A Retrospective on Sudan-South Sudan Separation and the Future

 The International Crisis Group posted on 18 August 2026 an hour-long podcast titled "Sudan's Separation Fifteen Years Ago and Today's Disaster" with Alan Boswell, Alex de Waal, and Abdul Mohammed.  

Alex de Waal and Abdul Mohammed review the background of South Sudan's independence from Sudan and the African Union High-Level Implementation Panel led by former South African President Thabo Mbeki.  They explained why negotiations ultimately failed to produce two viable states, and whether such coordinated high-level diplomacy is still possible in today's fragmented regional geopolitics.

Efforts to resolve the crises in Sudan and South Sudan today are experiencing greater involvement from the Gulf States and involve a larger number of competing actors.  Mediation today is extremely difficult.  The global environment is highly transactional.  The situation also has the possibility of becoming a regional war.  It is time for the African Union to step forward and play a stronger role in ending the conflicts.  

Sudan and the Peace Process

The Kampala, Uganda-based Sudan Democracy First Group (SDFG) posted on 17 February 2017 a commentary titled "Can a Peaceful Political Process in Sudan be Revitalized through the AUHIP? Challenges and Opportunities."

The SDFG suggests ways the African Union High-level Implementation Panel (AUHIP) led by former South African President Thabo Mbeki can revitalize the Sudan peace process.

The Limits of Darfur's Peace Process

The International Crisis Group published on 27 January 2014 an analysis titled "Sudan's Spreading Conflict (III): The Limits of Darfur's Peace Process." 

It concluded that "even though the government is distracted by its economic crisis, and the international community is focused on the civil war in South Sudan, there is present need to resolve the contradiction between the piecemeal and comprehensive approaches to peace in Darfur, to look at what is local and what is national and should be transferred to a more comprehensive process."