Darfur rebel groups deny Chad attack, finger Sudan’s militia

Sept 27, 2005 (ABUJA) — Two rebel groups fighting in the western Sudan’s Darfur region said Tuesday that their forces were not involved in a deadly cross-border raid into Chad and pointed the finger at government-backed militiamen.

Earlier, Chadian authorities had said that “armed and uniformed horsemen from Sudan” had massacred 36 villagers before clashing with security forces.

Ahmed Tugod, a spokesman for the rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), said: “We heard of the development in Chad but we had nothing to do with it. The Janjaweed must have been reponsible for the killings.”

The Janjaweed is a mounted Arab militia which has been deployed by the Sudanese government against the JEM and an allied rebel group, the Sudanese Liberation Movement (SLM), and which has been accused of carrying out unprovoked attacks on civilians.

SLM spokesman Abdurahman Musa said: “We don’t have any information about the incident, but we don’t attack civilians let alone Chadian villagers.”

Both rebel spokesmen were in the Nigerian capital Abuja, where they are attending African Union-sponsored peace talks with the Khartoum government. AU and government officials were not immediately available for comment.

(AFP/ST)