Darfur faction denies abuse allegations by UN
July 29, 2007 (KHARTOUM) — The main Darfur rebel faction which signed a May peace deal with the Sudanese government denied reports yesterday that its fighters had raped and murdered civilians during a recent offensive.
The Sudan Liberation Movement mainstream leader Minni Minnawi acknowledged that his group had been involved in clashes with rival factions opposed to the peace agreement, but insisted that the others had started the fighting.
“It’s not true,” Minnawi said when asked about a UN situation report citing testimony from fleeing civilians in North Darfur state that they had seen fellow villagers raped or killed by his fighters.
“The statement was misunderstood and misreported,” he said, referring to the African Union peacekeeping mission, which was cited as the source of the testimony. “We request that the UN accept an independent team to investigate,” Minnawi added.
The situation report released by the UN Mission in Sudan on Sunday had said that some 4 000 Fur civilians had fled an offensive by Minnawi’s fighters in the Tawila area of North Darfur state.
The assault had targeted the rival SLM faction of Abdul Wahid al-Nur which draws much of its support from the Fur — Darfur’s largest ethnic group. The report added that the displaced said that 15 young women had been “raped and then killed” and about 40 men had been kidnapped and were feared dead.
Minnawi acknowledged that his troops had been involved in fighting with opponents of the peace deal which he signed in Nigeria in May, but insisted that he had given orders to try to avoid hostilities.
“I don’t deny there are some clashes . . . but we try to avoid them. All the clashes are from the forces who want to break the peace,” he said.
Minnawi warned that his fighters were unable to control mounting insecurity across western Sudan and neighbouring eastern Chad, and called for the swift deployment of UN peacekeepers to Darfur to rein in the violence.
“There are many troops, militias, uncontrolled troops — in Chad also, there are the Janjaweed (pro-Khartoum militiamen),” he said.
“The government cannot control the security situation. We cannot either . . . We need the deployment of UN troops, right this year.” Despite hints by senior officials earlier this year that Khartoum might accept the deployment of UN peacekeepers to Darfur, President Omar al-Beshir has since repeatedly rejected the replacement of the current, overstretched African Union force.
The Darfur rebels are particularly sensitive to allegations of rape or other abuses by their fighters. They charge that rape was systematically used as a weapon by the Janjaweed in their suppression of the more than three-year-old uprising. As many as 300 000 people have died and more than 2,4 million more been left homeless since the fighting began in early 2003
(AFP)