Sudan has been challenged in its modern History. In 1955 just as the country was gaining its independence from the United Kingdom and Egypt, a civil conflict erupted in the Southern part of the country which was temporarily settled in 1972 before it resumed and escalated in 1983. The conflict lasted over two decades until the Government of Sudan and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) signed the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) in January 2005. As a result of the 22 years of civil war an estimated 2 million people have died and 4 million others displaced. The war consumed much of the country’s resources that could have served its economic development.

As the North-South peace deal was putting an end to Africa’s longest war, another conflict erupted in 2002-2003 as the Government of Sudan (GoS) was faced with opposition from the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SLM/A) and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) in Darfur. Following months of negotiation and the pressure from the international community, Abuja peace talks led to the signing of Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA) by the GoS and a faction of the SLM/S in Abuja in May 2006. The DPA deal did not succeed in brining peace and stability to the people of Darfur. A new negotiation process is taking place in Libya with mediation by the UN and the African Union (AU). Darfur conflict has engulfed the three states killing over 200,000 people and forcing more than two million persons to flee their homes.

In addition to the 2005 CPA and the 2006 DPA, the Government of Sudan signed with the Eastern Front the Eastern Sudan Peace Agreement (ESPA) in October 2006 in Eritrea’s capital, Asmara. The signing of the ESPA ended a decade long low-intensity conflict in the Eastern part of the country that is home to some three to four million of Sudan’s poorest people. The living conditions in eastern Sudan are so harsh that the local population has been facing for a very long time acute poverty, persistent drought and famine, a lack of adequate access to healthcare and education, high levels of unemployment in addition to land degradation and shrinking pasture areas. This state of affairs led to a low-intensity conflict over the past eleven years that was settled with the signing of the ESPA.

The following text of the CPA, DPA, and ESPA offers an overview of the breakthroughs achieved through the signing of each peace deal. They form the basis of the transformation that the country has been undergoing since January 2005:

-The Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA)  - The Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA) - The Eastern Sudan Peace Agreement (ESPA)