<P> The Second Sudanese Civil War was a conflict from 1983 to 2005 between the central Sudanese government and the Sudan People's Liberation Army . It was largely a continuation of the First Sudanese Civil War of 1955 to 1972 . Although it originated in southern Sudan, the civil war spread to the Nuba mountains and Blue Nile . It lasted for 22 years and is one of the longest civil wars on record . The war resulted in the independence of South Sudan six years after the war ended . </P> <P> Roughly two million people died as a result of war, famine and disease caused by the conflict . Four million people in southern Sudan were displaced at least once (and normally repeatedly) during the war . The civilian death toll is one of the highest of any war since World War II and was marked by a large number of human rights violations . These include slavery and mass killings . </P> <P> The Sudanese war is often characterized as a fight between the central government expanding and dominating peoples of the periphery, raising allegations of marginalization . Kingdoms and great powers based along the Nile River have fought against the people of inland Sudan for centuries . Since at least the 18th century, central governments have attempted to regulate and exploit the undeveloped southern and inland Sudan . </P> <P> Some sources describe the conflict as an ethnoreligious one where the Muslim central government's pursuits to impose sharia law on non-Muslim southerners led to violence, and eventually to the civil war . Douglas Johnson has pointed to an exploitative governance as the root cause . </P>

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