**Sudan’s president is due to sign a ceasefire with Darfur rebel group, the Justice and Equality Movement (Jem).**The framework agreement includes an outline deal on the sharing of power “at all levels”.
It is being seen as an important step towards peace, though the other main rebel group has refused to enter talks.
But, ahead of the signing, Jem was reported to have warned it was unlikely a final peace accord would be signed by mid-March, ahead of elections.
“After the agreement is signed, the rest will come through more negotiations,” Adrees Mahmoud, a Europe-based representative of the group said, according to Reuters.
He added that it was too early to say if the target of a final binding agreement by March - one of the clauses of the ceasefire deal - would be met.
ANALYSIS
James Copnall, BBC News, Khartoum
The Justice and Equality Movement is perhaps the strongest of the Darfur rebel groups.Two years ago they shocked Sudan by attacking Omdurman, across the Nile from the capital Khartoum. Jem has not looked like matching that feat since, but the ceasefire between it and the government can only help improve stability in Darfur.
The framework agreement, which lays out the issues for talks, is also welcome in its detail. It is clearly a consequence of the rapprochement between Chad and Sudan.
Chadian President Idriss Deby is widely believed to have supported Jem, perhaps in part because Jem’s fighters are from his Zaghawa ethnic group. Last month President Deby visited Khartoum, and both sides agreed to stop supporting each other’s rebels.
But no peace agreement can be conclusive without the Sudan Liberation Army-AbdulWahid faction. At the moment this other strong rebel group is refusing to talk to the government.
Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir is due to sign the accord in Qatar, where it was brokered in negotiations by neighbouring Chad. Sudan says Chad has backed and armed Jem.
According to the text of the accord, obtained by the BBC, the rebel group will constitute a political party after the signing of a final agreement.
The text also specifies that changes in the administration of the Darfur region will form part of the final accord and that death sentences imposed on 100 Jem fighters will be cancelled.
According to the BBC’s James Copnall, in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, the deal is a major breakthrough.
The power-sharing agreement, our correspondent adds, has shaken the political establishment.
Two years ago, the Darfur rebel group took its fight to the heart of the country, attacking the city of Omdurman, where parliament sits.
The government said that more than 200 people were killed in the attack and sentenced more than 100 Jem fighters to death by hanging for their involvement.
The seven-year war between forces loyal to the government and rebels in Darfur has lost intensity in recent years.
But the UN estimates 300,000 died in the worst years of the conflict. Some 2.5 million people are still displaced.