West Sudan rebels say government air raid kills 25
By Opheera McDoom
CAIRO, Dec 11 (Reuters) – Sudanese rebels said on Thursday the government had killed 25 people in an air raid in a poor western region, where analysts say growing conflict threatens a peace deal to end two decades of civil war in the south.
The Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), one of two main rebel groups in Africa’s largest country that started a revolt in Darfur in February, said a plane bombed civilians for 15 minutes on Wednesday morning.
“Civilians had escaped an area where there was a battle…and the government plane followed them and bombed them,” said Abu Bakr Hamid al-Nur, general coordinator for JEM.
Government officials were not available to comment.
The strife in west Sudan has been largely overshadowed by an impending peace deal being negotiated in Kenya to end the war in the south that has killed about two million people. But analysts warn the western conflict could undermine a Kenya deal.
“Here is another civil war in Sudan…It is potentially very disruptive,” said a U.N. official, who declined to be named.
JEM said last week they killed about 700 government troops and pro-government militia fighters in the area north of government-held Kebkabiya in Northern Darfur state.
An aid worker who recently visited the area said reports were widespread of a large battle with hundreds killed and the government side “coming off worse”. He said travel outside main towns was almost impossible, making verification difficult.
Analysts say that the numbers of dead seemed improbably high, but were not impossible. Militias attack riding camels and horses rather than armed forces in vehicles.
HUMANITARIAN CRISIS
Britain’s Secretary of State for International Development Hilary Benn visiting Khartoum said humanitarian access to Darfur was urgently needed as the situation was “extremely grave”.
Aid agencies say the government sometimes hinders access to potentially safe working areas.
Ben Parker, spokesman for the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator in Sudan, told Reuters more than 600,000 had been displaced by the conflict, with 75,000 refugees fleeing to Chad.
“Here are the ingredients of a very serious humanitarian crisis,” Parker said, adding the U.N. had temporarily withdrawn its staff from government-held Geneina, near the Chad border.
He said the conflict affected one million of a regional population of 5.9 million people, according to a 2001 consensus.
Peace talks between Khartoum and the other main Darfur-based rebel group, the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) that signed a ceasefire with Khartoum in September, were due to restart in Chad on Wednesday but were delayed after government complaints of truce violations.
JEM, which accuses the government of marginalising Darfur, has not signed a truce with Khartoum.
In the Kenya talks, the Khartoum government and the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) expect to sign a framework peace deal in the next two weeks and a more comprehensive agreement early next year, sources at the talks said on Thursday.