Egypt celebrates fifty years of independence for Sudan
Egypt Celebrates Fifty Years of Independence for Sudan:
Sudanese refugees massacred by Egyptian Police;
Egyptian Foreign Ministry declares enthusiastic support for Khartoum as site of AU, Arab League summits
By Eric Reeves
Jan 3, 2006 — There are many perspectives from which to view the 50th anniversary of Sudan’s independence from Anglo-Egyptian condominium rule (1898-January 1, 1956). One of the most telling was provided in Cairo last week, as thousands of Egyptian police brutally assaulted some 2,500-3,000 refugees who had camped across from the offices of the UN High Commission for Refugees. Extraordinary violence—including violence against young children and women—has been reported. There is no reliable casualty report, in part because Egyptian security forces are not returning the dead to their families. But the Cairo representative of the southern Sudan People’s Liberation Movement has reported, on behalf of the SPLM Committee in Cairo, the results of a canvassing of area hospitals:
– 180 dead at Giza Hospital
– 27 dead at Zeinhom Hospital
– 35 dead at Manshiet Bakry Hospital
– 23 dead at Kasr El Ein Hospital
This represents a total of 265 dead; the Egyptian regime is cleaving to a figure about a tenth of this. There is no authoritative independent casualty figure, nor will this repressive regime allow for such. Indeed, the first step toward ensuring that the we will never know the full truth is Egypt’s “preparation to deport some 600 Sudanese [who were] part of a group of nearly 2,000 people detained after police broke up a protest in Cairo, a Sudan official said Monday” (Agence France-Presse [Khartoum], January 2, 2006). In a striking understatement, AFP also reports that “human rights groups have expressed concern for the safety of those [Sudanese] being returned.” For of course the vast majority of those being deported are marginalized Sudanese citizens, most without good command of Arabic, all of whom will be utterly at the mercy of Khartoum’s brutal security services when they are deported back to Sudan. (Egypt officially declared today that it would deport 645 Sudanese refugees.)
But Egypt’s role in Sudan’s history deserves more attention than will be occasioned by this particularly vicious moment. Those interested in a political history of the period from independence to the 1989 military coup by the National Islamic Front can do no better than Peter Woodward’s fine “Sudan, 1898-1989: The Unstable State” (1989).
An especially telling episode in the latter part of this history is the Jonglei Canal, a huge hydro-construction project in Upper Nile Province of southern Sudan, backed enthusiastically by Egypt. The canal was designed to alter the course of the White Nile as it passes through the enormous, largely swampy area in southern Sudan known as the Sudd.
The Jonglei Canal would have straightened the White Nile at this point, diminishing the large amount of water that evaporates during the present meandering course of the river. This would have had the effect of providing Egypt with more water, although it is important to bear in mind that about 80% of Egypt’s Nile water comes from the Blue Nile, which does not pass through southern Sudan. Lost in the collaboration between the Nimeiri regime in Khartoum and Cairo was the environmental devastation that would have occurred in the lands of the indigenous populations, primarily the Nuer but also the Shilluk and Dinka, whose lives and livelihoods are governed by the annual flooding of the White Nile. The Jonglei Canal was quite simply one of the most ecologically irresponsible “development” projects ever proposed. Egyptian enthusiasm for the project is a perfect measure of the contempt, in particular racial contempt, felt by those who rule from Cairo and still see all of Sudan as a quasi-colony.
The digging and building of the Jonglei Canal was well underway in 1983, when a resumption of civil war forced suspension of the project. But the very substantial dredging of the Sudd that had been accomplished at the time would not be nearly as difficult to re-dig on resumption of the project, and there can be little doubt that the current NIF regime cares no more about the terrible disruption to the ecology of the region than Cairo does. If war re-ignites in the south—an all too distinct possibility—and Khartoum seizes control of the oil regions and other parts of Upper Nile Province, the Jonglei Canal project will almost certainly resume.
More recently Egypt attempted to subvert diplomatic progress in the north/south peace negotiations, part of a larger regional strategy that entailed ensuring the NIF regime retained its tyrannical control over all of Sudan. The so-called “Libyan-Egyptian Peace Initiative” of 2000 was nothing more than a transparent diplomatic ploy to undermine the peace process then stumbling along under the weak auspices of IGAD. Eventually the leadership of this consortium of East African countries was strengthened, and with the assistance of Western diplomatic muscle (especially that of the US, the UK, and Norway), IGAD was finally able to achieve a peace agreement, exactly a year ago.
But IGAD was the essential vehicle, primarily because Khartoum had committed to negotiate with the SPLM—through IGAD—on the basis of the so-called “Declaration of Principles.” Key among these “Principles” was the right of southern self-determination, which was embodied in the historic Machakos Protocol of July 2002. What has been largely forgotten in the wake of eventual success in the negotiations that proceeded from the Machakos agreement on southern self-determination—including the essential right to vote for secession—was the fierce opposition voiced by Egypt.
Throughout the balance of the summer in 2002, Cairo spared no opportunity to condemn, indeed excoriate the Machakos Protocol; this very public criticism eventually came directly from the office of President Hosni Mubarak. In short, Egypt was condemning, as a matter of official foreign policy, a breakthrough diplomatic agreement that was the necessary condition for any real progress toward a peace agreement for Sudan, which had been war with itself almost constantly since independence.
Egypt’s cynical and contemptuous regard for Sudan, especially southern Sudan, continues to this day—and goes a long way toward explaining the murderous assault on bereft and desperate Sudanese refugees in Cairo last week. We may in this context also see more clearly into what lies behind Cairo’s enthusiastic support for Khartoum as the site of both African Union (January 2006) and Arab League (March 2006) summits. MENA, the Egyptian regime’s news service, reports:
“Ambassador Masum Marzuq, the director of [the Sudan] Department at the Egyptian Foreign Ministry, affirmed Cairo’s full support of Sudan’s hosting of the coming African and Arab summits. According to the Egyptian MENA, in a press conference at the end of his visit to Khartoum, Marzuq said the formation of a transitional government in Sudan, signing the Naivasha peace accord last year, and Sudan’s independence 50 years ago are all elements which assert the importance of holding both summits in Khartoum.” (MENA, December 24, 2005)
The Sudan Tribune (December 17, 2005) had earlier reported on the decisive approval of the Arab League summit in Khartoum by former Egyptian foreign minister, and now Arab League chief, Amr Moussa:
“The next Arab summit will be held in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, next March [2006], said a top Arab League official here Saturday. Ahmad bin Hali, assistant secretary general for political affairs, said in a press statement [ ] that Arab League chief Amr Moussa would visit Sudan next month to have a close look at final preparations for the summit.”
Amr Moussa continues to represent Cairo’s foreign policy priorities from within the Arab League. His diplomatic stance on the Arab League summit venue is dictated by Cairo’s determination that the tyrannical Khartoum regime face no serious international diplomatic pressure; the presence of both AU and Arab League summits in Khartoum serves precisely this goal by legitimizing the National Islamic Front security cabal. Cairo regards the NIF regime as the most pliable, the most cynical—and, crucially, the best means of undermining any possibility of southern self-determination.
The NIF is also the Sudanese regime most likely to resist meddlesome human rights concerns, which Egypt rightly fears; the massacre of Sudanese refugees in Cairo is hardly the first such massive human rights abuse sanctioned by the Mubarak government. Indeed, it is worth remarking a recent New York Times dispatch on efforts by the UN “to produce an alternative to its widely discredited Human Rights Commission.” But this effort to “redeem the UN’s credibility in 2006” is threatened by some of the world’s worst human rights abusers. The UN “Human Rights Council” that has been proposed is a significant improvement over the hopelessly corrupt Human Rights Commission, but “diplomats at the UN singled out Egypt and Pakistan as countries that were leading the resistance to the proposed council” (New York Times [dateline: United Nations], January 1, 2006).
With the recent example in Cairo of Egyptian “security” methods, we should hardly be surprised that diplomats are able to be so explicit in blaming the Mubarak government.
OTHER PERSPECTIVES ON SUDAN’S 50 YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE
In the most superficial sense, Sudan could be billed as an African success story: a much celebrated north/south peace agreement (January 9, 2005), growing oil wealth, a hosting of both African Union and Arab League summits, and increasingly good relations with the US over intelligence concerning the “war on terrorism.” Major General Saleh Abdallah ‘Gosh,’ head of Khartoum’s savagely efficient security operations (the Mukhabarat) was, after all, flown to Washington, DC by the CIA last spring, with very high-level clearance coming from within the Bush administration White House. This was part of a quid pro quo arrangement: Gosh’s cooperation on terrorism intelligence (he served as minder for Osama bin Laden during the fruition of al-Qaeda in Sudan, 1991-1996) in return for a symbolically important visit to Washington on a CIA executive jet.
But of course, as evidence had already clearly revealed at the time of the visit, Saleh ‘Gosh’ is one of the prime architects of genocide in Darfur. Khartoum’s genocidaires may thus be forgiven for believing that despite international public outrage at the ongoing destruction of Darfur’s non-Arab or African tribal populations, nothing in the way of real political or diplomatic pressure would confront them. A different kind of “success” for Khartoum.
A report by The Economist that the “CIA is now building a listening post on the outskirts of Khartoum to monitor events in the Horn of Africa” (cited by The Independent [UK], December 30, 2005) suggests why the National Islamic Front security cabal should feel re-assured that the US has no real intention of backing up its harsh assessment of NIF behavior in Darfur (“genocide”).
Nonetheless, whatever superficial evidence there may be that Sudan has succeeded as a state is profoundly undermined by realities readily apparent to those who will only look with a modicum of sustained interest. Whether to the east, the south, or Darfur in the west, Sudan is failing terribly.
The Comprehensive Peace Agreement between Khartoum and the southern Sudan People’s Liberation Movement is neither “comprehensive” nor a genuine agreement: Khartoum daily refuses to honor any number of obligations central to the “agreement,” including: accepting the findings of the international Abyei Boundary Commission; disarming its militia allies in Upper Nile Province (the primary oil region); providing transparency for oil revenues (revenues desperately needed by the people of the south); withdrawing its troops from the south as scheduled (the crucial element in the peace agreement’s “security protocol”); and interfering with the operations of the UN peace support operation in southern Sudan and the Nuba Mountains (under the auspices of the UN Mission in Sudan [UNMIS]; see paragraphs 24, 25 and 42 in the December 21, 2005 monthly report of the Secretary General, on Sudan).
In the east, the Eastern Front—primarily the Beja and Rashaida groups—continues to be on the verge of full-scale rebellion. Since the essential oil pipeline for crude exports passes through areas presently threatened by the Eastern Front, we must expect that Khartoum’s eventual military response will be massive and brutally destructive.
Other domestic policies that define NIF rule have also recently been highlighted, offering further perspective on the meaning of 50 years of Sudanese “independence”:
[1] In his most recent report on Darfur, Kofi Annan speaks of the torture of detainees in Darfur, noting that “these reports [of torture] add to a disturbing pattern of mistreatment of detainees by National Security officers during interrogation. Torture is comprehensively prohibited by the Interim National Constitution and by international law” (December 23, 2005 report to the Security Council, paragraph 20). Countless thousands of Sudanese have been brutally tortured during 16 years of NIF tyranny.
[2] In his more general report on Sudan as a whole, Annan reports:
“National Security personnel continued to assert arbitrary powers of arrest and detention. Across the country, they are reported to have physically abused detainees and continued to enjoy the benefits of immunity laws” (December 21, 2005 report to the Security Council, paragraph 58).
[3] Reuters reports on the recent arrest of a journalist in Khartoum, an arrest entirely in keeping with repressive NIF policies governing the news media and reporting in Sudan:
“Sudanese security forces jailed without charge a journalist accused of slandering President Omar Hassan al-Bashir in a move some parliamentarians called unconstitutional. Zuheir Sirraj [is] a columnist for the al-Sahafa daily paper. A source in state security said he had violated the law by writing an article saying the president did not care about the country’s problems and citizens. But no charges had yet been brought against him.”
“Newspapers are often closed or suspended in Sudan, although the authorities deny censorship. A source in state security said Sirraj had violated the law: ‘He was arrested yesterday because he wrote an article about the president of the republic…and he used unsuitable words.'” (Reuters [Khartoum], December 31, 2005)
[4] The word “marginalized” hardly does justice to the extreme deprivation that prevails in so many regions of Sudan, or the inordinate concentration of national wealth and power in the hands of the NIF. But a recent UN report on child mortality in Sudan gives us a sense of how desperately marginalized large populations are in this country of obscene contrasts:
“Thousands of Sudanese children are exploited, while 149 out of 1,000 in the eastern and southern parts of the country die each year before making five, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned on Wednesday. ‘Thousands and possibly millions of Sudanese children suffer from exploitation and discrimination,’ said Ted Chaiban, UNICEF’s representative in Sudan, at the launch of the ‘State of the World’s Children 2006’ report.”
“The report indicated that in northern Sudan, children from middle – and upper-class families are twice as likely to be vaccinated against killer childhood diseases than poor children.”
Here it is worth remarking that Khartoum has repeatedly, over many years, obstructed vaccinations campaigns in Sudan, most recently during the effort to vaccinate people in Kordofan Province against deadly Yellow Fever. The dispatch from the UN’s Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN) (December 14, 2005) continues:
“With regard to the ongoing conflict in the western Sudanese region of Darfur, which affects over 3 million children, the report observed: ‘Discrimination on the basis of ethnicity can erode self-worth and confidence in children and deprive them of opportunities for growth and development, blunting the promise that is every child’s birthright.'”
“‘Reaching the unreached, excluded children—from El Geneina [Darfur] to Torit [Eastern Equatoria] to Kassala [in the east]—is an imperative,’ [UNICEF’s Ted] Chaiban said. ‘They deserve to be seen. They deserve to have their rights fulfilled.'”
Under the tyranny of the National Islamic Front, these “unreached, excluded children” will never be a priority, and untold suffering and destruction will haunt their lives.
[5] As the International Criminal Court attempts to conduct an investigation into various violations of international law in Darfur, and to exert the claims of international justice, lead ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo has been greeted at every step of the way with open contempt by Khartoum’s genocidaires. Well aware of their own guilt, the most senior members of the NIF refuse to cooperate in any way with the ICC, and have made clear that neither witnesses nor accused Sudanese will be allowed to travel to The Hague, or be interviewed in Sudan:
“Sudan will not allow ICC investigators to enter its Darfur region to probe suspected war crimes committed during the conflict there, justice minister [Mohammed Ali al-Mardi] said on Tuesday. [ ] Mardi said the ICC investigation, requested by the Security Council, was not necessary because the Sudanese judicial system was capable of trying any crimes in Darfur. ‘The ICC officials have no jurisdiction inside the Sudan or with regards to Sudanese citizens,’ Mardi [said]. ‘They cannot investigate anything on Darfur—they have no jurisdiction. This is quite clear and they know it.'” (Reuters, December 14, 2005)
Indeed, as Moreno Ocampo clearly recognizes, the very fact of an ICC investigation threatens civilians and humanitarians in Darfur:
“The information currently available highlights the significant security risks facing civilians, local and international humanitarian personnel in Darfur. These issues will present persistent challenges for the investigation.” (ICC Report to UN Security Report, June 2005, page 8)
Moreno Ocampo has also given “a list of actions he would not or could not take, including the almost impossible task of protecting witnesses” (Reuters, December 14, 2005).
In short, an “independent” Sudan is making a mockery of international efforts to secure justice and the protection of human rights.
[6] Sudan under the NIF is also on the verge of instigating a destabilizing war with Chad, with possible implications for the Central African Republic (Reuters, December 27, 2005). Khartoum is clearly supporting Chadian military mutineers on Sudanese soil, and there is no more telling evidence than the medical treatment that was accorded the Chadian mutineers/rebels in el-Geneina, West Darfur. Following their December 18, 2005 attack on the town of Adre in eastern Chad, the mutineers/rebels were brought to the hospital in el-Geneina:
“Patients at el-Geneina hospital said between 25-30 fighters injured in a separate attack by Chadian army deserters and allies on the border town of Adre two days ago had been brought to the hospital. But armed soldiers and plain-clothed security men prevented journalists from entering their ward.”
“The Chadian government said they chased the dissidents into Sudan, killing about 300 of them, and blamed Sudan for the attack. The dissidents say they want to remove Chadian President Idriss Deby from power.”
“‘They were brought here at night by relatives, with the permission of the government,’ said one patient who was present in the hospital at the time. ‘It took five trips to bring them in,’ other witnesses added. The witnesses declined to be named for fear of being targeted by authorities.” (Reuters [dateline: el-Geneina], December 20, 2005)
Provoking regional instability is yet another feature of “independent” Sudan under the NIF.
DARFUR AT YEAR’S END
But ongoing genocide by attrition in Darfur best reflects the essential security policy of the National Islamic Front, which dominates, unyieldingly, Sudan’s nominal “Government of National Unity.” If we want the most telling picture of Sudan at 50 years, then it is to Darfur that we must turn.
Extant data, from a wide range of sources, strongly suggest that to date approximately 400,000 human beings have died from Khartoum’s genocidal violence in Darfur and the malnutrition and disease that have come in the ghastly wake of this violence, which has largely destroyed food-stocks and the means of food production. The systematic and comprehensive destruction of 80-90% of African villages in Darfur has served as a means for Khartoum and its murderous Arab militia allies, the Janjaweed, to “deliberately inflict on the [African tribal groups] conditions of life calculated to bring about [their] physical destruction in whole or in part” (adapted from Article 2, clause [c] of the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide).
As human destruction and suffering continue on a massive scale throughout Darfur, we must see Sudan at 50 years as the site of the 21st century’s first great episode of genocide. But we must remember also that the genocide has roots going back to the very beginning of the NIF tyranny in 1989. Here it is difficult to overpraise the history of the conflict that has recently been provided by Julie Flint and Alex de Waal (“Darfur: A Short History of a Long War” [Zed Books: London & New York, 2005]). And it is de Waal who has reminded us most forcefully of the larger history of NIF genocidal policies:
“This [present genocide in Darfur] is not the genocidal campaign of a government at the height of its ideological hubris, as the 1992 jihad against the Nuba Mountains was, or coldly determined to secure natural resources, as when it sought to clear the oilfields of southern Sudan of their troublesome inhabitants. This is the routine cruelty of a security cabal, its humanity withered by years in power: it is genocide by force of habit.” (“Counter-insurgency on the Cheap,” London Review of Books, August 5, 2004)
This is the largest context in which we must assess Darfur going forward in the New Year.
Jan Egeland, UN Undersecretary for Humanitarian Affairs, provides a forceful overview of the extraordinary dangers facing civilians and humanitarians in his most recent report to the Security Council (December 19, 2005):
“We must realize that [humanitarians’] work and lives are under constant threat, and our operations can now be disrupted completely by renewed conflict any day and anywhere in Darfur. We must be acutely aware that all that has been built up by the thousands of relief workers and hundreds of millions of dollars in donor contributions could be destroyed. We could be on the brink of losing this huge humanitarian operation.”
“We have to face up to the terrible reality our colleagues on the ground are witnessing and reporting every day. The killings have not stopped. The rapes are continuing, as are the burning, looting and forced displacement which I first reported to you more than 20 months ago. For three consecutive months now, the situation has been deteriorating. We have had less humanitarian access during this period than at any other time since that first briefing in early April 2004. More than twenty thousand more people were displaced in the last few weeks alone. In a deeply worrying new development, Internally Displaced Persons camps themselves are increasingly being attacked by militia.”
Of the escalating conflict along the Chad/Darfur border, Egeland declares:
“A further deterioration of the situation would pose a threat to ongoing relief operations to Sudanese refugees and could trigger a serious humanitarian crisis.”
Egeland concludes by implicitly chastising the Security Council for its shameful failure to make good on its various resolutions concerning Darfur, all completely ineffectual to date:
“But unless these [Security Council] measures have a real impact on the ground, the wound will continue to bleed. And our massive humanitarian operation will not be sustainable unless we finally see commensurate efforts in the political and security areas. The next few weeks will be critical, both for the talks in Abuja and as the Security Council and the African Union deliberate on the next steps. We need an expanded and more effective security presence on the ground as soon as possible, a presence that can provide more effective protection and ultimately allow people to return to their homes. This expanded presence is needed whether or not the Abuja talks succeed. It cannot be right that we have twice as many humanitarian workers in Darfur as international security personnel.”
But there is no near- or medium-term prospect of an international security force that can protect Darfur’s acutely vulnerable civilians and equally vulnerable humanitarians. A UN force would take at least half a year to begin meaningful deployment, even as humanitarians are being withdrawn or evacuated now, and operations in many regions of Darfur have been suspended. UN humanitarian access to populations known to be in need (and there are more than 2 million who have not been assessed) is below 70% and declining. Moreover, there is no guarantee that a UN force would deploy with an appropriate protection mandate, or the personnel and resources necessary for this difficult task.
In Abuja there has been no meaningful progress, nor is there any prospect of progress. On the contrary, highly informed sources in Abuja paint an exceedingly grim picture of intransigence, bad faith, mistrust, and ineptitude. To all this, the civilians of Darfur are being held hostage. Egeland is certainly right: a much “expanded [security] presence is needed whether or not the Abuja talks succeed.” But what is fully clear now is that there is no near- or medium-term possibility of success in these talks; and more importantly, there is no evidence that the Khartoum regime will feel obliged to respect any agreement signed in Abuja. One consequence of international failure to hold the NIF regime firmly to the terms of the southern “Comprehensive Peace Agreement” is that Khartoum’s genocidaires are confident the same will be true of any future Darfur peace “agreement.”
Meanwhile, even a checklist of recent developments on the ground in Darfur suggests all too clearly the terrible threats to civilians lives and livelihood:
[1] In his most recent report on Darfur to the Security Council (December 23, 2005) Kofi Annan notes “numerous reports of the deliberate destruction and burning of vast areas of cultivated land by militia and nomadic groups,” actions that may well “wipe out” the expected increase in crop production (paragraph 23). Here we should note that the victims of such devastating crop destruction are the very same African tribal populations that have been the targets of genocide from the beginning.
We should also note that Annan has again resorted in these reports to a disingenuous use of the term “militia” when the evidence is overwhelming that those responsible are the Arab militia forces known as the Janjaweed. Indeed, the word “Janjaweed” appears only once in Annan’s report and that is in the context of his invoking UN Security Council 1556 (July 30, 2004), which “demanded” that Khartoum disarm the Janjaweed (named explicitly) and bring its leaders to justice. No doubt embarrassed by the NIF’s open flouting of a UN Security Council resolution which names the “Janjaweed,” Annan has chosen the disingenuous tactic of avoiding use of the word in his reports.
[2] Annan reports on a UN investigation of actions by Khartoum’s regular military, including the repeated use of helicopter gunships for military purposes (Khartoum previously committed to halting the use of these deadly war-machines in Darfur). In the Jebel Moon area in particular, we see not only the actions of Khartoum’s regular forces, but a shameless (if characteristic) prevarication:
“On November 18 [2005], the Sudanese Armed Forces carried out operations in the Jebel Moon area, allegedly against Chadian deserters who had moved into the area. [ ] Following discussion with members of the community in the area, [the UN investigating team] confirmed that Sudanese Armed Forces had not only attacked the area, but that helicopter gunships had been used in the operation. [A number of civilians were injured.] Furthermore, there was no sign of Chadian deserters as alleged by the Government.” (paragraph 8)
[3] Annan declares, as do many humanitarian and other organizations, that “reports from the ground confirm the marked deterioration in the situation since September,” and that “large-scale attacks against civilians continue [in Darfur], women and girls are being raped by armed groups, yet more villages are being burned, and thousands more are being driven from their homes” (paragraph 39).
[4] In a terribly ominous development, highlighted by Egeland, camps for displaced persons are increasingly being attacked. There are numerous reports of the sort that comes from UN IRIN (December 12, 2005):
“Last month, 13 militiamen entered a camp in North Darfur and fired on civilians, killing two children, aged six and nine, and injuring a teenager and an adult male. In South Darfur state, humanitarian workers say that armed men attack Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) camps.”
“‘The security situation in Abu Shouk [the second largest camp in Darfur] is deteriorating each day,’ says a local aid worker. ‘IDPs were reporting continuous military presence inside the camps during the nights with threats, detentions, harassment to the civilian population and shootings.'”
[5] Security for humanitarian operations continues to deteriorate, as do the evacuations of humanitarian workers; the attenuation of humanitarian reach follows immediately. A measure of how dangerous the situation has become is a comment from Keith McKenzie, UNICEF’s special representative for Darfur:
“McKenzie said aid workers had to move around in helicopters because of rampant banditry and fighting [ ]; any convoy that looks like a food convoy is automatically hit.” (Reuters, December 20, 2005)
SUDAN AND 50 YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE
Tyranny, genocide, arbitrary arrest and torture, suppression of press freedoms, chronic poverty for most of its citizens despite substantial national oil wealth, the subverting of international justice and human rights bodies, bad faith in diplomacy and negotiated agreements—this is the true portrait of Sudan at 50. There will be no significant change until the National Islamic Front is removed from power.
– Eric Reeves
– Smith College
– Northampton, MA 01063
– Tel: 413-585-3326
– Email: [email protected]
– Website: www.sudanreeves.org