What Does "All Sudan Solution" Really Mean?

The need for an "All Sudan Solution" gained broad recognition among both policy and activist circles of all persuasions, particularly over the last year. Sudan's regional conflicts cannot be addressed in isolation --- sustainable peace in Darfur is not possible without the same in the South, and in the East.

Such was the topic of a recent conversation with a friend, who proffered that Darfur will fall off the map, so to speak, as the international community struggles to avert the failure of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), which ended a long civil war between North and South Sudan in 2005. The resumption of civil war could make Darfur look like a sideshow, the security situation in Darfur is comparatively more stable than in the South ("comparatively" being the operative word), and negotiations between Khartoum and Darfur's splintered rebel groups remain stagnant.

Focus on the CPA is long overdue. However, it seems more and more that diplomatic talk of an "All Sudan Solution" is really just code for tending to the CPA, which could come at the expense of progress towards meaningful peace in Darfur. One seems worse than the other, so you put out the biggest fire first.

The problem with this approach is, simply, that we've gone down that road before. The first, and most intense, years of the Darfur crisis were intentionally ignored by international negotiators focused on the CPA, and then the implementation of the CPA fell by the wayside as attention shifted to Darfur. It's like a bad case of political whiplash.

So if focus shifts once again, back to the CPA and to the exclusion of Darfur, will the stage be set for disaster once more? An "All Sudan" approach must be true to its name.

[Photo: A handout released by the United Nations Mission in Sudan shows SPLA (Sudan People's Liberation Army) troops south of Abyei, in 2008. Clashes between rival ethnic groups in south Sudan have killed more than 160 people, a UN official said.]