[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 133 (Wednesday, September 29, 2010)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7737-S7738]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SUDAN
Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, in just over 100 days, Sudan will face a
defining moment. The choices its leaders make can lead to a peaceful
two-state solution. Or, as many fear, they could result in a return to
chaos and war in a place too often synonymous with both.
Responding to this urgency, the Obama administration has recently
launched a heightened campaign of diplomatic engagement with both North
and South Sudan to help the parties to find their way through this
process. I traveled to Sudan in April 2009 and I have met with Sudanese
from all parts of the country since that time, including Salva Kiir,
the leader of Southern Sudan, last week. Today, joined by Senators
Brownback, Durbin, Wicker and Feingold, I am introducing legislation
known as the Sudan Peace and Stability Act. Congress must not be silent
at this critical time.
On January 9, 2011, the people of Southern Sudan and the adjoining
territory of Abyei are scheduled to hold referenda on secession.
Realistically, Sudan's choice is no longer between unity and
separation--southerners have apparently made that decision. Every
reliable source indicates that they will vote for separation, dividing
Africa's largest country and taking with them some eighty percent of
known Sudanese oil reserves. The Secretary of State has called a vote
for separation inevitable. No, the choice before the peoples of Sudan
is that between a future of peaceful coexistence or a return to the
country's bloody past.
The Sudanese, both North and South, set out on this path when they
signed the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement. The CPA brought to a
close a war that had raged for two decades and claimed millions of
lives. And it offered Southern Sudan the promise of a choice in 2011
between continuing unity and separation from the Sudanese government in
Khartoum.
The landmark agreement ended the war, but it intentionally postponed
the
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tough decisions about the modalities and meaning of 2011. In theory,
the six intervening years were intended to solidify connections between
former enemies. But not enough was done to build those ties, and the
death of South Sudan's most forceful voice for unity, Dr. John Garang,
further diminished unity's prospects. For champions of separation, the
time period meant a deferral of their dream of independence that has
now come due. But this intervening period has also served one crucial
purpose: It has demonstrated that North and South can live side by side
in peace.
With January fast approaching and progress scant on the mechanisms
for division, the two sides are almost out of time to craft a peaceful
transition. To fulfill the full promise of the landmark 2005 peace
agreement, they must negotiate terms of separation and prepare for a
future in which they remain fundamentally connected.
Southern Sudan possesses most of the known petroleum reserves, but
the pipelines to market for that oil run through the north. An
estimated million and a half southerners displaced by the war live in
Khartoum and may well remain there, and northerners will live in the
South. Every dry season, herders from the north's Arab Misseriya tribes
cross into what will likely become the country of Southern Sudan and
then return. The Nile will continue to flow northward, irrespective of
borders and politics. Boundaries must simultaneously be demarcated and
accommodating. And the parties need to finalize the details fast enough
to ensure that violence cannot fill the vacuum.
The last war between North and South lasted for decades and claimed
millions of lives. And, earlier this year, then Director of National
Intelligence Dennis Blair told Congress that, over the next five years,
Southern Sudan is the place where ``a new mass killing or genocide is
most likely to occur.''
America acted as one of the architects of the CPA in 2005, and has a
moral obligation as well as a strategic interest in helping the parties
to see it through. The Sudanese must make the decisions, but we--and
others--can help them navigate this process. Failure to act now--
whether by high level diplomatic engagement, scenario planning for a
variety of potential outcomes, and pre-positioning humanitarian
supplies in the region--may contribute to a larger crisis later.
While we try to prevent the next potential wave of genocide, we
cannot ignore the fact that Darfur's tragedy remains unresolved. Even
as America asks how it can help Southern Sudan prepare for the likely
burdens of statehood, it must also consider the Sudan that remains and
Darfur's need for peace, stability, and justice. Attention to Darfur
must not be a casualty of our necessary fixation on the North-South
crisis.
The goals of the legislation are:
1. To spell out clearly the objectives of U.S. policy and the
bilateral and multilateral tools available to pursue them;
2. To emphasize the need for all parties to commit to see the CPA
through the January referenda and beyond;
3. To underscore the importance of Darfur and to provide policy
guidance on both the peace process and the humanitarian situation;
4. To lay the legal groundwork, spur the humanitarian planning, and
shape the policy framework in the likelihood of secession; and
5. To strengthen both capacity building and accountability.
Our bill offers a number of specific prescriptions, including the
designation of a senior official to work with the Special Envoy to
Sudan by heading up the U.S. team in the Darfur peace process, much as
Ambassador Princeton Lyman is currently doing in Juba in the South. The
legislation also seeks to strengthen multilateral efforts to build
capacity in the South and aid implementation of the CPA.
In approaching Sudan we are rightly concentrating for the moment on
the things that the parties must do between now and January 9, 2011,
from registering voters for the referenda to coming to terms on major
issues such as citizenship, oil, debts, and the border territory of
Abyei. But we must also look beyond January as well. Much has to be
done between January and July 2011, when, under the terms of the CPA,
Southern Sudan and Abyei are to become independent if that is the
outcome of the referenda. But even more importantly, we have to think
beyond that milestone, to what independence will mean for a new and
fragile country in the south and a significantly changed country in the
north, including for Darfur.
The United States helped to bring about the Comprehensive Peace
Agreement. We have led the world in providing humanitarian assistance
and in supporting the peacekeeping mission in Darfur. While the
Sudanese must own their future, the United States can help the parties
find a path forward to peace and stability.
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