Mali Junta Wants Talks with Tuareg Rebels

Bamako---Mali’s military rulers have called on the Tuareg-led MLNA rebels advancing in the north-eastern region of the country, to cease attacks and hold talks, as international pressure on the Junta to restore constitutional order continues to mount.

The Tuareg said on Monday the fall of the strategic town Kidal, 1000km from the capital, Bamako, was imminent following a Sunday incursion in the town, which the army say they had repelled.

Leader of the military rulers Captain Amadou Sanogo, in an appeal broadcast on the State TV, called on the rebels to "cease hostilities and to come to the negotiating table as soon as possible."

 "Everything is negotiable except national territorial integrity and the unity of our country," he said.

The rebels have advanced south on three fronts since fighting erupted in mid-January striking in several northern towns in overwhelming attacks on the relatively weak and ill-equipped army in a campaign that has forced more than 200,000 people to flee the fighting.

Many have warned that key cities including fabled Timbuktu were at risk of falling to the Tuareg, their campaign to create an independent state in northern Mali, a significant transit and smuggling corridor in the vast Sahara Desert.

The call comes amid piling international and regional pressure and condemnation on the Junta, with many western states suspending aid into the country.

West African regional body ECOWAS says it has suspended Mali until democratic institutions are returned to normal, a position it said was non-negotiable.

"We cannot allow this country endowed with such precious democratic instruments, dating back at least two decades, to leave history by regressing," said Alassane Ouattara, the president of Ivory Coast who is the rotating chair of Ecowas.

The suspension comes following an emergency meeting of ECOWAS held in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, as a delegation of its several heads of state are expected to tour Mali to press the coup leaders to restore democracy.

The US has announced it was following Europe, Canada and other countries in suspending aid to Mali pending a resolution of the situation on the ground.

The UN Security Council has followed in the condemnation of the coup, calling on all the renegade soldiers to return to their barracks. The Junta continues to face internal objection, as a united front of political parties and organisations staged a demonstration on a national holiday on March 26 demanding restoration of constitutional order.

The Junta announced it was partially re-opening its borders to allow transport of basic goods into the country, urging all civil servants and private employees on Tuesday to return to their jobs.

The Junta says the mutiny that deposed President Amadou Toumani Toure on March was in response to the government’s inability to suppress a Tuareg uprising which has gained momentum since January by the return of heavily armed and experienced Tuareg fighters from the Libyan conflict who fought alongside former leader Muammar Gaddafi.

Juba, South Sudan

Khartoum Planes in Border Airstrike

Sudanese warplanes have carrying out overnight strikes in the oil-rich border regions of South Sudan in days of clashes between the two neighbour states in contested regions, a southern official say.

Information Minister for the South’s Unity state Gideon Gatpan told AFP news agency that ground assaults have seized but Sudanese armed forces have been bombing territories in the South at night.

There was bombing in Panakwach, 35km from Bentiu," the state capital, Gatpan said. "There are still tensions and soldiers are preparing in case of fresh assault - we are expecting more bombing."

Forces from Sudan and South Sudan have clashed since Monday in reported heavy battles in disputed border regions, in the fighting each side claim was started by the other. South Sudan believes this latest fighting was triggered by Khartoum, to sabotage the April negotiations, but Khartoum puts the blame squarely on Juba.

The Sudanese army says calm had returned to the area on Tuesday and its troops were in control of the contested key oilfields of Heglig, earlier reported to be under the Juba troops.

However Gatpan could not confirm if Southern troops had pulled out of Heglig, saying he was still waiting for military reports from the frontline. Both Heglig and the area hit by air strikes are run by the Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Company (GNPOC), a consortium led by China's state oil giant CNPC.

The African Union which has recently mediated in series of talks between the two states said on Wednesday it was deeply concerned with the escalating security situation on the border, calling for both sides to pull their troops from border zones.

The UN Security Council has called an end to the violence, with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton saying Khartoum bore the greatest responsibility for the renewed clashes.

The renewed hostilities have led to suspension of a scheduled tour of Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir to South Sudan in April for negotiations on outstanding matters since South’s independence in July.

The two have since failed to agree on a possible border and sharing of oil resources which are said to pit the two states in counter-accusations over spoiling prospects of resolving the long-standing north-south conflict.