S.Sudan has enough forex for 6 months despite conflict -minister

South Sudan's foreign exchange reserves can last for six months and the currency has been more resilient than the government expected, the finance minister, said after a conflict that erupted in December but had limited impact on oil output.
   As part of efforts to restore battered donor confidence in Africa's newest nation, the government is also reviewing the state payroll to ensure wages are not paid to "ghost" workers, or those who don't turn up, Aggrey Tisa Sabuni told Reuters.
   The conflict erupted in the capital, Juba, and briefly affected some oil fields forcing a modest cut in production, but those two main drivers of the economy were left largely unscathed. Oil accounts for 98 percent of government revenues.
   The fighting between backers of President Salva Kiir and those loyal to the vice president he fired in July, Riek Machar, quickly spread across the nation that won independence from Sudan in 2011.
   Thousands were killed and more than half a million fled their homes during five weeks of fighting until a shaky ceasefire was agreed between the government and rebels on Jan. 23. Peace talks resume on Monday, despite sporadic clashes.
   Although the economy has held up better than expected, the finance minister said in a weekend interview that much depended on the pace of progress in negotiations taking place in Addis Ababa.
   "If the ceasefire holds, the peace talks progress very rapidly, whatever has happened over the last seven weeks will be a very unfortunate gap but can very easily be bridged," he said. "If it drags on then definitely the investors we had expected to come will not come back."
   The government had started to rebuild foreign reserves in the second half of 2013 after oil production resumed following a more than year-long shutdown.
   Juba was also drawing more investment interest, hosting a well-attended investor conference in December, days before soldiers clashed around the capital.
   "The foreign reserves of South Sudan have not been affected by the current crisis. Before the crisis the foreign reserves of the country had steadily built up," the minister said.
   Oil fields were a target in the fighting but output dropped only modestly - by a fifth to about 200,000 barrels per day.
   Oil firms in South Sudan include China National Petroleum Corp, India's ONGC Videsh and Malaysia's Petronas. Work in some fields has been suspended.