South Sudan - Sudan Bombing A "Declaration Of War"

Sudanese war planes bombed a market in the capital of South Sudan's oil-producing Unity State on Monday, residents and officials said, in an attack the southern army called a declaration of war.

Sudan denied carrying out any air raids but its President Omar Hassan al-Bashir ramped up the political tension by ruling out a return to negotiations with the South, saying its government only understood "the language of the gun".

A journalist saw aircraft dropping two bombs near a bridge linking two areas of Unity's capital Bentiu, although it was impossible to verify the planes' affiliation. He saw market stalls ablaze and the body of one child.

Weeks of border fighting have brought the neighbours closer to a full-blown war than at any time since the South split away from Sudan as an independent country in July.

The two halves of the country went their separate ways last year without settling a list of bitter disputes over the position of their shared border, the ownership of key territories and how much the landlocked South should pay to transport its oil through Sudan.

The disputes have halted nearly all the oil production that underpins both struggling economies.

"Bashir is declaring war on South Sudan. It's something obvious," southern army (SPLA) spokesman Philip Aguer told Reuters after the Bentiu bombing.

Aguer and the United Nations Mission in South Sudan said two people were killed in the air strike.

"Early reports indicate the bombings started at 8.30 hours and that Rubkona market has been struck," the U.N. mission in South Sudan said in a statement, without spelling out who carried out the attack.

"These indiscriminate bombings resulting in the loss of civilian lives must stop," said Hilde F. Johnson, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for South Sudan.

The mission said its officers had seen one bomb land on the market and three near a bridge. "A young boy burned to death as the hut he was in caught fire from the blast in Rubkona market area", it quoted one of its officers as saying.

Sudan denied carrying out any air attacks in the area. "We have no relation to what happened in Unity state, and we absolutely did not bomb anywhere in South Sudan," the country's military spokesman, Al-Sawarmi Khalid, said.

"LANGUAGE OF THE GUN"

In the worst fighting since the split, South Sudan earlier this month seized the disputed oil-producing territory of Heglig - then announced it had started withdrawing on Friday, following sharp criticism from U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Bashir, dressed in military uniform, visited the Heglig region on Monday, descending from his plane to shouts of "Allahu akbar" - "God is greatest" - from soldiers and officials gathered on the tarmac.

Speaking to Sudanese army troops, he vowed not to negotiate with South Sudan after it had occupied the region.

"We will not negotiate with the South's government, because they don't understand anything but the language of the gun and ammunition," he said at a barracks near the oilfield along the contested border.

A Reuters journalist on an official tour of the region filmed bombed-out pipelines dripping oil in the largely damaged Heglig oilfield, as well as heavy damage to the central processing facility, power station and other infrastructure.

Abdelazeem Hassan Abdallah, an oil worker in Heglig, accused South Sudan's forces of attacking the oilfield.

"They know how to do the job completely. They destroyed our main power plant, and they destroyed our processing facilities," he told Reuters.

"CAPABLE OF CAPTURING HEGLIG"

General Kamal Abdul Maarouf, a Sudanese army commander who led the battles in Heglig, said his troops had killed 1,200 South Sudanese soldiers in fighting in the area, an account South Sudan denied.

Journalists travelling on an official trip to the region said they saw bodies strewn on the road to the barracks. Some clearly had South Sudanese flags on their uniforms, but it was not always possible to verify their nationalities.

Aguer dismissed Maarouf's report. "The number of casualties the SPLA has suffered since the 26th or March doesn't exceed 50," he said.

South Sudan won its independence in a referendum that was promised in a 2005 peace accord that ended decades of civil war between Khartoum and the south.

South Sudan's armed forces have 10 helicopters but no fixed-wing aircraft, except for one Beech 1900 light transport aircraft, according to an International Institute for Strategic Studies report.

News Source: Rueters