Sudan’s JEM rebels expelled from Darfur talks for assault
Feb 1, 2006 (LAGOS) — Three members of a Darfur rebel delegation to the peace talks in Abuja, brokered by the African Union (AU), have been expelled for assaulting two colleagues, the AU said Wednesday.
On Saturday two members of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), Ibrahim Sideeq and his wife Amani Basheer, “were brutally attacked by three members of the same movement, after some unfortunate developments, that were internal to the movement,” the AU said in a statement sent to AFP.
Sideeq told AFP that they were attacked because he resigned from the JEM to join the rival Sudan Liberation Movement. “They really deliberately wanted to kill me,” he alleged.
Sideeq said his wife was injured in her left eye and had difficulty seeing, while he was hit on the back and the neck and “I now walk with the support of a stick.”
He said the matter had been reported to the AU, representatives of the international community as well as the Nigerian police.
The pan-African body’s report said that after investigations conducted by the AU mediators, international partners and other participants as well as the JEM leadership, the assailants were identified as Mohamed Mansour Kitir, Mohamed Bushara Yahia and Salih Basheer Tiyya.
“Deeply appalled by this brutal attack perpetrated by a few misguided members of the JEM, against their fellow members,” the AU and the international partners “condemn in the strongest possible terms and without any reservation whatsoever, such a blatant and unwarranted attack and deplore its barbaric nature as totally unacceptable and unjustified under any pretext.”
“Mohamed Mansour Kitir, Mohamed Bushara Yahia and Salih Basheer Tiyya, will be expelled from the talks and repatriated to Darfur by the AU as a matter of top priority,” it said.
They would not be replaced during the current seventh round of talks.
The AU said the JEM leadership should consider “other administrative and disciplinary measures” to be taken against the three and inform the AU and the international partners of such action within the shortest possible time and in any case, before the end of the seventh round, it said.
“In consultation with the host authorities, security within the venue of the talks will be enhanced with appropriate instructions to security personnel to deal ‘firmly and decisively’ with any future breach or threats to parties, the safety and security of participants at the talks”, it added.
“Henceforth, heads of delegations of participating parties will be held personally accountable for the conduct of their members, within the venue of the talks,” the statement said.
The Darfur conflict, which broke out in February 2003, pitted the rebel groups, campaigning for a greater share of the power and riches of Sudan, against the government in Khartoum and its affiliated Arab Janjaweed militia.
The fighting has claimed between 180,000 and 300,000 lives and displaced more than two million people.
(AFP/ST)