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Sudan: Rebels Did Not Cut Oil Flow To Khartoum

Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir

KHARTOUM, October 3 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – The Sudanese government denied Wednesday, October 2, southern rebels’ claim that said they had cut off oil supplies to Khartoum, just as a Kenyan mediator opened talks aimed at convincing the government to return to the negotiating table.

“A commando unit of the 20th brigade ... penetrated the oil collection and production complex in Heglig and destroyed the main station,” said the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) in a statement.

The rebel organization said it suffered no casualties “despite attacks by the helicopter gunships of the regime” of President Omar al-Beshir.

“Oil supply to Khartoum has been cut off” as a result of the operation carried out early Monday, SPLA spokesman Yasir Arman told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on the telephone from Eritrea.

The Heglig oilfield accounts for the bulk of Sudan’s oil production running currently at around 240,000 barrels per day (bpd). It came on stream in August 1999, making Sudan an oil-exporting country.

A Sudanese army spokesman, quoted by the official news agency SUNA, dismissed the SPLA statement as “lies” and part of “the psychological warfare against our people and the armed forces.”

“The rebel Yasir Arman is continuing to spread lies, the latest being about the destruction of the main field in Heglig,” he said, reacting several hours after the SPLA report.

The destruction of the pumping station would strike a blow to Khartoum’s plans to boost production to 300,000-325,000 bpd by the end of 2003, and to more than 450,000 bpd by 2005.

The SPLA statement was issued as Kenyan mediator General Lazaros Symbio was presenting ideas in Khartoum to convince the Sudanese government to resume peace talks with the rebels.

Symbio met Wednesday with Ghazi Salah Eddin Atabani, Beshir’s advisor for peace talks, and foreign ministry undersecretary Mutref Siddeiq.

A statement released by the Sudanese government on the meetings with Symbio did not elaborate on the Kenyan mediation, but said Khartoum would study the initiative.

The government pulled out of the negotiations held in the Kenyan town of Machakos on September 2, to protest the SPLA’s capture of the southern key garrison town of Torit.

The aim of the negotiations was to finalize a landmark agreement signed in Machakos in July to end the 19-year civil war that has claimed around two million lives.

Under the accord, the mainly Christian and animist south will have six years of self-rule, before deciding in a referendum whether it wants to secede or remain part of the Sudanese state.

Khartoum has demanded a nationwide ceasefire as its price for going back to Machakos, but Arman on Tuesday said the SPLA would halt attacks only when the talks resume and as long as they last, AFP said.

The SPLA “do not accept a ceasefire as proposed by the government,” Arman said.

In its statement on the attack on the Heglig complex, the SPLA “renewed its warning to all oil companies, telling them to halt oil production until a just peace is achieved.”

It said all oil contracts would be renegotiated if a deal is signed, AFP said.

Heglig is operated by the Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Co. (GNOC), a consortium made up of the China National Petroleum Corp. (CNPC), with a 40 percent stake, Malaysia’s Petronas (30 percent), Canada’s Talisman Energy (25 percent) and Sudanese state-owned company Sudapet (five percent).

The SPLA said the attack on Heglig was codenamed “our petrol.”

“It targets the government’s plan to pillage our people’s resources ... The Heglig operation is the beginning of our response to the government offensive and the government should expect more surprises,” it added.