Bashir, Garang meet for first time

Sudanese President Umar Hasan al-Bashir and southern rebel leader, John Garang, on Saturday held their first ever face-to-face meeting in the Ugandan capital Kampala, and endorsed the recent signing of a framework peace deal.

A communique issued by the Ugandan government said Bashir and Garang "applauded the breakthrough" and "undertook to ensure that all efforts are deployed to resolve outstanding issues".

Siraj al-Din Hamid, the Sudanese charge d'affaires in Kampala, told IRIN on Monday that the two leaders would have discussed peace and "made expressions of seriousness about the Machakos agreement."

The meeting had served to "break the ice" between the two men after 19 years of war, and had prepared the ground for the next round of talks, he added.

The two leaders have attended peace talks in the past, but have conducted negotiations through mediators, never meeting face-to-face.

The framework peace agreement, formulated under the auspices of the regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), was reached on 20 July in the Kenyan town of Machakos, and included broad agreement on two of the most difficult problems facing negotiators: the right to self-determination for the south, and the relationship between church and state.

Further talks are scheduled in Kenya for the middle of August, during which negotiators will focus on a comprehensive ceasefire, reform of the central administration to include southerners, and the sharing of Sudan's oil wealth.

While welcoming the Machakos agreement and the leaders' meeting, aid agencies say a workable, comprehensive peace agreement is still some way off. In the coming talks, "the warring parties will be tasked with establishing a peace agreement that makes unity an attractive option for all Sudanese. This will not be an easy task," a spokesperson for CARE International told IRIN on Monday.

The meeting took place after a recent thaw in relations between Khartoum and Kampala, with the two countries in April agreeing to re-establish full diplomatic ties, severed in 1995 after Khartoum accusing Uganda of supporting the rebel SPLM/A.

The Sudanese government in March gave the Ugandan army permission to pursue the rebel Lord's Resistance Army in Sudanese territory, and said it had stopped supporting the Ugandan rebel movement.

In separate talks with Museveni, Bashir reiterated his government's "commitment to continue cooperation with Uganda regarding the current military measures" being undertaken by the Ugandan army against the LRA in southern Sudan.

"The relations with Uganda are quite perfect," Al-Din Hamid said.