Archive for the 'Darfur' Category

Sudanese leaders are holding our beloved Coca-Cola hostage

Sudan’s ambassador to the United States reacted angrily to the news that the US will tighten trade sanctions on his country. Ambassador John Ukec Lueth Ukec, also known as Kartoum Karl, denied that Sudan is engaged in genocide, and asserted that no-one is dying in the Darfur region. Such denials are outrageous, of course, coming from the most murderous regime on the planet. But then the ambassador went too far (video):

The good and peaceful leaders of Sudan were prepared to retaliate massively: They would cut off shipments of the emulsifier gum arabic, thereby depriving the world of cola.

“I want you to know that the gum arabic which runs all the soft drinks all over the world, including the United States, mainly 80 percent is imported from my country,” the ambassador said after raising a bottle of Coca-Cola.

A reporter asked if Sudan was threatening to “stop the export of gum arabic and bring down the Western world.”

“I can stop that gum arabic and all of us will have lost this,” Khartoum Karl warned anew, beckoning to the Coke bottle.

Here’s the way I look at it:

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Jay McGinley is arrested outside White House for demanding action on Darfur, 9/9/06

Meanwhile, the suffering continues

Since May 14, 2006, Jay McGinley has led dozens of activists in a heroic hunger strike to protest the ongoing genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan. He and his fellow strikers eat no more than 1,000 calories per day, and hope to force the international community to deal more directly with Sudan’s government.

McGinley reckons that the United Nations and the European Union can be forced to confront the Sudanese government more directly and more forcefully if he can convince thousands of activists to join his hunger strike (for updates, see McGinley’s website, Darfur Dying for Heroes, also linked in my blogroll under “organizations”).

It’s important to understand that when McGinley says he advocates more forceful action, he isn’t talking about airstrikes against Sudan, or an invasion of the country. The idea is to save lives, so the goal must be accomplished using the minimum level of violence that is necessary. As fellow activist Alex de Waal points out, empty threats of military action only serve to undermine efforts to stop the genocide:

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Alex de Waal of the African Union mediation team

Minni Arcua Minnawi, leader of Darfur’s largest rebel faction (the Sudan Liberation Army), accepted a modified version of the peace agreement offered by the government of Sudan. Negotiators must now present the modified agreement to the Sudan government for approval. Leaders of two other rebel factions walked out of the talks:

“Our people sent us here to bring back their rights,” Abdul Wahad al-Nur, the chief negotiator for one of the factions of the Sudanese Liberation Movement, who later rejected the agreement, said at the villa. “We cannot accept anything less than their minimum rights.”

The agreement includes extensive security provisions, as well as greater representation for the region in the Sudanese government and money for development. The talks were thought to represent the best hope for peace, and came at a critical time, as both rebel forces and pro-government militias have extensively re-armed.

A measure of how crucial the talks were is the fact that many nations sent negotiators from high up in their foreign ministries. For example, the US sent Robert Zoellick, who is the second ranking member of the State Department and considered by some to be the department’s best negotiator. Alex de Waal, of the African Union mediation team, stressed the importance of this round of talks in an open letter released yesterday:

All those who believe in peace for Darfur will ask ourselves whether we did enough to bring it about, and the needless deaths that occur will scar our consciences. Today is the day.

De Waal gave an overview of the negotians in an interview for NPR, available here.

(cross posted at Liberal Avenger)

Abu Shouk refugee camp in Northern Darfur

General Omar Hassan Bashir, ruler of Sudan, formally rejected a United Nations request to send an assessment mission to the Darfur region, in western Sudan. That mission is considered crucial to planning for a 15,000 member peacekeeping force that the U.N. hopes to send in the fall.

The U.N. force would relieve an underequipped 6,000 man African Union force that is currently trying to keep peace in the region. So far, that force has been unable to keep the Janjaweed militia, which is backed by the Sudanese government, from rampaging through the region.

The 3-year-old war has so far left more than 100,000 dead and made refugees of another 2 million. Another conflict continues to simmer in the south of Sudan, and the war has already spilled into neighboring Chad. Rebels in Chad who were captured during a recent uprising have said that they were recruited from refugee camps in eastern Chad and Darfur by Sudanese security forces.

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In Washington, a coalition of 164 humanitarian and religious groups will gather for a massive demonstration to ask for intervention in Darfur. The groups include the National Association of Evangelicals and Amnesty International. Organizers hope to push the Bush administration into pushing more forcefully for a multinational peacekeeping force.

That may be difficult, given the resistance of General Bashir, but the Bush administration was able last year to help broker a tenuous peace in southern Sudan.

My own opinion is that it should be possible, as a last resort option, to scrap the U.N. effort and send a NATO force instead, using Chad as a staging area. But that’s unlikely, given the fact that the Bush administration had to be pushed hard by Evangelical groups to agree to intervene in any capacity in southern Sudan. So the best option remains pressuring the government of Sudan to fulfill its earlier promise to allow U.N. forces into the region.

Are you sure you Blue Helmets are up for this?

The African Union agreed yesterday to hand over peacekeeping responsibilities to the United Nations in the Darfur region of Sudan. The handover is to be completed by Sept. 30.

The African Mission in Sudan (AMIS) was plagued by manpower and funding shortages from the outset of the mission, but it may have been the spread of the conflict to Chad that finally prompted the African Union to agree to the handover. Chad’s border runs along the Darfur region.

Chad stands at the verge of a civil war, and and the 7,800 soldiers of the AMIS would stand little chance of halting an escalation of violence if either Sudanese or Chadian rebel forces began a large-scale campaign across Chad’s border with Sudan.

Chad’s President, Idriss Deby, announced yesterday the dismissal of 70 officers, including two generals and four colonels, who appear to have defected to rebel groups in Eastern Chad and Darfur. Deby himself took power through a rebellion that started in the region, as did his predecessor.

If the shaky ceasefire in place does not hold, it’s unclear whether a U.N. force will be able to keep the peace when it does arrive. The region is already the site of the world’s worst ongoing humanitarian disaster, and estimates of the death toll range from 70,000-350,000. Thousands of acres of land lie fallow as residents flee the conflict, causing a straining of resources and an escalation of tensions. In the near future, the AMIS forces may be reinforced, but only if more money is allotted to the mission by already cash-strapped African nations.

Even so, the commitment by the U.N. gives hope to a shattered region, as it would appear that the world beyond Africa has finally taken notice of the situation, and is now ready to commit resources to begin resolving the conflict.

The fighting in Sudan’s Darfur region that has left at least 70,000 dead and displaced 2 million appears to be spreading into eastern Chad.Rebels from Darfur that have been fighting the Sudanese government have set up bases in Chad, and Sudanese militias pursuing these forces have begun raiding across the border.

Entire villages have been abandoned as residents flee the conflict, creating a humanitarian crisis in the areas to which they relocate. These areas typically do not hae the necessary infrastructure of resources to sustain the new population influx. The New York Times story, along with a multimedia feature that includes a short history of the conflict is here. (note: since publication of the Times piece, it has been corrected. See here.)

The new development is particularly troubling for Chad’s government, as Sudan has a history of incursions and aiding rebels in eastern Chad. Like many African nations, Chad’s history is marked by events in which the government has sent the army to quell a rebellion or border conflict, only to have some units sieze power. Regime changes that originate in unstable areas neighboring countries are not uncommon.