‘Heglig war part of Western conspiracy against Sudan’

The South Sudan Democratic Front Party (SSDFP) says that the war in the oil-rich Heglig town in southern Sudan was part of a Western conspiracy against Sudan, Press TV reports. “I think this is an international conspiracy against the Republic of Sudan because there was no reason at all for the government of South Sudan to invade Heglig, which is an internationally recognized territory of Sudan,” Professor David de Chand, the party’s chairman, told Press TV in an interview on Thursday. “They (South Sudanese invaders) got all their arms from abroad and this is part of the conspiracy toward the government of Sudan,” he added. “There is a cold war going on over oil and the control of resources. Therefore the decision to divide Sudan was a strategic plan of many western countries headed by the United States.” South Sudan became independent on July 9, 2011 after decades of conflict with the north. The new oil-rich nation is one of the least developed countries in the world where one in every seven children dies before the age of five. South Sudanese forces seized Heglig in mid-April, sparking days of deadly border clashes between the two sides. On Monday, South Sudan's government spokesman Barnaba Marial Benjamin said that troops from the south had eventually withdrawn from Heglig, but claimed that Sudan continued to bomb the region during the pullout. Khartoum denies the accusation, saying it had repelled an attack by rebels on its own side of the border. De Chand went on to say that the US and Western countries aimed to overthrow the government of Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir.