Ethiopia and Sudan agree to resolve conflict at Nairobi meeting

By Vincent Owino, NAIROBI Kenya

Sudan’s junta leader Lt-Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Dr Abiy Ahmed reached consensus on Tuesday for peaceful resolution to disagreements.

Leaders and representatives of Igad member states arrive for the 39th Heads of State Summit in Nairobi on July 6, 2022.

This came as the leaders met for the first time since the two countries’ tiff over outstanding issues began a few weeks ago.

The two leaders met in Nairobi during the 39th Heads of State Summit for Igad members in which only four heads of state out of the eight member states were represented in person. Other leaders in attendance were Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta and Djibouti’s Ismail Omar Guelleh.

South Sudan President Salva Kiir was represented by Vice President James Wanni, Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni was represented by Defence Minister Vincent Ssempijja, while Somalia’s Hassan Mohamud was represented by Deputy Prime Minister Mahdi Mohammed.

At the end of the summit and after a separate meeting with Gen al-Burhan on the sidelines of the Summit, PM Abiy tweeted that they had both reached a consensus that their “countries have plenty of collaborative elements to work on peacefully.”

“We both made a commitment for dialogue and peaceful resolution to [our] outstanding issues,” he wrote.

Over the last few weeks, the two countries have been hurling threats at each other.

The conflict started last month when Sudan accused the Ethiopian military of capturing and killing its troops, a claim Addis has since denied, saying the slain soldiers were killed by a “local militia” and not Ethiopian forces.

The Intergovernmental Authority on Development (Igad) heads of state and government summit had “peace and security situation in the region” top of its agenda in the closed-door meeting.

Gen al-Burhan, who chaired the meeting, said it “comes at a crucial time when our home is besieged by a wide spectrum of challenges and threats both internally and externally.”

“Peace and security are the bedrock of prosperity, development and regional integration. Therefore, conflicts are the single biggest threat to our success as states and societies,” he added.

President Kenyatta said that despite the conflicts that have rocked the region, “we see a commitment to a peaceful resolution,” and called on the leaders to work together “to navigate the multiple crises that we face.”

With the leader of, the Igad states deliberated and resolved on issues pertinent to maintenance of peace and security in the region.

But even as the summit played a role in brokering peace and dialogue between Khartoum and Addis Ababa, a series of conflicts remain unresolved in the region, and the leaders underscored “the need to collaboratively address and diplomatically tackle national, political and security related issues that bear greater ramifications on the Igad region.”