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Amid uncertainty over the status of oil blocks straddling the border between Sudan and South Sudan, Canadian-Pakistani businessman Lutfur Khan, whose involvement in Sudan’s oil industry goes back to the 1990s, has found a partner to help finance development of three oil fields in northern Block 7.

Even as negotiations continue towards the restarting of oil exports via Sudan, South Sudan is pushing ahead with plans to build alternative routes to export its oil, say senior government officials. The Juba government is also planning to build a refinery, launch a licensing round, and break up oil concessions awarded by Khartoum prior to independence, writes Richard Nield, recently in Juba

The Khartoum government’s Oil Exploration and Production Authority (OEPA) is attempting to entice new exploration with an international licensing round for six vast blocks

As South Sudan celebrates its birth and its neighbours issue statements of support, the Ilemi Triangle border dispute seems to have been forgotten. Nairobi and Khartoum have both eyed this notoriously volatile area’s oil prospects in recent decades, but Juba has yet to publically take a stance

With no deal yet in place on oil revenue-sharing between north and south Sudan, Khartoum has imposed a pipeline usage fee of $22.80/bbl on South Sudan’s exports

Without genuine co-operation over oil flows, efforts to rein in militias and a concerted international effort to overcome Abyei and other crises, history may show that the January referendum and independence day celebrations were a high point for the new South Sudan and its troubled northern neighbour

Another Sudanese drama beckons with President Omar Hassan Al-Bashir’s threat to shut off the main pipeline linking oil fields in the soon-to-be-independent south with the export terminal at Port Sudan unless the Government of South Sudan (GoSS) continues to share revenues or pays a transit fee on every barrel exported

Jeddah-based Islamic Corporation for the Insurance of Investment and Export Credit (ICIEC) has told African Energy that non-payment cover involving power projects in Sudan had been a major focus for the organisation.

Growing political tensions across Sudan as the date for southern secession approaches are slowing international trade and risk-taking business, writes Kevin Godier

The World Bank, acting on behalf of the South Sudan Electricity Corporation and the Ministry of Energy and Mining, seeks expressions of interest by 4 April from consultants to draft an electricity sector strategy

Although the exact number of casualties has not been independently confirmed, sources in Abyei said more than 20 people had been killed in fighting between the Dinka and Misseriya. The south claims the Khartoum government instigated the fighting to put pressure on negotiations and undermine the secession referendum process, which will deliver a massive majority in favour of secession.

The Government of Southern Sudan will not compromise in negotiations with the north over the status of Abyei, and is prepared to take up arms again if the impasse continues

Despite a continuing stand-off over the sharing of oil facilities and future of oil-producing blocks along the border, the Government of Southern Sudan is pressing ahead with plans to develop its oil sector. South Sudan’s oil sector is both the most critical and the most contentious element of its economic future. According to BP’s latest statistical review of world energy, Sudan produced an average 490,000 b/d in 2009, and at year-end had proven reserves of 6.7bn bbls. An estimated 75% of known oil reserves are in South Sudan,

African Energy has seen an early copy of the investors’ guide to the new mining bill, which is due to be published by the Ministry of Energy and Mining at the end of January and distributed to companies.

The government is optimistic that a new mining bill will soon attract investment to help develop the country’s minerals potential and is drawing up model contracts and licences. Despite strong indications of high prospectivity for metals and minerals in South Sudan, a lack of data has meant that their potential has remained unrealised. But, according to senior officials at the Ministry of Energy and Mining....