Political Boundary dispute

Ben Spillum
Sudan and South Sudan
Past:
Before gaining their independence from the main country of Sudan,
the two countries fought two grueling civil wars. The first civil war was
between the Sudanese government and southern rebels who
demanded greater autonomy for southern Sudan, from 1955 to 1972.
The war ended with the 1972 Addis Ababa Agreement. This granted
significant regional autonomy to southern Sudan on internal
issues. After about 10 years of the closest thing the Sudanese could
call peace, the second civil war erupted in 1983, due to issues
heightened by then President Jaafar Nimeiris decision to introduce
Sharia law. When the wars were over, they left two and a half million
dead and 4 million displaced.
In January of 2005 the National Congress Party (NCP) and Sudan
Peoples Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) signed the
Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA). The CPA insured 6 years to
measure how well South Sudan and mainland Sudan could cooperate
with each other and unite.
In April of 2010, Sudan held elections meant to pave the way toward
democratic transformation. However, the purpose was not at all the
result, and the two groups were even more drastically divided. The
people of Southern Sudan then voted for their independence in the
Southern Sudan Referendum on January 9th of 2011, and once the 6
year CPA expired, South Sudan entered the world as a new country.

Present:
The two countries remain in a very tense relationship to this
day. Because of the two outbreaks of violence, in Blue Nile and South
Kordofan, security has dropped and the progress on negotiation issues
has been blocked. Until the two countries can make some progress
towards a series of issues, negotiations will continue to be stuck. On
May 2 of 2012, the U.N. Security Council unanimously passed
Resolution 2046, calling for the immediate cessation of hostilities
between Sudan and South Sudan, the two sides return to negotiations
under the facilitation of the African Union High-Level Implementation
Panel (AUHIP) with support from the Chair of the Intergovernmental
Authority on Development (IGAD), among other things. It also urges
the combatants to accept the Tripartite Proposal, concerning access
of humanitarian aid groups to South Kordofan and Blue Nile, as well as
the beginning of negotiations between the government of Sudan and
the Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement-North. They declared that
failure of any party to apply any aspects of the resolution could result
in the imposition of U.N. sanctions under Article 41 of the U.N. Charter.

Heglig, home to Sudans largest resource for oil since the Souths
succession, has been a target for violence. The Abyei territory is also
an area of discrepancy between the two countries.
Future:
The ongoing fighting in South Sudan is dramatically hurting the
futures of the children there, living in danger each and every day.
UNICF representative of South Sudan, Jonathan Veitch, said, what they
need more than anything, is peace. Obviously if the violence
continues, casualties will remain high or increase, and the people of
South Sudan will be caught in an endless cycle of growing up around
violence and thus executing it once theyre older.
Sources:
http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/africa/horn-of-africa/southsudan/op-eds/tubiana-horn-of-africa-sudan-and-south-sudan-inchtoward-war.aspx
http://www.enoughproject.org/conflicts/sudans
http://www.enoughproject.org/conflicts/sudans/tensions-two-sudans
http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2013/03/22/86550/
http://www.monitor.co.ug/OpEd/Commentary/Uganda--South-Sudanshould-urgently-settle-borderdispute/-/689364/2464086/-/j6wikm/-/index.html
http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritorie
s/south-sudan/index.html
http://reliefweb.int/report/south-sudan/mapping-conflict-motivessudan-south-sudan-border
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/19/south-sudanconflict-spread-border-khartoum
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=49589#.VJMCkAGBA
http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/05/13/south-sudan-violence-leavestrail-of-bodies-starving-children-and-destruction/#__federated=1