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                Sudan's Bashir in First Visit to Juba Since Spit

   by Reuters

   Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir said on Friday he wanted
   normal ties with his nation's old adversary South Sudan on his first
   visit there since southern secession in 2011.

   The neighbors agreed in March to resume cross-border oil flows and ease
   tension that has been permanent since South Sudan's independence in
   July 2011 following a 2005 treaty which ended decades of civil war.

   But the rivals in one of Africa's longest conflicts still
   dispute much of their 2,000 kilometer border including ownership of the
   symbolically important region of Abyei.

   Bashir, who cancelled a visit to Juba a year ago when border fighting
   almost flared into full-scale war, said in a speech in the southern
   capital that he had ordered Sudan's borders with South Sudan to be
   opened for traffic.
   "I have instructed Sudan's authorities and civil society to open up to
   their brothers in the Republic of South Sudan,'' Bashir said alongside
   South Sudan's President Salva Kiir.

   Kiir said he had agreed with Bashir to continue talks to
   solve all outstanding conflicts between the African neighbors.
   "I and President Bashir agreed to implement all cooperation
   agreements,'' Kiir said.
   Security was tight during the visit to the ramshackle
   capital which, like the rest of the country, has few paved roads.
   Police lined main streets, which had been closed and festooned with the
   flags of both countries, as the leaders drove from the airport to the
   presidential office.

   Many South Sudanese are tired of conflict and crisis.
   "We need to live in harmony. We need peace between Sudan and South
   Sudan,'' said 22-year old engineering student Robert Mori.
   Edmund Yakani, head of the Community Empowerment for Progress
   Organization (CEPO) which promotes values of civil society, said
   Bashir's visit showed he wanted peace.
   Disagreements also remain over how much the landlocked south should pay
   to export its oil through Sudan.
   The new African country shut down its 350,000 barrel a day output in
   January 2012 at the height of the pipeline fee dispute, with a
   devastating effect on both struggling economies.
   The two sides subsequently agreed to restart oil shipments, grant each
   others' citizens residency, increase border trade and encourage close
   cooperation between their central banks.
   Last week, South Sudan relaunched crude production with the first oil
   cargo expected to reach Sudan's Red Sea export terminal at Port Sudan
   by the end of May.

   Both nations withdrew troops from border areas as agreed in an African
   Union-brokered deal in September. But they took until March to set up
   the demilitarized border zone.
   About two million people died in the war that was fuelled by divisions
   over religion, oil, ethnicity and ideology.
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   [1]http://www.voanews.com/content/bashir-in-south-sudan/1640016.html

References

   1. http://www.voanews.com/content/bashir-in-south-sudan/1640016.html