[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 12]
[Senate]
[Pages 17249-17250]
[From the U.S. 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 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

[[Page 17250]]

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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