KHARTOUM, Sudan — The United States has demanded negotiations. Uganda has threatened to intervene. China has called for an immediate cease-fire. The conflict in South Sudan has attracted attention from around the world, but nowhere are leaders watching the crisis with more interest — and more at stake — than here in the country’s longstanding rival, Sudan…
Sudan has a great deal at stake if the fighting in South Sudan continues to take a toll on oil production, and with it transit and refining fees. There has been a lot of domestic fallout in Sudan from the billions of dollars in oil revenues lost after the South’s independence…
“President Bashir’s trip [to South Sudan] shows how concerned both Khartoum and Juba are about the oil,” said John Ryle, director of the Rift Valley Institute and a professor of anthropology at Bard College. “Control of the border and restoring the flow of oil are likely to be Khartoum’s two priorities.”