The Sudanese government and rebels in Sudan's Darfur region wrapped up the second day of peace talks early Tuesday as the dicey issue of power and wealth sharing shall come to the fore in the coming days.

Tuesday's talks between the two sides lasted less than an hour in the morning in Abuja, capital of Nigeria, as delegates of one of the two rebel groups in Darfur, the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM), came late and asked for more time to consult.

Ahmed Tugod, spokesman for the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), another rebel group in the region, who spoke to Xinhua after the session was adjourned, said Wednesday shall witness a "declaration of principles."

"It's better to focus on, immediately, to the political issue we are looking for ... we want to make a breakthrough," Tugod said.

"Already, we have formed a committee to settle the issue of security ... so that we can fully focus on the political issue as it is the main issue."

He said that the talks were now focused on the political issue,because the first round, which ran between Aug. 23 and Sept. 17, concentrated on humanitarian and security issues but "took a lot of time and ended in a deadlock."

The JEM spokesman said that the political talks were sure to push the process of talks forward as all sides had showed that they had open minds.

Earlier, spokesman for the government delegation, Ibrahim Mohammed Ibrahim, told Xinhua that the Sudanese government was prepared to share power and wealth.

"We have no problem at all over power sharing. We have agreed and adopted that under the Sudanese federal system," he said.

"Darfur is part of Sudan, so whatever is in Sudan shall be shared by all in Sudan."

The African Union (AU), which brokered the ongoing talks, has initially hoped that both sides could quickly complete and sign a humanitarian protocol agreed in last month's talks, which covers refugee protection and aid deliveries.

The rebels, however, insisted they were not ready for further talks on the humanitarian issue, claiming that any agreement on it would only be a paper work unless the causes, power and wealth sharing, were resolved.

"But we on our side consider the humanitarian issue very essential to the situation in Darfur. It is the only way to bring relief to the people in the crisis area," Ibrahim noted.

On Monday, the Sudanese government announced two newly emerged Darfur rebel groups could be allowed in the talks, but conditioned their participation on the approval of the AU.

Foreign Minister Mustafa Othman Ismail said in a statement that his government is collecting information about these two movements, including their size, whether they have military existence in Darfur and the reasons behind their appearance at this moment.

The AU and UN officials, however, said the emergence of the two rebel groups could complicate international peace efforts in the region. The two groups might be behind a series of armed attacks against government caravans and aid workers in Darfur, they said.

So far, there has been no word on the precise length of this round of talks, but Tugod of the rebel JEM said Tuesday that it might last two to three weeks.

The talks are another effort by the AU to solve African problems by Africans. The 53-member bloc has made headway into resolving the Darfur conflict since a summit in Ethiopia in July, but the process remained slow.

On Monday, an AU official said the organization would start deploying reinforcements for a peace monitoring operation into Darfur region by the end of this month.

Earlier, the AU Peace and Security Council has agreed to send more than 3,000 extra troops, drawn from Nigeria and Rwanda, to help restore security in Darfur and monitor a faltering truce between rebels and government forces there.

The AU has deployed some 300 soldiers to the Darfur region to protect about 150 observers, who are monitoring a ceasefire reached in April between Khartoum and Darfur rebel groups.

Clashes flared up in February 2003 between a militia force known as Janjaweed and locals over scarce resources in the barren western Sudanese region of Darfur.

The two rebel groups, the SLM and JEM, took up arms to fight the Janjaweed, which was believed to be responsible for killings and looting. They also accused the government of years of negligence and unfair allocation of resources.

Source: Xinhua