Former Darfur rebels commited to peace after clash
April 1, 2007 ( KHARTOUM) — Former Darfur rebels said on Sunday they were committed to a peace deal signed last year with the government despite clashes last month that killed at least 10 people and threatened the agreement.
Mustafa Teeyrab, secretary-general of the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) blamed the violence on what he called a small group of police who intended to sabotage the deal with his group, the only rebel faction to make peace with Khartoum.
“There is no way we will stray from peace because it is a choice. There is no way that any trouble will make us turn away from peace,” he told a news conference.
Eight SLM members and two Sudanese police officers were killed in the clashes in the city of Omdurman, on the west bank of the Nile opposite Sudan’s capital.
The SLM had said the peace could collapse if the government did not meet its demands in negotiations after the fighting.
Teeyrab said he was sure the government would abide by an agreement under which it would turn over the bodies of SLM members killed in the fighting and release members of the group who were arrested.
The government has handed back the SLM headquarters, which security forces had surrounded after the clashes.
“There were some policemen who do not like the peace agreement. They are trying to make problems and instigate,” said Teeyrab. “A small group of policemen were responsible.”
After last year’s peace deal, SLM leader Minni Arcua Minnawi became senior assistant to the president with special responsibilities for Darfur.
But he has complained the dominant National Congress Party (NCP) lacks political will to implement peace.
Experts estimate 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million driven from their homes in Darfur to miserable camps in four years of rape, killing and pillage. Washington calls the violence genocide, a term Khartoum rejects.
Rebels and residents say nomadic Janjaweed militias backed by the government carry out widespread abuses but the government calls them outlaws and says it has no links to the militias.
(Reuters)