Juba (AFP)
South Sudan announced on Monday that it is renegotiating an oil deal with Sudan, being unable to complete paying it by December the three billion dollars (2.7 billion euros) it is committed to pay him compensation after his secession in 2011.
South Sudan and Sudan signed an agreement in 2012 under which Juba pledged to pay this sum after gaining independence with 70 percent of the oil fields hitherto exploited by Khartoum.
South Sudan's Minister of Petroleum Awou Daniel Chuang told reporters that his country has paid $ 2.4 billion so far but was unable to pay the remaining $ 600 million by December.
"At the approach of the term of the contract, we should be able to postpone (the deadline) because we can not operate in the vacuum (legal) It is this agreement that governs the compensation we pay to Sudan", he said.
Talks to postpone the deadline will begin at the end of October and a South Sudanese team is already working on this issue in Khartoum, the minister added.
To pay Sudan compensation, $ 15 is taken from each barrel of South Sudan crude, which is then refined in Sudan, Chuang said.
But years of conflict have reduced oil production and payments have fallen behind.
South Sudan sank into civil war in 2013, when President Salva Kiir accused his former vice president, Riek Machar, of fomenting a coup.
The conflict, marked by atrocities and the use of rape as a weapon of war, has claimed more than 380,000 lives according to a recent study, and pushed more than four million South Sudanese, or nearly a third of the population, to to leave their homes.
The peace agreement reached in September 2018 has led to a sharp decline in fighting, although they have not completely stopped.
It provides for the formation of a national unity government by 12 November.
Since the signing of this agreement, crude production has risen from 135,000 to 178,000 barrels a day, compared to 350,000 barrels at the peak of production before the war.
© 2019 AFP