CEPO Executive Director Edmund Yakani. (Photo: Awan Moses/Eye Radio).

A prominent South Sudanese civil society organization has welcomed the United Nations Security Council’s latest statement on the country, pledging to help facilitate an inclusive political dialogue as pressure mounts on rival leaders to cooperate and revive the stalled peace process.

In an audio statement, Edmond Yakani, Executive Director of the Community Empowerment for Progress Organization (CEPO), said the Council’s communiqué issued under the United Kingdom’s presidency met the expectations of civil society stakeholders.

“The communiqué content has answered our expectation, it has responded to our wishes as a stakeholder in South Sudan and as citizens of South Sudan,” Yakani said, describing the Council’s call for dialogue as “straightforward.”

Earlier this week, the United Nations Security Council urged South Sudan’s leaders to resolve political disagreements through peaceful dialogue and warned that continued tensions threaten implementation of the 2018 peace agreement.

Yakani said the call for dialogue reflects a broad and growing consensus. “United Nations Security Council, AU Peace and Security Council, AUC5, IGAD and South Sudanese citizens above all, have demanded for the warring parties in South Sudan to use dialogue as a strategy of resolving their political differences,” he said.

Yakani also referenced remarks made by Salva Kiir Mayardit at the recent African Union summit, where the President pledged to restore peace in South Sudan.

“We are really in praise of restoring peace in South Sudan under his leadership as the head of state,” Yakani said, appealing directly to Kiir and opposition leaders to act on their commitments.

He stressed that any dialogue process must be inclusive, transparent and open to all rightful signatories of the 2018 peace agreement. “The dialogue must really bring the rightful signatories … to the same table to renew their political pledge to implement the pending tasks of the transition,” he said.

Yakani said civil society actors are ready to “moderate and facilitate the dialogue,” working in cooperation with regional and international partners including the African Union, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) and the Security Council.

He pointed to a proposed retreat under the AUC5 framework, chaired by South Africa, as a possible stepping stone toward consensus among leaders.

“We are voluntarily standing up to take a lead in facilitating the dialogue,” Yakani said, urging that talks be rolled out immediately after the proposed retreat and that leaders commit to dialogue “as the only option for paving a way for transition the country from violence to peace.