in next season’s Champions League. There are eight rounds left in the league.
This fixture has been wild and chaotic in recent years and while the latest edition was hardly a classic, there were 10 yellow cards and a melee to go with two goals disallowed after video review — one for each side.
Moises Caicedo thought he had put Chelsea 2-0 ahead in the 56th when he volleyed home sweetly after a free kick was only partially cleared, but the goal was ruled out for offside against Levi Colwill in the buildup after long VAR check that frustrated fans.
Tottenham substitute Pape Sarr then had a long-range strike scrubbed off because he fouled Caicedo before surging forward to take his shot. In the end, Sarr lost his goal and was booked for his challenge.
Tottenham captain Son Heung-min had a chance saved by Robert Sanchez before 12 minutes of stoppage time.
“If we want to become an important team, we need to win in a dirty way, ugly way,” Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca said, “and (I’m) quite happy.”
Tottenham stayed in 14th place, with its priority now clearly the Europa League after reaching the quarterfinals. This was another below-par league performance that will pile the pressure on its under-fire manager, Ange Postecoglou, who was unhappy at Sarr’s goal being disallowed and faced some criticism from fans for his substitutions during the second half.
“My subs have been booed, it’s not the first time,” Postecoglou said. “They are allowed to boo.”
The match saw the return from injury of Chelsea striker Nicolas Jackson after two months out.


Putin envoy says diplomatic solution possible but differences remain after US talks

Updated 32 min 46 sec ago
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Putin envoy says diplomatic solution possible but differences remain after US talks

WASHINGTON: A senior Russian envoy on Thursday said differences remain between the US and Russia but a diplomatic solution to bring an end to the war in Ukraine is possible.
“I think (with) the Trump administration, we are now in realm of thinking about what is possible, what can really work, and how we can find a long term solution,” Kirill Dmitriev, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s investment envoy, told CNN following talks with US President Donald Trump’s administration in Washington.


Macron, on Egypt visit, to go near Gaza to show support for ceasefire

Updated 54 min 7 sec ago
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Macron, on Egypt visit, to go near Gaza to show support for ceasefire

  • A draft accord on treating Palestinian wounded brought out of Gaza is to be signed during the visit

PARIS: French President Emmanuel Macron will go to an Egyptian port near the Gaza Strip next week to highlight concerns over the conflict in the Palestinian territory, his office said Thursday.
Macron will go to Arish, 50 kilometers (30 miles) from Gaza, next Tuesday during a visit to Egypt, officials said.
Macron will meet humanitarian and security workers next Tuesday to stress his “constant mobilization in favor of a ceasefire,” his office said in a statement.
Arish is a transit point for international aid intended for Gaza.
But food and other supplies have not been able to use the nearby Rafah crossing from Egypt into Gaza since a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas was suspended last month.
Macron is to go to Egypt on Sunday and on Monday will meet the country’s President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi.
Egypt has been a mediator in the Israel-Hamas conflict since the Ocxtober 7, 2023 Hamas attacks and Macron will stress “the urgency” of securing a new ceasefire so that Gaza’s population is no longer has to bear a “humanitarian catastrophe,” Israeli strikes are ended and Israeli hostages in Gaza are freed, the French leader’s office said.
A draft accord on treating Palestinian wounded brought out of Gaza is to be signed during the visit.
 

 


US Senate Republican pushes for congressional approval of president’s tariffs

Updated 59 min 33 sec ago
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US Senate Republican pushes for congressional approval of president’s tariffs

  • The Republican critics in Congress of Trump’s tariff moves remained a distinct minority

WASHINGTON: Republican US Senator Chuck Grassley introduced a bill on Thursday that would require congressional approval for new tariffs, the day after President Donald Trump unveiled sweeping new taxes on a vast array of imported goods.
Grassley, whose home state of Iowa relies heavily on the global agricultural trade, joined Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington for the “Trade Review Act of 2025” which would require Congress to sign off on new tariffs within 60 days of their imposition or automatically block their enforcement. The move, made the day after four other Senate Republicans voted for a measure that would lift Trump’s tariffs on Canadian goods, was the latest sign of dissent among Republicans as Trump’s aggressive moves fanned recessionary fears and sparked Wall Street’s worst day since 2022.
Neither Grassley’s bill nor the measure that passed the Senate on Wednesday were seen as likely to become law while Trump’s Republicans hold majorities in both the Senate and House of Representatives, where many of their members are voicing support for Trump’s moves.
Trump, who has long advocated for tariffs, said that the highest US trade barriers in more than a century would both raise federal revenue and drive manufacturing back to the US Economists have voiced deep skepticism about both possibilities.
Grassley, the longest-serving member of the US Senate, did not directly criticize Trump in introducing his bill. He noted that he had proposed a similar trade approach during Trump’s first administration, citing the US Constitution establishing congressional authority over trade issues, but that over time the legislature has ceded this power to the executive branch.
But some Republicans have indicated unease with parts of Trump’s tariff plans.
“I would have expected more targeted tariffs to meet the needs of where countries are taking advantage of us, and perhaps a more modest approach in the amounts,” Republican Senator Jerry Moran told reporters. He also expressed concerns that tariffs placed on US allies in Southeast Asia were similar to those placed on China, which he called a “damaging” economy to the US
Republican Senator James Lankford said he was surprised by the 17 percent tariff on Israel and hoped the US Trade Representative could explain why the tariff level on Israel was different from other countries. Republican senators Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell — the chamber’s former Republican leader — provided the votes on Wednesday to pass Democratic Senator Tim Kaine’s disapproval resolution on the Trump trade approach toward Canada.
“Tariffs drive up the cost of goods and services. They are a tax on everyday working Americans,” McConnell said in a statement on Thursday.
About half of Americans, and one in five Republicans, believe that increasing tariffs on imports will do more harm than good, a Reuters/Ipsos poll completed on Wednesday found. The Republican critics in Congress of Trump’s tariff moves remained a distinct minority. Indeed, the House earlier this month passed a measure meant to strip Congress’ power to challenge new tariffs imposed by the president.
“The president has been talking about unfair trade against the United States for 40 years, so he’s been very consistent on this,” said Senator John Barrasso, the chamber’s No. 2 Republican. “Long-term, I think this is very important for the country, bringing jobs and manufacturing back to America, focusing on our economy.”
Grassley’s Democratic co-sponsor, Cantwell, said that Trump’s tariffs risked long-term damage to the US economy.
“We can’t afford a trade war that lasts for two or three years, leaving our product off the shelves,” Cantwell said. “We cannot have arbitrary policies that create chaos and uncertainty.”