Senegal’s new government and pro-independence Casamance rebels in the country’s south have signed an “important agreement” aimed at bringing definitive peace to a region that has endured four decades of conflict, broadcaster RTS said Monday.
The agreement was signed by Senegalese Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko during a visit to Bissau on Sunday where he met members of the Movement of Democratic Forces of Casamance (MFDC) at talks mediated by Guinea-Bissau President Umaro Sissoco Embalo.
The talks are the first made public between the separatists and the Senegalese authorities elected in March last year.
The two parties concluded “after three days of work an important agreement which is a very big step towards peace in Casamance,” RTS quoted Sonko as saying.
Casamance — separated from much of the rest of Senegalese territory by Gambia — has hosted one of the longest ongoing conflicts in Africa since rudimentarily armed separatists withdrew to the bush after an MFDC march was put down in December 1982.
Having claimed thousands of lives and devastated the economy, the conflict has persisted but on a much-diminished level in recent years.
Senegalese authorities have recently begun to resettle displaced people after announcing the destruction of several rebel bases, including on the border with Guinea-Bissau.
The most recent accord announced as concluded came in August 2022 in Bissau between the Senegalese state and a rebel military leader, Cesar Atoute Badiate, following Guinea-Bissau mediation.
