Janjaweed militia kills 3 students in North Darfur capital
Dec 06, 2006 (KHARTOUM) — Pro-government janjaweed militiamen killed three students in one of Darfur’s main towns, where the situation was highly volatile Wednesday, as rebels massed outside the town shaken by protests and riots, a U.N. official in Darfur said.
A coalition of Darfur rebels warned Tuesday it could attack Al Fasher, the capital of North Darfur province, to protect the population from the janjaweed militia that looted the town’s main market a day earlier. A U.N. official said the rebels were gathered about 10 kilometers (6 miles) outside Al Fasher.
“That they take the town is highly unlikely, but we’re preparing for the possibility of a quick raid,” said the official on the telephone. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.
The United Nations evacuated 135 staff, diplomats and aid workers from Al Fashe rby late Tuesday, said Dawn Blalock, the spokeswoman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Sudan.
Other staff could be pulled out if the situation worsened, but the step was not being planned for now, Blalock said.
“Our priority is not to interrupt the humanitarian assistance,” said Blalock. Some 200 U.N. personnel and aid workers remained in Al Fasher, a town of over 200,000 people that is an administrative center for aid agencies, the African Union peacekeeping mission and the Sudanese army. Large refugee camps are also located on the town’s outskirts.
Some civilians and refugees on Wednesday rioted outside the base of African Union peacekeepers on Al Fasher’s outskirts, stoning peacekeepers’ vehicles and burning down shops, a U.N. official said. Refugees have complained the peacekeepers do not do enough to protect them from janjaweed.
Sporadic shooting could be heard in various parts of the city, shops and schools were closed and the Sudanese army had heavily deployed in the town, the official said.
The worsening situation in Al Fasher underscores the increasing violence in Darfur, where more than 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million driven from their homes since 2003. The government is accused of unleashing the janjaweed — Arab tribal fighters — to help it put down the rebellion by ethnic Africans, and the janjaweed are blamed for widespread atrocities against civilians.
The Sudanese military transported janjaweed fighters into North Darfur to help in an offensive against rebels launched in the fall, observers say. The janjaweed recently moved into Al Fasher.
But it was not clear how much control the army had over them, U.N. and aid workers in the town said. There have been several incidents were the militia clashed with the regular government forces.
Violence broke out on Monday when janjaweed fighters looted an Al Fasher cattle market and then clashed with former rebels of the Sudan Liberation Movement, killing two and losing two of their own men, the AU peacekeeping mission to Darfur said.
SLM leader Minni Minawi, who is the only rebel leader to sign a peace deal with Khartoum and is now part of the government, set an ultimatum for Khartoum to rein in the janjaweed by the end of December. Khartoum denies backing the militia, but agreed to disarm them under the May peace deal.
Late Tuesday, janjaweed attacked students from Al Fasher’s university, killing one. On Wednesday, two students in a group demonstrating against the assault were also slain by janjaweed, an aid worker and an U.N. official in Al Fasher said, on conditions of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.
U.N. staff and aid workers were also largely evacuating zones of eastern Chad close to the border with Darfur. The evacuations threaten to leave more than half of the 200,000 Darfur refugees living in Chad without humanitarian assistance, the U.N. refugee UNHCR said.
(AP)