these are three main stories we're covering point this out and a million people could take to cairo's tahrir square late on friday in protest over egypt's transitional government interference from north to differing on the promise of democracy from every is uprising. murdoch is killing off britain's best selling newspaper the news of the world it's been widely scoundrelly the tabloids let's throw in the mood of victims include soldiers around us. and israel is bracing itself for hundreds of proof protestant activists ranting at the country's main

airport their action follows the blocking of ships from the grounds that a foot. after decades of wars and bloodshed southern sudan is preparing to break free and go to the moon. guests discuss now where it's already at risk of failure before it flies its first flag of independence and crosstalk. live. in. a low and welcome to cross talk i'm here all about after decades of conflict in war

south sudan is said to become an independent state on july ninth as the world intice a paid for this event and there are lingering questions surrounding the buy ability of this new oil rich country as south sudan failed even before it established. the can. still live. to cross talk the future of south sudan i'm joined by my guests in washington jonathan kevin he is the director of the sudan program at the united states institute of peace john campbell he's the ralph bunche senior fellow for african policy studies at the council on foreign relations and he is an african political analyst all right gentlemen this is cross talk that means cross talk rules in effect i mean you can jump in anytime you want need i'd like to go to you first in washington and looking at the future of south sudan and will have its independence in a few hours is it mission impossible or is it already mission failed. oh it's neither of those those i don't think the possible outcomes of course everything is

in the air it depends on what happens more than it depends on what important act is do the leadership in southern sudan and the people in government or not want to become known then sudan the people of southern sudan the international community and of course they need three are for countries so there are a lot of this i actually think the future. while it is not problem free is is much more positive than and seen in the media do you have a number of important i said go in for them but a lot of their reporting has been on the difficulties which is right but we mustn't forget that the important things go in for them international goodwill they have a lot of all you know then i'm too small for it's hard on the north and people most important go for if you look at the referendum that people weren't there this is something that people really want and where there is a will there is there is

a way ok mr ambassador john campbell if i go to you i'll repeat my question is it mission impossible mission failed already because as we already heard there's a lot of ifs out there and i'd like to point out this is seems to be a very important foreign policy objective of the united states a lot of money has been poured into this endeavor what are your thoughts on it. it is certainly not mission impossible. it is however a challenging mission. a number of the very important issues between south sudan and sudan and the khartoum government still need to be worked through for example only about eighty percent of the border has been delineated then there is the question of how the oil revenue is going to be shared what arrangements they're going to be for export in the oil most of which goes out through port sudan which is in the north and then there is the nationality question

what do you do about people from the south who live in the north and vice versa these are important issues left over from the comprehensive peace agreement that have not yet been resolved and then there is the question of the south sudan's own institutional development one of the things we have seen is that in countries which have enormous amounts of oil there are is have the institutional stress how in other words do you make best use of the oil revenue and prevent it from a sensually going into the pockets of a few corrupt individuals ok i don't really know not to bring in jonathan here i mean we've heard a lot it looks like this is a new state built on a lot of hope is that is that. a point to much cold water on the future of this country. it is built on

a lot of hope ninety eight percent or more of south sudanese voted to secede and that was a legitimate ninety eight percent that's almost unanimous which is really a remarkable thing it will be a state boring week but i don't think it will be a state borne failed i think that's unfair to the south sudanese but the challenge is that a massive campbell talks about are real and i will add one more which is that there are real ethnic divides within the south and there are perceptions that the southern government and the southern leadership are dominated by a few ethnic groups and that's something that the southern people will have to deal with early on that kind of ethnic division has been very problematic in other parts of africa and then i go to you i mean when hoping so south sudan develop its institutions it looks like the military and security get a lion's share of foreign aid united states state department is one hundred million dollars a year expensive everything else infrastructure wise and we're talking about one of the poorest places on the planet is that

a wise move. well i think it's. a sign and that's time to move to begin with i mean notice that my michael dance and i are all in washington and so we have our fingers down on how sudan policy gets me and i think people have been rightly worried about the war in their domain eighteen new you. know the sudan and we're in for the last few days president bashir has made a lot of very worrying statements and there is a war on the border and i would be and in southern kordofan so yes you have to look at the security guard everything that has been said i agree totally with because of the especially the challenges of oil and ethnicity we have to help the sudan southern sudanese the u.s. and others who care have to help them to build institutions incidentally i think if you stressed democracy you will have word world people wrongly called the oil case

it is not their kids what is necessary is once you have oil you are to build strong institutions to do with the oil the united states is well endowed with no it doesn't corrupt their their country as much as people assume for other places so i do think yes the focus on military and security may seem skewed by that is their fair stead now the hard work begins are to run started it comes and countries independent people should not say everything is done and google him particularly people like me octavius ten people in the united states who do put pressure on what the u.s. ought to do we have our work cut out for us to pressure the u.s. government to build the i'm very institutions i think i share their concern in your question that you shouldn't be against military only well let's talk about the military here if i go to the invites or human rights watch and amnesty international are very concerned about the funding of the military in the south

because they know. soldiers have been responsible for grave human rights abuses including unlawful killings of civilians and looting and destruction of civilian property i mean again i mean is this such a is this a good time for independence if you have you have militias and security forces that are not very disciplined to be polite the security situation is extraordinarily difficult. it's very easy in the euphoria leading up to the end to end dependence today it's very easy to simply put aside the fact that there is active fighting going on in the in south kordofan there there are claims by various ethnic groups of. north north sudan sensually trying to destroy them as independent entities in other words south sudan has to have at this stage

a robust security establishment all of that said it is perfectly true that in south sudan as elsewhere in africa the behavioral and the training of the military is not necessarily what we would like it also makes the training of military all the more important and it's interesting jonathan if i go to you i mean it's an interesting mix here i mean the united states has been spending enormous money amount of money on the security situation there and as it was pointed out on this program there's a heck of a lot of oil there i think there's an estimated six billion barrels of oil on the ground underground i mean so you have a very large security force in a lot of oil that it could make speakers why would the security forces be more interested in revenues. well it's important to keep in mind that the southern army of the sudan people's liberation army is the largest employer in south sudan by far this is going to be a country with very little employment opportunity now the s.p.l.

a is too large everybody recognizes that and there are a lot of soldiers in there who should probably be mobilized but it's very difficult for the southern government to do that because there are few alternatives in terms of employment for any demobilized soldiers and there's a chance that any demobilized soldier is might revolt or join some of the current rebellions in the south so that's really a sensitive issue for the southern leadership i think the south is actually rather unified around their oil and they're certainly unified around keeping as much of the oil and keeping as much of the profits as they can but there is certainly speculation about corruption in the oil sector and speculation that the army has been involved in that i mean if i go to you do you see a possible future for south sudan light maybe like nigeria because of the oil. number one i hope not number two i don't really think it because i think of cause

the l.b.o. gallops they'll be they'll be similarities but i think for me the differences will be essential because if nothing else we have the example of nigeria to to to look out and to try to avoid the things that got them in trouble and so i am i'm not emphasize again i think the bully is making sure that we build democratic institutions the challenges that michael connelly as i've mentioned are all correct in the give them the right emphasis guards they don't mean ones on the army and the dominance of the s.p.l. and the ethnic issues but i think we do have the example of other problem areas in africa in the south in sudanese people in the government how can watch by the who need international help and international assistance and i must also add that i'm on the hopeful side and not nothing and i am saying is because you know we are in washington washington get celebrated a good life for over two hundred years of the end dependence if you cast your mind

back it looked like a very impossible mission when windows peter was declare independence and so when people feel strongly about it they can take on the challenges i do think we must find time to talk about the rule of khartoum and president bashir he because with all of the internal challenges are in sudan i do think are you with us i think sadly as we as we are after we return from a break after the break we'll continue our discussion once again state. of the. state. wealthy british stock.

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well imagine all the talk you know about remind you we're talking about the birth of another sudan. ok mr mesereau like to go to you know when it was mentioned right before we go to break what about the north north sudan as it will be and their attitude towards the new country to the south can they make or break the possibility of a sovereign state a state that can actually take care of itself with all that oil by the way but nonetheless what cards they play to make or break the new country. well. they certainly have the potential if for example you have full scale warfare breaking out between south sudan sudan and the north the the emergence of south

sudan will become infinitely more complicated i note that according to the press this morning by sheer will be in juba for the the end dependence day celebrations i hope that is correct because ever since the comprehensive peace agreements were signed the north has dragged its feet. on the process peschiera himself openly and publicly accepts the end dependence of south sudan but the shear has an opposition he has an opposition in khartoum and there are others in khartoum who are not happy. about south sudan becoming independent not least because of the or there is a kind of mantra that you can sometimes hear in khartoum to the effect of that he sure has lost south sudan bushehr has failed to end the crisis in darfur

and bashir is approach to the opposition in khartoum. is repressive so bashir is not a totally independent actor enormous ok jonathan when you think about i mean when that when the noise seize all this oil and i could point out i mean right now the oil does go through the north for exports so i mean there is some kind of interdependence already built into this relationship irrespective of attitudes political attitudes about the independence of the new state. and this is why the oil is actually a positive factor in terms of north-south relations in some ways because there is such mutual dependence between the north in the south in order for both of them to get their oil revenue the south gets about ninety eight percent of its revenue from oil almost all of their revenue comes from oil the north the numbers are a little fuzzy but probably something in the neighborhood of sixty percent of their revenue comes from oil they both need it they can't afford to live without it

despite some of the heated rhetoric that we're seeing and so the fact that almost all the oil about eighty percent of it comes out of the ground in the south but then goes through pipelines in the north and refineries in the north means that they have to work out a deal on oil they can't afford to do anything else and so i think there will be a deal on oil probably not by saturday july ninth but they have agreed to keep talking and i think that mutual dependence does act as a brake on a return to a full scale civil war which i don't think is likely i do think it's likely that we're going to see some of this violence around the north-south border for some time to. go ahead you want to jump in there and. yes i want to i think today is very right i mean nothing is right about the ambassador made the point of president bashir in the north and i would be our new independent and i think that is totally true he shared fly down there he had been see he.

again when decision of the south to brick a we are sad to see it but then who are seen beginning last week and since he came back he's been very beleaguered what i want to say is another thought that in the northern. china china's relationship by sheer which also would bring in their rule of the united states i mean we all know president obama. wants an africa and these two can interest in africa. to others means it's. this is obama was us in south africa so i hope that behind the scenes president obama is talking to the chinese because there are an important influence on. both. sudans especially the north because the our land is palmed by companies from three countries their major one being chinese company it is the law it is sold to china and order by she has come from china so i hope the u.s.

is talking to china so that the constructive role because jonathan too is right the are. dealt with properly can reduce the friction between the two countries because unlike you said yes they have both needed so it can be a positive factor and you say mr ambassador i'm going to you know i did during celebrations on saturday. in the indian country there should be a lot of dignitaries there i think colin powell is going to be there the current u.s. u.s. representative the united nations susan rice is going to be there and a lot of other dignitaries is it all about oil i mean if it were any other if there were no oil there do you think a lot of dignitaries would be showing. yes yes i think there would be a lot of dignitaries showing up because yes oil is important but what is also important is that this marks the errand of a conflict which has gone on for almost a generation. i mean the warfare between between the north and the

south has nor are africa for for more than twenty years i'm going to take this opportunity though to jump in with respect to the mutual dependence of the south and the north on each other and with a particular focus on oil it's perfectly true yes indeed they're mutually dependent the question becomes whether the leadership of the two and here i would particularly focus on courage you know whether the leadership of the two recognize that fact and are willing to take that reality into account as they develop their policies that's what we're going to have to watch over the over the next several weeks. to share concern about the belligerence of comments that bashir

has been making over over the past week or so i will be watching with a great deal of interest about what he actually says on independence day and the day after what you think about john if in the mean if there if we have by sheer is so secure is a lot of people make that might think he is i mean he can have a lot of trouble he's going to have to start saying the right things irrespective if it's against his own country's best interest as we've been talking about this interdependence i mean if it no one gets any money if the oil isn't pumped out of the country so i mean what kind of what kind of variables is he could have to deal with to get to maintain his power base but it's still accept that a new country has come into being. well when we talk about him saying the right things it depends what audience he's talking to and the right things for the international audience can be very different than the right things for domestic northern sudanese audience the message that president bush here in the n.c.p. leadership are trying to send right now within the north is that we are in control

and that there aren't going to be any more breakaways like what we're seeing in southern sudan and this i think explains to some extent the violence that we're currently seeing in southern kordofan state and the efforts to disarm some troops in southern kordofan state in the north who are aligned with the south and that of course has been a rather violent process to go back to oil as well i think it's important not to overemphasize the importance of oil in sudan it's a medium level producer about four hundred ninety thousand barrels a day doesn't make it a big x. ray global producer and for the u.s. oil is actually not that important because the u.s. doesn't consume any sudanese oil because of the sanctions that the u.s. has on sudan so this has as much to do with the history and bloodshed that ambassador campbell was talking about as the oil it's not just an oil story if i go to you when you know what kind of precedent is being said here could we see even

regions within south sudan start breaking apart or even the north seeing seeing the state of the north start collapsing if once we see whatever moves he makes one way or another it could destabilize the north as well we've been focusing a lot on the south what about the north and yes that is absolutely true and it's a i hope it doesn't i mean the ambassador is right there was on for a long time but i would take you to even further you know i'm from ghana going to begin to plan in one thousand nine hundred seven so that i'm actually became independent. and the tensions. also. actually you can see it's. and sold it in one thousand nine hundred fifty six so the conflict has actually been there for more than fifty years so this is the grip of the south and the and they're ninety eight percent for the referendum to me tells me that this was a special case and that i hope it hasn't spread to other parts or sued sudan for in

on the in sudan trying to break up i mean there's even some talk among some of the other i'd need groups that well in southern sudan i don't want to put too much of a fine point on it but people always talk about breaking away i think we should be the exception rather than the rule and i hope it doesn't happen in other parts of sudan but beyond whom it depends on how the government governs the country if people feel that the wishes and grievances i take into our count india listen to even if the problems are not solved there will still be which. allows as in the short time left to give some thought to places like darfur and of cause there sanctions the u.s. as it is now the sudan was mentioned but again i think washington if it is creative this ratio of the linemen it is creative those pressure points can actually be used not just on by sheer but also on the oprah zisha and also rebels in other areas

like darfur to mention that there are no more because i think i said general rule i don't like to see brit guards in africa for that matter it benefits political vicious political people more than ordinary citizens but in the case of southern sudan i think it's the assertion that proves the rule ok jonathan i'm going to give you the last word the program what is the future of south sudan in thirty seconds. i think the biggest challenge in south sudan is for the south sudanese to define themselves and to define what it means to be south sudanese for a long time what has held southerners together is getting to this referendum getting to this and and and and also the common enemy that they see in the north it's now time to get beyond that and to define what it means to be a member of this very new brand new country of south sudan ok that's

a very good point in the program are many thanks to my guest today in washington thanks to our viewers for watching us here r.t. see you next time and remember cross talk. and. three couldn't take three. four three. three. three. three. three volunteers video for your media project free media gone to r.t. dot com.