AFRICA/SUDAN - Strong tensions between North and South Sudan

Khartoum (Agenzia Fides) - Tension rises between North and South Sudan, that continue to accuse each other of destabilization attempts. The Minister of Defense in Khartoum, Abdel-Rahim Mohamed Hussein, has accused the government of South Sudan to try to destabilize North Sudan, citing as evidence the seizure of weapons from southern Sudan to the rebels of Sudan People Liberation Movement North (SPLM-N ), in the states of the Blue Nile and South Kordofan. These two States belonging to the North, but bordering the South, are at the center of a territorial dispute between Khartoum and Juba, and fighting has been going on for months between Sudanese troops and the SPLM-N. The latter group is related to the Sudan People Liberation Movement (SPLM), the movement that fought for independence in South Sudan (July 9) and which now governs the newly elected State.
The SPLM-N is one of four rebel movements active in North Sudan that on November 11 established the Sudan Revolutionary Front (SRF), an alliance whose declared aim is the overthrow of the Khartoum regime, led by the National Congress Party (NCP), and the establishment of a democratic State based on the voluntary participation and the neutrality of religion in politics. Sudan is in fact a federal state, which has several claims against the Khartoum central government (mainly related to economic demands and the distribution of wealth) and where disputes on the application of Sharia as state law are still alive.
The other 3 movements that gave birth to the SRF are Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) and the two main factions of the Sudan Liberation Movement, respectively led by Abdel Wahid Al-Nur (SLM-AW) and Minni Minnawi (SLM-MM) . These 3 groups operating in Darfur, western Sudan, have been in revolt against the central government since 2003. The intelligence in Khartoum has accused South Sudan to support the new alliance rebel.
In turn, South Sudan (which has a federal structure like the North) has accused Khartoum of having bombed some areas of its territory (a fact confirmed by the UN) and to support armed groups operating in certain areas of the Southern Federation. The army of Southern Sudan said they had confiscated several assault rifles from northern Sudan, from members of the South Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SSLM/A), the group that on November 10 led an assault on a military garrison in the Upper Nile State, on the border with North Sudan. Both North and South Sudan have sent military reinforcements along the common border. (L.M.) (Agenzia Fides 14/11/2011)