South Sudan said Saturday it will not arrest Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir, wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes, during an upcoming visit to the newly independent nation.

South Sudan said fears by former civil war foe Sudan that Bashir would be arrested when he visits Juba on April 3 were unfounded as he had been invited by his southern counterpart Salva Kiir.

Negotiators are finalizing a joint U.N., Arab League and African Union plan for aid to Sudan's war-torn South Kordofan, where food shortages have sparked global concern, sources said on Thursday.

Hollywood actor George Clooney highlighted the issue last week when he and several Congress members were arrested outside Khartoum's Washington embassy demanding an end to a Sudanese offensive they fear will cause thousands to starve.

Actor George Clooney and several members of the U.S. Congress were handcuffed and arrested Friday outside Sudan's embassy as they demanded an end to an offensive they fear will cause a humanitarian crisis.

Swarmed by flashing cameras and TV crews, Clooney led more than one dozen prominent campaigners to the steps of Sudan's mission in Washington's Embassy Row, ignoring several warnings by police to leave the premises.

The latest week-long round of talks between Sudan and South Sudan has ended without any deal on the contentious issues of disputed border areas and oil revenue sharing, mediators said Tuesday.

The two parties did agree that their respective presidents, Omar al-Bashir of Sudan and his southern counterpart Salva Kiir, would meet at a summit to be held in South Sudan's capital Juba "quite soon", lead mediator Thabo Mbeki told reporters here, without elaborating on the date.

Fierce ethnic clashes over cattle rustling killed more than 200 people in South Sudan at the weekend, and hundreds more were abducted in the troubled fledgling nation, a state governor said Monday.

The latest attacks appear to be reprisals for a wave of ethnic violence and cattle raids in the same area in January when an 8,000-strong militia razed villages and massacred people in their wake.

South Sudan accused former foe Sudan on Friday of holding 35,000 Southerners as "slaves," stalling talks to resolve to furious oil dispute as tensions remain high between the two neighbors.

"There is unfortunately a disagreement, because the government of Sudan refused the inclusion of the freedom of about 35,000 South Sudanese enslaved citizens," South Sudan's chief negotiator Pagan Amum told Agence France Presse.

The U.N. Security Council on Tuesday demanded an end to border attacks and hostilities between Sudan and South Sudan in a forceful warning to the rivals to ease mounting tensions.

Amid widespread predictions that the two countries, which separated in July last year, could be headed for a new conflict, the council also demanded Sudan authorities allow humanitarian access to two conflict-stricken states.

Bloody civil war in Sudan's South Kordofan border state risks becoming as brutal as the conflict in its western region of Darfur, a rights group official and former U.N. chief in Sudan said Tuesday.

Government aircraft regularly bomb civilians in the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan, actions "tantamount to war crimes," said Mukesh Kapila, of the Aegis Trust, a British-based rights group which campaigns against genocide.

The walls of the former Shebab base in Baidoa, Somalia, are littered with rudimentary drawings of machine guns and tanks, a note reading "Fear God, don't write on these walls" and a sketch of an al-Qaida flag, homage to the rebel group's international allies.

The crumbling building is now occupied by Ethiopian troops who nearly two weeks ago forced Shebab rebels out of Baidoa, their former Shebab stronghold and Somalia's third-largest city. It is the second time Ethiopia has occupied Baidoa after pulling out of Somalia in 2009 following a bloody two-year war.

An International Criminal Court warrant issued against Sudan's defense minister means "nothing" and Khartoum does not care about the decision, the foreign ministry said on Thursday.

The reaction came after the Hague-based court said it has issued an arrest warrant for Defense Minister Abdel Rahim Mohammed Hussein, for alleged crimes against the civilian population in Sudan's western region of Darfur.