RESTRAINT URGED AFTER SUDAN SPLIT !

The south has become frustrated that oil wealth is undecided. The US has called on the ruling parties of north and south Sudan to exercise restraint after the ex southern rebels withdrew from the unity government. Diplomats fear the move could jeopardise the 2005 deal that ended the 21-year north-south civil war.
The Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) wants the pact to be honoured before returning to government.
Some officials of the northern National Congress Party (NCP) have described the SPLM's actions as incomprehensible.
Others, like Abd-al-Raheem Ali, chairman of the Consultative Council of the NCP, told the BBC the walkout was a negotiating tactic.
The BBC's Amber Henshaw in the capital, Khartoum, says the Comprehensive Peace Deal (CPA) signed two years ago has been looking increasingly fragile over the last few weeks as important deadlines have been missed.
The SPLM wants boundary demarcations, the redeployment of northern troops from the south to be implemented and the chance to reshuffle its minister in the unity administration.
Some 1.5 million people died in the conflict - Africa's longest civil war - which pitted the mainly Muslim north against the Animist and Christian south before the CPA was agreed. In Washington, the US state department has called for all elements of the CPA to be implemented.

But Mr Ali said some of the southerners' demands were "difficult to respond to".
"So, it should be subject to further dialogue in order to reach satisfactory and practical solutions," he said.
The African Union's envoy has voiced concerned that peace in Sudan could begin to unravel.
"I think we should be worried. I think this is an unfortunate development, and I hope everything possible will be done to deal with the issues concerned, so that the SPLM can resume co-operation with the government of Sudan," Salim Ahmed Salim told the BBC.
He pointed to a breakdown of trust which he said had led to the rift.
Some southerners, however, have been critical of SPLM leader Salva Kiir's actions, saying that grievances should have first been referred to African mediators of the CPA before putting the pact in jeopardy.

Starting from scratch

But Ezekiel Lol Gatkuoth, an SPLM diplomat based in the US, said the south wanted the world to "intervene in rescuing the CPA" but did not want any violence.
"The SPLM is not for war. We are not advocating war, we are for peace, and we want this agreement to be implemented.
"You don't want to have two Darfurs in Sudan," he said, referring to the crisis in the country's western region.
"If we are going to have to go back to war, which we are not wishing, between the south and north, then definitely Sudan will be in chaos."
The power and wealth-sharing deal is intended to pave the way for elections by 2009 and to give the south the right to decide whether to split from the north by 2011.
There is not yet an agreement on the final border between north and south which means the division of oil wealth cannot be completed.
According to an SPLM statement, the party is also unhappy that its request to reshuffle its ministers in the coalition government has been ignored.
Currently there are 10,000 UN peacekeepers in southern Sudan.

BBC NEWS REPORT.