Key Darfur rebel group signs deal with Khartoum

Darfur's most heavily armed rebel group, the Justice and Equality Movement, said yesterday it had signed a framework agreement with the Sudanese government in Chad that provides for a ceasefire.

Soon afterwards, Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir announced that he was quashing death sentences handed down by the courts against some 100 JEM fighters for their parts in an unprecedented rebel assault on the capital Khartoum in May 2008.

"We have just initially signed the framework agreement," JEM spokesman Ahmed Hussein told AFP by telephone from the Chadian capital Ndjamena.

"We will discuss many issues - return of the IDPs (internally displaced persons), power and wealth sharing, compensation, detainees," he said in English.

"We are committed to a peaceful solution for Darfur," he added.

JEM leader "Dr Khalil (Ibrahim) asks to our force to stop" military operations.

Last Friday, the Sudanese president had promised "good news" about Darfur, adding that an agreement with the JEM would end the devastating seven-year conflict in the troubled western region which has claimed some 300,000 lives and left 2.7 million refugees, according to UN figures.

The movement's attack on the capital in 2008 brought it to just across the Nile from the presidential palace in the first ever such offensive by a Sudanese rebel group.

The fighting resulted in at least 220 deaths and the capture of a large number of rebel fighters. A total of 105 were later convicted and condemned to death.

"I cancel all the sentences of hanging pronounced against members of the Justice and Equality Movement," Beshir said in a campaign speech yesterday to members of women's associations.

"And tomorrow we will release 30 per cent of the prisoners," he added.