Splinter Movements Slows Peace Hopes: Only a Few Months Ago, It Seemed Certain That Sudan Would at Long Last Find Peace. but No Sooner Had the North and South Signed Agreements Than a Host of Other Splinter Movements Emerged. James Badcock Reports

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The halt of progress in the peace talks between the Sudanese government and the southern rebels, and a growing humanitarian crisis due to fighting in the western Darfur region make the prospects for Sudan in 2004 grimmer than many had hoped last year.

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It seems that the progress that was made towards a power-sharing agreement between North and South has spurred on other regional groups to make a push forward in their struggles.

That optimism culminated in the signing this January of a wealth-sharing accord to last the duration of the six-and-a-half-year transitional period to follow the conclusion of an eventual peace deal.

The signatories, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) led by John Garang, and the Sudanese Government headed by President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, have failed to make the expected progress since then at the ongoing Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) talks in Kenya.

Worse still, fierce fighting between other rebels and government-backed militias in the western province of Darfur has created an alarming humanitarian crisis as an estimated 600,000 civilians have left …