Abyei deal reported but Sudan talks drag on

ADDIS ABABA (AFP) - Khartoum has agreed to withdraw its troops from the disputed Abyei region, a southern minister said on Monday, as northern and southern Sudanese leaders continued to thrash out sticking points into the night.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton cut short a visit to the Ethiopian capital for fear of being stranded by a cloud of ash from a volcano in neighbouring Eritrea after briefly meeting south Sudan leader Salva Kiir.

"We have information that they have accepted to withdraw from Abyei as long as they agree on the specific arrangement with regards to the Abyei administration," south Sudan's Information Minister Barnaba Marial Benjamin told the independent Sudan Radio Service.

"What troops ... will replace the Sudanese Armed forces (SAF -- the northern army) when they withdraw, they will discuss the details of that security arrangement," Benjamin said.

"I think they have accepted the principle that they have to withdraw," Benjamin added.

Northern troops overran the flashpoint border district on May 21, in response to an attack on a convoy of SAF troops and UN peacekeepers, prompting more than 100,000 people to flee, according to UN estimates.

Prior to arriving in the Ethiopian capital Clinton endorsed the idea of a peacekeeping force in Abyei and encouraged both sides to take up an Ethiopian offer of troops.

"The government of Sudan should urgently facilitate a viable security arrangement starting with the withdrawal of Sudanese Armed Forces," Clinton said, referring to the northern army.

"We would welcome both parties (north and south Sudan) agreeing to ask Ethiopia, which has volunteered to send peacekeepers, to do so as part of the UN mission," she said.

Clinton had to cut short her trip for fear she would be stranded in Addis Ababa as a cloud of ash from a volcano in neighbouring Eritrea moves across the region.

She met briefly with a northern official and then with Kiir before heading for the airport.

Posing for the cameras with Kiir before their meeting she told him: "I was hoping to spend a long time talking to you, but I'm being chased by a volcano."

Clinton, who had intended to stay in Addis Ababa until Tuesday afternoon, had not planned to meet with Sudan President Omar al-Bashir. He is wanted for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes by the International Criminal Court in The Hague but refuses to recognise its authority, though his travels have been severely restricted.

Bashir and Kiir have since Sunday been in talks here aimed at resolving the crises in Abyei and another border region, South Kordofan, one month ahead of the south's independence.

Mediators described the talks as tense and by late evening discussions were still going on behind closed doors and no information had filtered out.

The talks come as the United Nations confirmed that the fighting of the past few days in volatile South Kordofan, the north's only oil-producing state, has spilled into the south.

"Fighting including bombardments and artillery shelling has been reported in 11 of the 19 localities in Southern Kordofan state, and has spread to Pariang County in Unity State, southern Sudan," the UN humanitarian office (OCHA) said.

South Sudanese officials have been saying the northern army has killed civilians in air strikes south of the border but UN sources had previously insisted the bombing was restricted to the border area.

UNICEF Sudan Representative Nils Kastberg said all sides in the various conflicts in Sudan have shown a "total lack of respect for international humanitarian principles."

He called on Bashir and Kiir to "send a clear and unequivocal message - one that reaches all the way down to each and every soldier in the field -- that the denial of humanitarian access constitutes a grave violation of human rights."

The south is due to proclaim full independence on July 9, under a peace deal after decades of conflict with the north, and the fighting threatens to overshadow the historic event, particularly if the southern army is drawn in.

The two sides have struggled to make progress on resolving those issues, of which the future status of Abyei remains the most sensitive and intractable.

An AU statement prior to the talks had indicated that they would focus on Abyei, among other "key issues facing Sudan at this historic juncture". lc/hv/