Sudan People’s Liberation Movement - North

5 January 2013

Today, January 5, 2013, a historical agreement was signed between all Sudanese opposition forces and in particular, representatives and the top leadership of the Sudan Revolutionary Front and a senior delegation representing the National Consensus Forces, youth, women and civil societies. After five days of deliberations, we arrived at a document to answer the questions: how Sudan can best be ruled during the transitional period and how we can accelerate and coordinate a peaceful uprising to get rid of the genocidal regime of the National Congress Party.

Sudan will collapse and disintegrate if this regime shall continue.

All the opposition forces agreed to reinforce a peaceful uprising by a joint action on the basis of the “New Dawn Charter”, which is the first charter after the end and the collapse of the National Democratic Alliance that brought all the opposition under one umbrella.

It came after a lot of consultations and meetings between all the opposition political groups and civil societies, youth and women inside and outside of Sudan, and we agreed to form a coordinating council that will coordinate our joint work.

This is a major qualitative development that will have a huge impact on the Sudanese political scene, and we are calling upon the Sudanese inside Sudan and in the Diaspora and in the refugee camps to support this move to end the war and to bring a just peace and democracy to our country and to establish a government that the Sudanese deserve.

We agreed that the transitional period will be for four years. Within the four years, we will hold a national constitution conference.

The New Dawn Charter has adopted a new approach refraining away from business as usual, answering many questions of today and absorbing and taking seriously the painful experience of the National Congress regime that forced South Sudan to secede.

The New Dawn Charter addresses how we can unite the rest of Sudan and look forward for strategic relations with the Republic of South Sudan that is based on the mutual interests and historical ties, building two viable states and seeking in the future a Sudanese union between two independent states.

We call upon the friends of Sudan in the region and in the international community to support the unity of the Sudanese opposition forces and the New Dawn Charter to achieve peace, democracy and stability. It has been proven beyond doubt that stability can only be achieved through democracy, and if you sacrifice democracy for the sake of stability, you will end up sacrificing both of them.

The regime of General Bashir is the ugliest and most brutal regime on the African continent. The Sudanese people need to end the war to realize peace and democracy. This is a cause that should be supported by all lovers of peace and democracy.

Yasir Arman | Secretary General, SPLM-North | Secretary for External Affairs, SRF | January 5, 2013