South Sudan’s presidential advisor on security affairs, Tut Gatluak, received Monday at Juba Airport Sudanese officials, who had arrived on an official visit to Juba.

Lieutenant General Shamseddin al-Kabbashi, a member of Sudan’s ruling Transitional Sovereign Council, is leading a high-level delegation including ministers of foreign affairs and defense.

The visiting Sudanese delegation is scheduled to meet the peace partners to discuss the challenges facing the implementation of the 2018 peace agreement.

Sudan is the current chair of the East African regional block IGAD and one of the guarantors of the South Sudan peace agreement.

The visit of the Sudanese delegation comes two days after the meeting between South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir and his First Vice President Riek Machar ended with no resolution amid an ongoing stalemate over Kiir's dismissal of the defense minister recently.

Kiir also swapped the defense ministry set for Machar's party to his party and handed Machar the interior ministry, in a move that goes against the terms of the peace deal.

The deal gives parties the power to remove their representatives from the council of ministers and nominate replacements by notifying Kiir.