With the next phase of Sudan's peace negotiations due to resume in early January 2003, the International Crisis Group has urged both the Khartoum government and the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) to prepare for compromise to end almost two decades of war. The last round of peace talks, which ended on 18 November 2002, made significant progress but a final protocol on sharing political power and Sudan's considerable oil wealth was not signed, and the late re-emergence of harder line elements on both sides was "worrying".