Building capacity for sustainable peace in Sudan project draws to a close.

Project Ploughshares and the Kenya-based Africa Peace Forum (APFO) have been working together to support peace in Sudan since 1999. In 2005 they launched a project to research policy options to overcome obstacles to the implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) signed in January 2005. At the end of January 2008, this project was concluded.

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Funded by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), the project commissioned research papers on emerging security issues related to CPA implementation and held a series of four roundtables--two in Nairobi, Kenya and two in Juba, Southern Sudan--in which this research was discussed, analyzed, and developed. The project created space for the perspectives of a wide range of international, national, and local stakeholders, including civil society representatives, academics, and government officials.

Topics that were examined in depth include:

* Challenges to the Comprehensive Peace Agreement;

* Hazards in the power-sharing aspects of the CPA during the interim period;

* People-to-people peace initiatives;

* Disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) in Southern Sudan;

* Small arms legislation and control mechanisms in Sudan;

* Armed groups, DDR, and the CPA;

* Regional security and the implementation of the CPA;

* Small arms control and community security in Southern Sudan.

The last workshop was held December 4-5, 2007 in Nairobi. The 25 participants were drawn mainly from the Government of Southern Sudan (GOSS) and Sudanese civil society, although some international civil society representatives, including Ploughshares staff John Siebert and Emily Alexander, also attended. Two papers were discussed. One focused on gender identity, militarization, and disarmament in Southern Sudan; while the other considered regional security implications of CPA implementation. Both papers demonstrated how security in Sudan is intrinsically linked to political solutions and must be addressed comprehensively.

Many people, particularly the researchers and the roundtable participants, contributed to the success of the project. CIDA officials approved the project and remained engaged and interested in the attempts of primarily Sudanese participants to find solutions to Sudan's problems. Ambassador Kiplagat, Ambassador Adala, Victor Okello, and Laban Cheruiyot at APFO provided leadership and attended to many details. Ernie Regehr and Lynne Griffiths-Fulton from Ploughshares played key roles in launching and steering the project in its early phases.

This three-year project was conceived prior to the signing of the CPA as a contribution to longer-term "Track II" diplomacy efforts by APFO and Project Ploughshares. After the signing of the CPA, the project became more focused on implementation of specific provisions of the CPA that had an impact on security. Together the partners worked to ensure that dialogue took place in a low-key, nonjudgmental, and safe environment in which participants felt free to share perceptions, fears, and needs, and to explore solutions.

Now, three years after implementation, the CPA has experienced both advances and setbacks. The coalition government between the North and South, the Government of National Unity (GONU), has been set up, as well as the Government of Southern Sudan (GOSS), along with revised constitutions, a standing parliament, and Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration (DDR) Commissions for the North and South.

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Political progress has been hampered by many obstacles, including disagreements over the North-South border, the frequently delayed population census, the large number of small arms and light weapons in civilian hands, weak security structures that include both the police and the military; and a lack of transparency by the North in sharing oil wealth.

Southern Sudan continues to suffer from the lack of such basic infrastructure as paved roads, electricity, health care facilities, and schools. Many Sudanese state that separation of the South from the rest of Sudan is inevitable, but only after a return to civil war. Clearly, much work on the Sudanese peace process remains to be done.

Project Ploughshares and APFO remain engaged in discussions on CPA implementation in Sudan, and are exploring opportunities for further research and dialogue on Sudan's elections, which are scheduled for 2009, and Southern Sudan's referendum on separation, slated in the CPA for 2011.

For more information on the Building Capacity for Sustainable Peace in Sudan project, including research papers and related documents, go to http://www.ploughshares.ca/build/Sudan.htm.