Africa

Clashes between Mozambique Government forces and the opposition Mozambican National Resistance, or RENAMO, have forced an increasing number of people to flee Mozambique and seek asylum in Malawi over the last few weeks, the United Nations refugee agency cautioned today.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has condemned the terrorist attack perpetrated by Al Shabaab this morning against an African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) base in the town of El Adde, Gedo region in Somalia.

How one African shoemaker is feeling the benefit of the rising US dollar.

A new case of Ebola has been confirmed in Sierra Leone, reflecting the ongoing risk of new flare-ups of the virus in affected countries, the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) announced today, just hours after declaring that all known chains of transmission had been stopped in West Africa.

Somalia's media is now bound by a new law which could put many journalists out of a job

Anger over Tanzania demolitions to prevent flooding

Following a briefing on Monday on the situation in Mali by UN peacekeeping chief Hervé Ladsous, the Security Council has stressed that all parties signatory to June’s peace agreement bear the primary responsibility for achieving lasting peace in the country.

"We are all in the same boat," reads a placard in a protest held by Taiwan environmentalists to call for action to reduce air pollution as well as ending nuclear power held in front of the Office of the President in Taipei December 26. Credit: Dennis Engbarth/IPS

By Dennis Engbarth
TAIPEI, Jan 13 2016 (IPS)

Taiwan may soon be the first nation in Asia to resolve to become a nuclear free nation after four decades of reliance on nuclear power.

Nearly 14 million of Taiwan’s 23 million people are expected to go to the polls Jan. 16 to choose between three presidential contenders: ruling Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang or KMT) Chairman Chu Li-wen, 55, Democratic Progressive Party Chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen, 59, and People First Party Chairman James Soong, 73, a former KMT Secretary-General.

Tsai, a former Vice Premier with a doctorate from the London School of Economics, has a hefty lead in the campaign, and is publically committed to turning Taiwan into a “nuclear free homeland” by 2025 phasing out the nation`s three 1970s-era nuclear power plants operated by the state-owned Taiwan Power Co.

Two nuclear power plants in northern Taiwan each have two General Electric designed boiling water reactors (BWR), while a third plant on Taiwan`s southern tip features two Westinghouse pressurized water reactors (PWR).

After 38 years of martial law imposed by the KMT was lifted in July 1987, civic opposition to nuclear power surfaced, focusing especially on the construction of a fourth nuclear plant in Gungliao Township on Taiwan’s northeastern coast. It features two 1,350-megawatt advanced boiling water reactor (ABWR) units designed by GE and Toshiba.

“We don`t want nuclear waste,” say two Taiwanese women during a demonstration against nuclear power in Taipei on March 8, 2015. The flying fish and nuclear waste barrel refer to the “low-level” radioactive waste disposal facility set up in 1984 by the state-run Taiwan Power Co on Lanyu (Orchid Island) off Taiwan`s southeast coast that is opposed by the island`s indigenous Dawu people. Credit: Dennis Engbarth/IPS

Taiwan’s continued use of nuclear power reemerged as a critical political issue after the March 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster in Japan.

Despite the shock, Ma said “Progress toward phasing out nuclear power could take place only under conditions of “no limitations on electricity supply, no increases in power prices, and fulfillment of international commitments to reduce carbon emissions.”

Ma proposed that the three aging plants could be retired if the fourth nuclear power plant, whose construction costs ballooned to 10 billion dollars, was allowed to begin commercial operation.

On the other hand, Tsai aims to achieve the “nuclear-free homeland” goal by May 2025 through retiring the operating three plants on the current schedule and not starting up the fourth, which the KMT government finally decided to mothball in April 2014. That decision followed in the wake of street protests and a hunger strike by septuagenarian social activist Lin I-hsiung, who led a three-decade long campaign for a referendum on the project.

Tsai may gain the parliamentary clout to implement her policy if, as is widely expected, the ruling KMT loses its control over the 113-seat Legislative Yuan, Taiwan`s parliament, for the first time since forces of the late KMT autocrat Chiang Kai-shek occupied Taiwan in late 1945.

“The pro-nuclear lobby will suffer a grave blow if the KMT loses its legislative majority,” said National Taiwan University Professor of Political Science Lin Tzu-luen.

Lin recalled that the attempt by former DPP President Chen Shui-bien to halt construction of Nuclear Four in October 2000 had been overruled by the KMT legislative majority.

“If the DPP had a legislative majority in 2000, the controversy over Nuclear Four would not have continued to burn to this day,” declared Tsai in an election rally in Kaohsiung City January 9.

Bridging the gap

On December 22, Tsai told leaders of seven industrial and business associations that a DPP government could realize a “nuclear free homeland” by 2025 by accelerating the upgrading the efficiency of existing gas and coal burning power plants, using differential pricing to improve peak-load management, rapidly boosting promotion of renewable energy sources and promoting “green” innovation-based industries.

“Wu Yu-sheng insists that Nulcear One must be decommissioned on schedule by the end of 2018,” proclaims a billboard in Chinshan, Taiwan, even though Wu is a legislator for the pro-nuclear ruling Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang or KMT). Credit: Dennis Engbarth/IPS

“The KMT is fond of stating that nuclear energy is cheap, but this is a lie,” Tsai declared on January 8, adding that “when the cost of dealing with nuclear waste and the risk of nuclear safety are
calculated, nuclear power is definitely not cheap.”

“Safety is the most important concern,” said DPP Legislator (Ms) Tien Chiu-chin, a longtime environmental activist.

“It is impossible to guarantee 100 per cent safe operation any of our nuclear power plants, but Taiwan would be devastated by any major nuclear accident and cannot afford to bear any such risk,” she told IPS.

The process of ending Taiwan`s dependency on nuclear power “will be painful, but a short-term pain is better than sleeping next to a ticking time bomb,” said Shieh Jyh-cherng, former Executive Director of a national earthquake relief foundation formed in the wake of a devastating temblor that hit Taiwan on September 21, 1999.

“The ending of the domination of nuclear power and the domination of Taipower over energy policy will liberate creativity to find other solutions, but will not be easy as the pro-nuclear lobby has not given up hope that the government will be compelled to revive nuclear power,” Shieh warned.

But public opinion is clearly on the side of the “nuclear free” advocates.

An opinion poll of 1,071 Taiwan adults (i.e. over 20 years of age) released December 16 by the Risk Society and Policy Research Center of National Taiwan University showed that nearly 79 per cent of respondents supported using alternative energy sources to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and 59 per cent opposed the use of nuclear power to curb carbon emissions, with only 38 per cent backing the nuclear option.

Moreover, the poll indicated that 85 per cent are willing to pay higher electricity prices for renewable energy.

Taiwan Renewable Energy Alliance (TRENA) Executive Director (Ms) Kao Yu-ping told IPS that “the goal of a nuclear free homeland by 2025 is definitely feasible.”

She contended that “Policies such as revamping housing codes to require energy saving methods, promoting citizen power by revamping the Electricity Act to permit community and even getting citizens to generate power and active promotion of smart grids and meters,” could result in sufficient power.”

“Taipower denies that there is much room for expansion of renewable energy because they are addicted to a mentality of centralization and big projects and do not understand how to foster renewables based on their dispersed logic,” Kao stated.

Tsai will also face the challenge of coping with the 3,575 tonnes of spent nuclear fuel generated by the three nuclear power plants and the fact that spent fuel pools in the four reactor units in the two nuclear power plants in northern Taiwan are close to saturation.

However, Tsai has repeatedly reaffirmed the DPP`s opposition to proposals by Taipower, also advocated by Chu, to send spent nuclear fuel abroad, probably to France, for reprocessing.

Finding domestic interim or final repository sites will require cooperation from residents and environmental organizations.

Securing such cooperation “will be easier if there is a national consensus to refrain from extending the operation of the existing nuclear power plants and therefore not create more spent fuel waste,” National Taiwan University Professor of Geology, Chen Wen-shan told IPS.

(End)

Ethiopia's government is set to abandon plans to expand the boundaries of the capital, Addis Ababa, after months of deadly protests in the Oromo region.

Sierra Leone's President Ernest Bai Koroma would only stay on in office beyond 2018 if called to do so, the government spokesman tells the BBC.

South Africa Test captain AB de Villiers is "not sure" if he wants to remain in charge beyond the Test series against England.

Borussia Dortmund and Gabon striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang says he will not be leaving the club for Arsenal or Barcelona.

World football's governing body Fifa dismisses suspended secretary general Jerome Valcke.

The elephant population in Africa continues to decline, despite an international ban on the trade of ivory tusks.

By Zadie Neufville
KINGSTON, Jamaica, Jan 13 2016 (IPS)

On a very dry November 2013, Jamaica’s Meteorological Service made its first official drought forecast when the newly developed Climate Predictability Tool (CPT) was used to predict a high probability of below average rainfall in the coming three months.

By February, the agency had officially declared a drought in the eastern and central parishes of the island based on the forecasts. July’s predictions indicated that drought conditions would continue until at least September.

Said to be the island’s worst in 30 years, the 2014 drought saw Jamaica’s eastern parishes averaging rainfall of between 2 and 12 per cent, well below normal levels. Agricultural data for the period shows that production fell by more than 30 per cent over 2013 and estimates are that losses due to crop failures and wild fires amounted to one billion dollars.

Jamaica’s agricultural sector accounts for roughly seven per cent of the island’s gross domestic product (GDP) and employs about 20 per cent of its workforce.

The Met Service’s, Glenroy Brown told IPS, “The CPT was the main tool used by our Minister (of Water, Land, Environment & Climate Change) Robert Pickersgill throughout 2015 to advise the nation on the status of drought across the island .”

It was also used but the National Water Commission (NWC) to guide its implementation of island-wide water restrictions.

A technician with Jamaica’s Met Service, Brown designed and implemented the tool in collaboration with Simon Mason, a climate scientist from Columbia University’s International Research Institute (IRI) for Climate and Society with funding from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

“The tool provides a Windows package for constructing a seasonal climate drought forecast model, producing forecasts with updated rainfall and sea surface temperature data,” he explained.

The innovation was one of the first steps in building resilience under Jamaica’s national climate policy. It provides drought-monitoring forecasts that allows farmers to plan their planting around dry periods and has been “tailored for producing seasonal climate forecasts from a general circulation model (GCM), or for producing forecasts using fields of sea-surface temperatures,” Brown said.

The tool combines a number of applications including Google Earth and localised GIS maps, to generate one to five day forecasts that are country and location specific. The information is broken down and further simplified by way of colour-coded information and text messages for the not so tech-savvy user.

The tool designed by Brown and Mason also incorporated IRI’s own CPT (designed by Mason) that was already being used by Caribbean countries with small meteorological services and limited resources, to produce their own up-to-date seasonal climate forecasts. The new tool combined data on recent rainfall and rainfall predictions to provide a forecast that focused specifically on drought.

“It was important for us to design a system that addressed Jamaica’s needs upfront, but that would also be suitable for the rest of the region,” Mason noted.

The scientists explained, “Because impact of a drought is based on the duration of the rainfall” and not only the amount of rainfall, looking forward is not enough to predict droughts because of factors related to accumulation and intensification.

“What we’re doing is essentially putting a standard three-month rainfall forecast in context with recent rainfall measurements,” Mason, told USAID’s publication Frontlines last May. He noted that if below-normal rainfall activity was recorded during an unusually dry period, indications were there was a “fairly serious drought” ahead.

Sheldon Scott from Jamaica’s Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) told IPS that farmers who used the SMS information were able to avoid the worse effects of the drought.

“The impacts were visible in relation to farmers who used the information and others who didn’t, because those who did were able to manage the mitigating factors more effectively,” he said.

During the period, more than 500 farmers received text alerts and about 700,000 bulletins were sent to agricultural extension officers.

Among the farmers who signed up for text messaging service, Melonie Risden told Frontlines, “The information we received from the Met office gave us drought forecasts in terms of probabilities. We still decided to plant because we were fortunate to have access to the river and could fill up water drums ahead of time in anticipation of the drought.”

Risden lost the corn she planted on the 13-acre property in Crooked River, Clarendon, one of the parishes hardest hit by the drought with only two per cent of normal rainfall, but was able to save much of the peas, beans and hot peppers.

Six months after Jamaica’s Met Service made its ground-breaking forecast, the CIMH presented the first region-wide drought outlook at the Caribbean Regional Climate Outlook Forum in Kingston. Now 23 other Caribbean and Central American countries are using the tool to encourage climate change resilience and inform decision-making.

“Regionally the tool is now a standard fixture across several countries within the region, including the Dominican Republic, Cuba and Haiti. This regional effort is coordinated by the CIMH,” Brown said.

Back in Jamaica, the tool is being hailed “a game-changer” in the climate fight by Jeffery Spooner head of the Met Service, who described the CPT as “an extremely important tool in Climate Change forecasting and specifically for the agricultural – including fisheries- and water sectors for rainfall projection .”

The CPT is now also used to provide regular monthly bulletins that are published by the Meteorological Service on their web site www.jamaicaclimate.net. RADA has also continued to use the CPT in its extension service, to enhance the ability of farmers’ and other agricultural interests to improve water harvesting, planting and other activities.

Since most of the island’s small farms depend on rainfall, more farmers – including those with large holdings – are using the information to better manage water use and guide their activities, Scott said.

Local and intentional scientists have linked the extreme atmospheric conditions related to the droughts affecting Jamaica and the region to the persistent high-pressure systems that has prevented the formation of tropical cyclones to global warming and climate change.

Across the agricultural sector, Jamaica continues to feel the impacts of drought and the challenges are expected to increase with the climate change. In a 2013 agricultural sector support analysis, the Inter-American Development Bank estimated, low impact on extreme climate events on Jamaica’s agriculture sector by 2025 could reach 3.4 per cent of “baseline GDP” annually.

In fact, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Synthesis Report (AR5) pointed to tools like the CPT to mitigate the impacts of climate change. Its importance to Jamaica’s and the region’s food security and water sector cannot be overlooked.

In addition to adaptation for the water sector, the CPT is being modified to provide early warning indicators for wind speeds and coral bleaching among among other applications, said the report.

And as showers of blessings cooled the land and brought much relief in the closing months of the year, CPT shows the drought could well be over.

(End)

January 12, 2016 (WAU) - Thousands of people lined-up Tuesday to welcome the governor of South Sudan's Wau state, Elia Waya Nyipuoch and deputy Andrea Dominic.

Governor Elias Waya addressing people in Wau upon his arrival on January 12, 2016 (ST)

South Sudan National Legislative Assembly's deputy speaker, Mark Nyipuoch Ubong and the country's ex-education minister, Joseph Ukell Abango accompanied the two leaders.

In his address during an occasion organised by the state council of ministers, the governor of Wau wowed to prioritise security, the political situation and development.

Governor Waya urged the people of Wau to embark on peace and reconciliation.

“The peace is already singed, therefore, the situation should go back to normal, the government has already signed everything with the SPLM IO [Sudan People's Liberation Movement in Opposition], and there is no more war again,” said Waya.

“Please forgive each other, open a new page to peace and discuss your differences at day time not at night,” he added.

Waya further assured the people of Wau that those detained since the mid-December 2013 outbreak of the South Sudan conflict would soon be released from detention.

(ST)

January12, 2016 (KHARTOUM) - The Sudanese Ministry of Information has said it is about to launch a centre to monitor news and reports broadcast on the Internet.

Sudanese Information Minister Ahmed al-Balal Osman speaks during a press conference in the Sudanese capital Khartoum on June 9, 2013. ( Photo AFP/ASHRAF SHAZLY)

The Ministry on Monday said the move was triggered by publication of false reports harming the government without further details.

Recently, the cyber crime security unit has filed complaints against two journalists because of certain interventions on the WhatsApp groups.

Information Minister Ahmad Balal Osman Monday said that the centre, which will be launched soon, "was dictated by the need to deal seriously with the lies electronic media says".

Osman didn't say when the monitoring body will be established.

The Sudanese government security apparatus used to censure the printed newspapers in the country but however failed to control the independent electronic media outlets.

The National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS) and the interior ministry have set up special units for combating cyber crime.

Observers described the measure as an attempt by the government to curb the increased use of electronic media in the country.

The government used in the past to block some websites but the measure has failed as there is many applications allowing to bypass Internet censorship and gain access to the censored sites.

(ST)

January 12, 2016 (JUBA) - South Sudanese peace partners have agreed to reopen up the peace agreement for further renegotiation on whether to revoke or confirm the 28 states unilaterally created by president Salva Kiir on 2 October in violation of the peace deal he signed in August 2015 with other opposition parties on the basis of the constitutionally recognized 10 states, government's officials said.

Ethiopian prime minister Hailemariam Desalegn (C), South Sudan's president Salva Kiir (L) and South Sudan rebel chief Riek Machar (R) attend a meeting on 3 March 2015 in Addis Ababa (Photo: AFP/Zacharias Abubeker)

Speaking to reporters on Tuesday in the national capital, Juba, shortly after participating in a third meeting of the Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission (JMEC), information minister Michael Makuei Lueth, who is also the acting chief negotiator for the government's faction, said about 10 outstanding issues had remained unresolved by the National Constitutional Amendment Committee (NCAC), a body set up to amend the current transitional constitution.

Minister Lueth revealed that the number of presidential advisors and the 28 states remained some of the sticking points the two parties would continue to engage in dialogue.

"It was agreed that the parties shall negotiate "outside the box" in regards to 28 states because it was not a legal issue but a political issue,” Lueth informed the public on Tuesday.

Fustus Mogae, former President of Botswana who heads JMEC also confirmed he had asked the parties: government under the leadership of President Kiir; armed opposition faction of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM-IO) led by Riek Machar; former detainees led by Pagan Amum and other political parties in the country to discuss the issue of 28 states and see how they can reach a consensus as a political, but not a legal issue.

“We have also agreed that the issue of the 28 states is not actually a legal issue but it is a political issue; so the parties have been directed to sit and negotiate outside the box so that the issue is resolved,” Mogae told reporters.

It was not however clear how the parties agreed to call the issue of states non-legal when the 10 states have been constitutional and therefore legal in the sense of their constitutionality. Likewise, the government unilaterally amended the constitution by inserting the 28 states into the constitution.

The issue of the 28 states will become the second sticking point to be discussed “outside the box”, meaning outside the provision of the peace agreement in further negotiations to finding a solution.

In the peace agreement, 10 states have been confirmed as the number of the administrative units in the country until the parties discuss whether or not to create more states, and on which basis, during the constitutional making process.

The move to discuss contentious issues outside the box is seen by observers to mean an attempt to reopen up the agreement for further negotiations including on deployment of joint integrated forces, among others, which the government has been split over its implementation.

The meeting also discussed the establishment of security institutions in the country and agreed that the next meeting of JMEC will be held on 2 February to follow up on the implementation of the agreement and see whether there are challenges to be addressed and resolved by the parties to the agreement.

JMEC chairman, Mogae, has called on the parties to form a transitional government of national unity in Juba and delay formation of state governments until the issue of 28 states is either confirmed, revoked or reconciled.

He on Tuesday announced that the parties to the power sharing deal will reveal names of their designate ministers to their respective ministerial portfolios which they selected last Thursday.

With the current urge to form government, it is not clear whether the leader of the SPLM-IO, Riek Machar, will return to Juba to form a transitional government with president Kiir before his forces could be deployed in the capital.

Earlier, his spokesman, James Gatdet Dak, told Sudan Tribune that Machar will not return to Juba until the security arrangements in the agreement are implemented including withdrawal of the government's “excess” forces from Juba to 25km outside the city and deployment of joint police and military forces in the capital.

(ST)

January 12, 2016 (KHARTOUM) - Secretary General of the rebel Sudanese People's Liberation Movement/North (SPLM-N) Yasser Arman has disclosed moves by Germany to host a meeting for the Sudanese opposition in Berlin to discuss the pre-dialogue meeting.

Leaders and delegates of the Sudan Call forces pose in a collective picture at the end of their meeting outside Paris on November 13 2015 (ST Photo)

In a message sent to the leaders of the “Sudan Call” charter and the Reform Now Movement (RNM) and seen by Sudan Tribune, Arman said the German moves have not yet matured but stressed if the meeting was held it would participate to unifying views of the opposition towards the pre-dialogue meeting.

It is worth to mention that Germany had signed a strategic partnership agreement with the AU High Implementation Panel (AUHIP) by the end of 2014 allowing it to work with the Sudanese parties to facilitate a process aiming to bring peace and achieve democratic transformation in the east African country.

Thanks to the German efforts, Sudanese opposition holdout groups, in a meeting held in Berlin last February, declared their readiness to participate the national dialogue preparatory meeting despite their previous reserves.

Arman pointed out that the proposed German meeting would include the RNM leader Ghazi al-Attabani who is a signatory of the Addis Ababa agreement.

Khartoum had previously refused to participate in a comprehensive preparatory meeting including the political opposition and civil society groups. Only it reiterated its readiness to meet the rebels to discuss the conditions and guarantees related to their participation in the internal process.

However, the Sudanese president Omer al-Bashir last October instructed the dialogue body known as 7+7 to meet with the signatories of Addis Ababa agreement including the Sudanese Revolutionary Front (SRF) and the National Umma Party (NUP).

The SRF and the NUP from one side and 7+7 committee from the other side on 5 September 2014 signed an agreement on identical term with the AUHIP “on the national dialogue and constitutional process”.

At the time, al-Attabani signed the agreement on behalf of the 7+7 committee but his party later withdrew from the national dialogue and since then the government refused his participation in the pre-dialogue meeting.

SPLM-N secretary general expected the AUHIP would submit its annual report and new plan to the AU Peace and Security Council (AUPSC) on January 20th, saying the latter would most likely renew its mandate to continue mediation efforts in Sudan.

“Important regional and international powers have developed new ideas and contacted [the mediation] asking them to take into consideration the latest developments and the new players such as Saudi Arabia,” he said.

Arman added in his message that the AUHIP chief Thabo Mbeke sought to hold the pre-dialogue meeting before he submits his new plan to the AUPSC on January 20th so as to test the will of the various dialogue parties but said that was no longer possible.

He stressed that it is not in the interest of the “forces of change” to keep the current African, regional and international stances, saying this would serve the interests of the regime.

“The internal [opposition] fronts constitute the foundation [for the opposition work] and the major factor to impact on the outside [world] however, it is important to develop a strategy for external action,” he said.

“The world is changing and we all know that opposition work [can't be carried out] the same way as we did in the seventies, eighties and nineties [of the twentieth century] ,” he added.

Some opposition parties inside the country refuse to join the dialgue process despite the regional and international efforts to convince them to change their mind. They say they plan to mobilize the street and bring down the regime through a popular uprising like what they did in 1964 and 1985.

Regarding the upcoming informal talks between the government and the SPLM-N, Arman said they would take advantage of any opportunity to arrive at an equitable dialogue leading to a comprehensive peaceful solution and allowing for delivering humanitarian assistance besides ending the war and allowing freedoms.

“Our negotiating team would be resilient enough to achieve those objectives and it wouldn't abandon the joint goal of [achieving] the comprehensive solution and the equitable dialogue in order to arrive at a political settlement within the framework of a credible political process,” he said.

He expressed readiness to hold more consultations with the political and civil society forces on the issues under discussion in order to develop the joint stances to address the new developments.

DARFUR TRACK

Meanwhile, SPLM-N secretary general welcomed ongoing efforts to achieve a solution on the Darfur track, noting they are aware of moves to hold informal discussions between the government and Darfur movements either in Addis Ababa or Berlin.

“We welcome those efforts and we had previously asked the Sudanese government to hold the [informal talks] on both tracks because the war must stop simultaneously,” he said

The Qatari Deputy Prime Minister Ahmed bin Abdallah al-Mahmoud Monday has discussed with leaders of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) Gibril Ibrahim and the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM-MM) Minni Minnawi ways to achieve peace in Darfur.

Doha brokered the Darfur peace negotiations which resulted in the signing of the Doha Document for Peace in Darfur (DDPD) by the Sudanese government and the Liberation and Justice Movement (LJM) in July 2011.

In April 2013, a dissident faction of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) joined the DDPD while the main Darfur rebel movements abstained.

The latest round of talks last November between the Sudanese government and the JEM and SLM-MM have stalled over issues pertaining to the security, humanitarian and political arrangements.

Darfur rebel groups demand to hold talks on Darfur conflict and to open the DDPD for discussion before to join the national dialogue process.

Earlier this month, the Sudanese government said it has received an invitation from AU to participate in an informal meeting with two Darfur rebel movements in Addis Ababa.

(ST)