Rebel SLM’s Nur will not sign Darfur deal
May 15, 2006 (ABUJA) — A rebel leader from Sudan’s Darfur region will not bow to intense international pressure to sign a peace agreement by Monday’s deadline because the government has rejected his conditions, a close adviser said.
However, Abdelwahid Mohamed al-Nur of the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) wanted to keep trying to make a deal with Khartoum and talks looked set to continue beyond the deadline because diplomats were desperate to gain wider support for the accord.
Nur rejected the peace settlement signed on May 5 by the Sudanese government and rival SLA factional leader Minni Arcua Minnawi to end a conflict that has killed tens of thousands.
Refugees have rioted against the agreement in several Darfur camps and students from the region have protested in the capital Khartoum. The violence has killed at least two people and heightened fears the war would continue despite the accord.
Nur argued the violence showed the peace agreement did not meet the aspirations of the people of Darfur, and therefore he was right to insist on more concessions from Khartoum.
“The situation in Darfur today is grave and dangerous. The people of Darfur have expressed their views clearly,” he wrote in a letter to the African Union (AU), which brokered the deal.
“There is much in the text that we find worthy and which we can agree with. However … the position of the SLA remains that the Darfur peace agreement … fails to address several important fundamental demands of the people of Darfur,” he said.
Nur’s demands include greater compensation from Khartoum to Darfur war victims, more political posts for the SLA and greater SLA involvement in the security of internal refugees returning home and in the disarmament of pro-government militias.
KHARTOUM REJECTS OFFER
He wanted the government to meet his key demands in an annex accord, after which he would sign the broader peace deal. Close adviser Ibrahim Madibo said the government rejected the idea.
“We received a response from the Sudanese government and it was not positive enough for us to go ahead and sign,” he said.
The SLA and smaller rebel group the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) took up arms in early 2003 accusing the Arab-dominated central government of neglecting Darfur, an ethnically mixed region the size of France in western Sudan.
Khartoum backed militias known as Janjaweed, drawn from Arab tribes, to crush the rebellion. The ensuing campaign of murder, looting, rape and arson has driven more than 2 million from their homes into refugee camps in Darfur and neighbouring Chad.
Nur is weak militarily but his endorsement of the agreement is important because he is a member of the Fur tribe, Darfur’s largest. His rival Minnawi has more fighters but he is from the smaller Zaghawa ethnic group.
The JEM has also rejected the peace accord, but observers say this is less of a problem because the group has few fighters left in Darfur and its constituency is small.
The AU had set a meeting of its Peace and Security Council in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa on Monday as a deadline for any new signature.
In his letter, Nur asked the AU for more help in trying to bridge the gap between him and the government. Diplomats said the AU was likely to accept as it did not want to give up hope of seeing Nur sign the accord.
Nur’s next move will depend on the communique that will be released at the end of the AU meeting, Madibo said.
(Reuters)