The First Sudanese Civil War was a conflict from 1955 to 1972 between the northern part of Sudan and a south that demanded more regional autonomy. Half a million people died over the 17 years of war, which may be divided into three stages: initial guerilla war, Anyanya and South Sudan Liberation Movement. However, the agreement that ended the fighting in 1972 failed to completely dispel the tensions that had originally caused the civil war, leading to a reigniting of the north-south conflict during the Second Sudanese Civil War (1983–2005). The period between 1955 and 2005 is thus sometimes considered to be a single conflict with an eleven-year ceasefire that separates two violent phases. 1955 (MCMLV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 1972 (MCMLXXII) was a leap year that started on a Saturday. ... Anyanya is the name of the separatist southern Sudanese rebel army of the First Sudanese Civil War which started in 1955. ... 1972 (MCMLXXII) was a leap year that started on a Saturday. ... The Second Sudanese Civil War started in 1983, although it is most accurately a continuation of the First Sudanese Civil War of 1955 to 1972. ... 1983 (MCMLXXXIII) is a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 2005 (MMV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Origins of the conflict

Until 1946 the British empire administered south Sudan and north Sudan as separate regions. At this time, the two areas were merged into a single administrative region as part of British strategy in the Middle East. This act was taken without consultation with southerners, who feared being subsumed by the political power of the larger north. Southern Sudan is inhabited primarily by Christians and animists and considers itself culturally sub-Saharan, while most of the north is inhabited by Muslims who consider themselves culturally Arabic. 1946 (MCMXLVI) was a common year starting on Tuesday. ... A map showing countries commonly considered to be part of the Middle East The Middle East is a region comprising the lands around the southern and eastern parts of the Mediterranean Sea, a territory that extends from the eastern Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf. ... Christianity is a monotheistic religion that recognizes Jesus Christ as its central figure, Lord and Messiah. ... In religion, the term Animism is used in a number of ways. ... ▶ (help· info) (Arabic: الإسلام; al- islām, the submission to God) is a monotheistic faith, one of the Abrahamic religions and the worlds second-largest religion. ... The Arabs (Arabic: عرب ʻarab) are a large and heterogenous ethnic group found throughout the Middle East and North Africa, originating in the Arabian Peninsula of southwest Asia. ...

After the February 1953 agreement by the United Kingdom and Egypt to grant independence to Sudan, the internal tensions over the nature of the relationship of north to south were heightened. Matters reached a head as the 1 January 1956 independence day approached, as it appeared that northern leaders were backing away from commitments to create a federal government that would give the south substantial autonomy. February is the second month of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1953 (MCMLIII) is a common year starting on Thursday. ... January 1 is the first day of the calendar year in both the Julian and Gregorian calendars. ... 1956 (MCMLVI) was a leap year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... <Italic textBold textBold textLink titlenowiki>Insert non-formatted text here</nowiki>Insert non-formatted text here--12. ...

Course of the war

In August 1955, members of the British Equatoria Corps, together with local police, mutinied in Torit and other southern towns. The mutinies were suppressed, though survivors fled the towns and began an uncoordinated insurgency in rural areas. Poorly armed and ill-organized, they were little threat to the outgoing colonial power or the newly formed Sudanese government. Note: as an adjective (stressed on the second syllable instead of the first), august means honorable. ... 1955 (MCMLV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Mutiny is the crime of conspiring to disobey orders that the mutineer is legally obliged to obey, for example by crew members of a ship. ... Torit is the capital of Imatong district in East Equatoria State in the southern region of Sudan. ... An insurgency is an organized rebellion that engages in deliberate actions to cause the downfall of a governmental authority, through destruction and armed actions. ...

However, the insurgents gradually developed into a secessionist movement composed of the 1955 mutineers and southern students. These groups formed the Anyanya guerilla army. (Anyanya is also known as Anyanya 1 in comparison to Anyanya 2, began with the 1974 mutiny of the military garrison in Akobo.) Starting from Equatoria, between 1963 and 1969 Anyanya spread throughout the other two southern provinces: Upper Nile and Bahr al Ghazal. However, the separatist movement was crippled by internal ethnic divisions. Anyanya is the name of the separatist southern Sudanese rebel army of the First Sudanese Civil War which started in 1955. ... 1974 (MCMLXXIV) is a common year starting on Tuesday (click on link for calendar). ... Location of Equatoria province in Sudan Equatoria (Al-Istiwaiyah in Arabic) THE OTTOMAN - TURKEY GAVE THE NAME TO REPLACE LADO , began as a province of Egypt, located in the extreme south of present-day Sudan along the upper reaches of the White Nile. ... 1963 (MCMLXIII) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1969 (MCMLXIX) was a common year starting on Wednesday For other uses, see Number 1969. ... Upper Nile Upper Nile (Aali an Nil) is one of the 26 wilayat or states of Sudan. ... The Bahr el Ghazal (Arabic: Gazelle River) is both a river and a region of southwestern Sudan, the region taking its name from the river. ...

The government was unable to take advantage of rebel weaknesses because of their own factionalism and instability. The first independent government of Sudan, led by Prime Minister Ismail al-Azhari, was quickly replaced by a stalemated coalition of various conservative forces, which was in turn overthrown in the coup d'état of Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Ibrahim Abboud in 1958. Resentment at the military government led to a wave of popular protests that led to the creation of an interim government in October 1964. These protests were the first appearance of Islamist Hassan al-Turabi, who was then a student leader. Between 1966 and 1969, a series of Islamist-dominated administrations proved unable to deal with the variety of ethnic, economic and conflict problems afflicting the country. After a second military coup on 25 May 1969, Col. Gaafar Nimeiry became Prime Minister and promptly outlawed political parties. In-fighting between Marxist and non-Marxist factions in the ruling military class led to another coup in July 1971 and a short-lived administration by the Sudanese Communist Party before anti-Communist factions put Nimeiry back in control of the country. Ismail al-Azhari (Saiyid) (1902 - 1969) was a Sudanese nationalist and political figure. ... A coup détat (pronounced ), or simply a coup, is the sudden overthrow of a government, usually done by a smaller supposedly weaker body that just replaces the top power figures. ... Ibrahim Abboud (1900–1983) was a Sudanese dictator, general, and political figure. ... 1958 (MCMLVIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Look up October in Wiktionary, the free dictionary October is the tenth month of the year in the Gregorian Calendar and one of seven Gregorian months with the length of 31 days. ... For the Nintendo 64 emulator, see 1964 (Emulator). ... Islamism refers to a set of political ideologies derived from various religious views of Muslim fundamentalists, which hold that Islam is not only a religion, but also a political system that should govern the legal, economic and social imperatives of the state. ... Dr. Hassan abd Allah al-Turabi (الدكتور حسن عبد الله الترابي in Arabic), commonly called Hassan al-Turabi (sometimes transliterated Hassan al-Tourabi) (حسن الترابي), is a political and religious leader in Sudan, who may have been instrumental in institutionalizing Islamic Sharia law in the northern part of the country. ... 1966 (MCMLXVI) was a common year starting on Saturday (link goes to calendar) // Events January January 1 - In a coup, Colonel Jean-Bédel Bokassa ousts president David Dacko and takes over the Central African Republic. ... 1969 (MCMLXIX) was a common year starting on Wednesday For other uses, see Number 1969. ... May 25 is the 145th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (146th in leap years). ... 1969 (MCMLXIX) was a common year starting on Wednesday For other uses, see Number 1969. ... Gaafar Muhammad an-Nimeiry (otherwise known as Jaafar Nimeiry, Gaafar Nimeiry or Gafar Muhammad an-Numayri; born 1 January 1930) was the President of Sudan from 1971 to 1985. ... A political party is a political organization that subscribes to a certain ideology and seeks to attain political power within a government. ... Marxism is the social theory and political practice based on the works of Karl Marx, a 19th century German philosopher, economist, journalist, and revolutionary, along with Friedrich Engels. ... July is the seventh month of the year in the Gregorian Calendar and one of seven Gregorian months with the length of 31 days. ... 1971 (MCMLXXI) is a common year starting on Friday (click for link to calendar). ... This article is about communism as a form of society and as a political movement. ...

In 1971, former army lieutenant Joseph Lagu gathered all the guerilla bands under his Southern Sudan Liberation Movement (SSLM). This was the first time in the history of the war that the separatist movement had a unified command structure to fulfill the objectives of secession and the formation of an independent state in South Sudan. It was also the first organization that could claim to speak for, and negotiate on behalf of, the entire south. Mediation between the World Council of Churches (WCC) and the All African Conference of Churches (AACC), both of which spent years building up trust with the two combatants, eventually led to the Addis Ababa Agreement of March 1972 ending the conflict. In exchange for ending their armed uprising, southerners were granted a single southern administrative region with various defined powers. 1971 (MCMLXXI) is a common year starting on Friday (click for link to calendar). ... Joseph Lagu was born in 192- , in Moli village, about 70 kilometers south of Juba. ... The World Council of Churches (WCC) is the principal international Christian ecumenical organization. ... The Addis Ababa Accords were a series of compromises in 1972, aimed at appeasing the non-muslim leaders of the insurgency in southern Sudan after the first Sudanese Civil War proved costly to the muslim Sudanese government. ... March is the third month of the year in the Gregorian Calendar and one of seven Gregorian months with the length of 31 days. ... 1972 (MCMLXXII) was a leap year that started on a Saturday. ...

Effects of the war

Five hundred thousand people, of which only one of five was considered an armed combatant, were killed in the seventeen year war and hundreds of thousands more were forced to leave their homes. The Addis Ababa Agreement proved to be only temporary respite. Perceived infringements by the north led to increased unrest in the south starting in the mid-1970s, leading to the 1983 army mutiny that sparked the Second Sudanese Civil War. Forced migration refers to the coerced movement of a person or persons away from their home or home region. ... 1983 (MCMLXXXIII) is a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... The Second Sudanese Civil War started in 1983, although it is most accurately a continuation of the First Sudanese Civil War of 1955 to 1972. ...

References

• Eprile, Cecil. War and peace in the Sudan 1955 - 1972. David and Charles, London. 1974. ISBN 0715362216.
• Civil Warfare in the South, Carnelian,