UNITED NATIONS, Aug. 6 (UPI) -- U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon welcomes the oil payment deal reached by the governments of Sudan and South Sudan, a Ban aide said Monday.
"It is an important milestone for building good neighborly relations between the two states," the representative for the United Nations leader said in a statement. "The secretary-general is encouraged that the two governments have significantly narrowed their positions on contentious issues."
The United Nations release cited media reports that the two African countries reached agreement this past weekend on how much South Sudan will pay to transport its crude oil through Sudan's pipelines. South Sudan's oil output had been shut down in January in a dispute over payment rates.
However, Ban's aide said the U.N. secretary-general regrets the two countries missed an Aug. 2 deadline set by the U.N. Security Council in endorsing a road map aimed at easing tensions and normalizing relations the relations between them.
"He [Secretary-General Ban] urges the Sudanese and South Sudanese leaders to muster the necessary political will to resolve all outstanding issues," the U.N. representative said.
South Sudan officially split from Sudan a year ago but tensions have remained with violence breaking out along their common border. The region had been embroiled in hostilities for decades prior to before a years-long truce that led to the formation of South Sudan.
Ban also commended the government of Sudan and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North for signing, separately, the so-called Tripartite Memoranda of Understanding -- with the African Union, League of Arab States and the United Nations -- on humanitarian assistance to war-affected civilians in the Sudanese states of South Kordofan and Blue Nile.
Violence between Sudanese forces and the SPLM-N has led to food shortages and about 170,000 Sudanese have fled to South Sudan, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.
