A team of the African union visiting Abyei on Tuesday
faced hostility from a crowd of the Ngok Dinka community, forcing it to
flee to Kadugli, the capital of neighbouring South Kordofan northern
state
The delegation was in the disputed Abyei region to
ease tension after Ngok Dinka community conducted a unilateral
referendum last week where an overwhelming 99.9 per cent of the Dinka
Ng'ok voted to join South Sudan.
The Misseriya community described the referendum result as a declaration of war.
The wrangle over Abyei is one of the main
unresolved disputes following the 2005 peace agreement between Sudan and
South Sudan, which ended a civil war and led to the independence of
South Sudan.
Abyei was meant to vote on whether to be part of
Sudan or South Sudan in January 2011 -- the same day Juba voted
overwhelmingly to split from the north -- as part of the peace accord.
But that referendum has been repeatedly stalled, forcing residents to press ahead and organise their own vote.
The vote was rejected by Sudan, the African Union and the United Nations.
The chairman of the AU delegation to Abyei, Simio
Oyoyo, told reporters in Kadugli that they will meet leaders of the the
Dinka and the Misseriya tribes.
Abyei was administratively transferred to northern Sudan in 1905.
Sudan wants the Misseriya nomads, who graze their
cattle in the northern part of Abyei to take part in the exercise. But
South Sudan wants only the nine Dinka Ng'ok chiefdoms, which were
transferred, to vote in line with a 2009 ruling of the permanent court
of arbitration at The Hague.
SOURCE: AFRICA REVIEW
SOURCE: AFRICA REVIEW
