What is the prospect for a settlement of the twenty-year civil war in the Sudan?
Snyder.Charles Snyder took up the complex issues in the civil war between the Islamic government in the north based in Khartoum and the Christian and animist rebels in the south led by the Sudanese People’s Liberations Army, SPLA, of John Garang. “There are three issues left on the table,” he said, “and they are related to each other, which means you can’t really move one without moving them all, because it is the end game, which is usually the hardest part of diplomacy. This deal is about 80% done. The broad cease-fire outline is done. The withdrawal timetables haven’t been worked out but the idea that they are going to withdraw and where they are going to withdraw to, that’s all agreed. Our military technicians and theirs can finish all that complex work in a couple of weeks and hand it over to the UN, which will come in to do it all.” The three issues, he said, are (1) three disputed areas, the Nuba Mountains, the Southern Blue Nile, and Abyei; (2) the governance of the capital at K
