FEATURE-Accused Darfur militia leader says turns to peace

By Opheera McDoom

KABKABIYAH, Sudan, May 19 (Reuters) – A tall figure with a slight pot belly, Musa Hilal clambers off the stallion he was racing, puffing with exertion and sneezing from the dust his antics had kicked up.

Musa Hilal, an Arab tribal chief accused by the United States of leading a dreaded militia in Darfur, addresses a crowd of villagers at his north Darfur home area in Mistiriyha, Sudan, May 10, 2005. (Reuters) .

“My body’s not quite what it used to be. I’m out of shape,” admits the man the United States accuses of leading a Sudanese government-allied Arab militia behind a campaign of rape and murder in the Darfur region.

The powerful tribal leader denies those charges and says far from being a warrior, he is now on a mission of peace.

Hilal, who heads Darfur’s largest Arab tribe, has been in the capital Khartoum for nine months for talks to try to heal a rebellion that is well into its third year by mostly non-Arab rebels against the central government.

He is now back home, not riding a horse or a camel, but in a white land cruiser, saying he wants to promote peace and reconciliation between all tribes throughout the troubled remote west.

The government-sponsored initiative is still in its early stages but has been welcomed in both Arab and non-Arab villages in Hilal’s home region of northern Darfur.

“We need to repair our home from within,” Hilal said. “This is something only the sons of Darfur can do.”

Although he says the roads are safe in Darfur now, he travels with a truck full of army soldiers, armed with a machine gun. He also has a bodyguard and carries a Kalashnikov in the back of his vehicle.

“There are so many weapons in Darfur,” Hilal said. “There’s not one tribe which does not have armed elements.”

REBELS AND MILITIAS

Tens of thousands of people have been killed in the fighting in Darfur between rebels and Khartoum’s armed forces and allied militias, known as Janjaweed.

More than 2 million have fled their homes, mostly from non-Arab tribes. Tensions between Arab nomads and non-Arab farmers still run high in the vast, arid region.

The United States has Hilal at the top of a list of leaders of the Janjaweed militias accused of war crimes in Darfur. The International Criminal Court in The Hague is investigating the war and U.N. sources say Hilal is a suspect.

Rights groups accuse him of being the top coordinator for recruiting the feared Arab militias and cite eyewitness reports placing him at the scene of at least one battle during the conflict.

They say he no longer directly leads the militias drawn from the tribes, but that he surely still had an influence over them.

“I suspect that his role has diminished because he’s too notorious and well-known now, but I’m sure that he still has some level of influence,” said Leslie Lefkow, a researcher for Human Rights Watch.

Last week, a senior U.N. official said Arab fighters are still targeting civilians in Darfur and that rape, kidnapping and banditry increased in April.

Hilal denies any involvement in such atrocities, and says he answered a government call to recruit popular defence forces to fight the rebels but that he never went to any battles.

“I don’t feel I am a criminal,” said Hilal, 44. “The rebels are the cause of the war.”

He was elected chief of the Rizeigat Muhameid tribe when he was 23, taking the mantle from his father who died aged 111. The tribe is estimated to number hundreds of thousands of people, who pay a form of tax to him.

“MIDDLE OF THE ROAD MUSLIM”

Hilal, who is in favour of Islamic law or sharia, describes himself as a middle of the road Muslim and a sufi, giving money to those who ask and listening to those who have grievances. His people show him respect and lower their eyes to greet him.

“The sheikh is the symbol of the tribe, the face of the tribe,” he said, wearing traditional white robes and turban and carrying a staff made of treated bamboo.

He married three times but divorced his second wife over “normal marital differences”. One wife lives in Khartoum with his two youngest children and one with whom he has eight children stays in Darfur.

“My father always used to say: only take three wives and keep the fourth spot open for negotiation. If they give you any trouble, then you can always say; take care, or I’ll fill the empty fourth spot,” he said.

Hilal, who has a calm authoritative air, treats guests with traditional Sudanese hospitality at his Darfur home decorated in characteristic Bedouin style.

But he is a stickler for punctuality, unusual in this hot, laid-back country, and will leave if a visitor is late for a meeting.

Driving through the great expanse of empty land in underdeveloped Darfur, coming upon the odd isolated village, he said: “If they only came together and made one large school and a bigger town, that would be so much more progressive for them.

“But people here can be backward. They stay because their grandfather founded the village, rather than moving forward.”

He says Darfur rebels and the government need a political solution to the conflict, using the route of African Union- sponsored talks. But, he says, the tribal leadership could help end the banditry and other violence in Darfur by identifying and capturing those responsible.

He sings along to the music of his favourite artist, the leftist Sudanese Nubian Mohamed Wardy, whom he calls a great nationalist: “The homeland is expensive. You can go and buy gold from the market, but you cannot buy a homeland.”

Hilal, who thinks he would have gone to university had he not become sheikh, says he is keen to learn English and understand more about the world. But he dislikes the United States, which he sees as controlling the United Nations and global politics.

“International law is just practised against small and weak states. But we are not weak in Sudan — let them try to come and we will show them,” he declared.