Khartoum: Rhino – The Coordination of Civil Democratic Forces “Progress” apologized on Tuesday for participating in the meeting of the first phase of the political dialogue organized by the African High Level Mechanism on Sudan in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa from the 10th to 15th of July, stressing that it will continue its positive interaction with the African Union in everything that enhances the chances of achieving peace in Sudan.

The Coordination said in a statement on Tuesday that the meeting is completely controlled by elements of the former regime and its interfaces, and the forces supporting the war, and revealed that it obtained information – very late – that confirmed the validity of its concerns about the lack of transparency about the design of the meeting, as it became clear beyond any doubt that this meeting is completely controlled by elements and interfaces of the former regime.

The Coordination stated in its statement that the conference marginalizes and excludes the forces of peace and democratic civilian transformation and weakens their role, “which will certainly only lead to legitimizing the war and its forces, rather than leading to peace in Sudan.

The Coordination revealed that on 10 June, it received an invitation from Dr Mohamed Ibn Chambas, head of the African High-Level Mechanism on Sudan, and that it studied the invitation within its organs and dealt with it with the utmost seriousness and responsibility, noting that the issue of stopping the war and reaching sustainable peace in Sudan is its first priority, and that its approach is based on making every effort to succeed in any initiative that leads to stopping the fighting in Sudan.

“Since the invitation we received lacked details about the parties and the methodology used to design the process, we quickly wrote a positive response in which we requested a meeting with the mechanism to respond to our inquiries, and the meeting was held electronically on the 25th of last June, and we did not succeed in obtaining the required details, as the mechanism reserved the right to notify us of the parties participating in the meeting and refused to consult about it,” the statement said.

The statement continued: “We continued our positive interaction with the mechanism through a series of ground meetings through a delegation we sent, led by the Secretary-General for Progress, who met with the African Union in Addis Ababa on 5 July to obtain the necessary information and discuss the best way forward. We concluded by stressing that the political process must be owned and led by the Sudanese, and that its launch must be the result of genuine consultations with the Sudanese parties and reflect their consensus on the issues of parties, agenda, stages, timelines and the role of regional and international facilitators.” (The statement continued).