Darfur violence increases local doubts over UN
February 22, 2008 (SIRBA) — Khamisa Abdallah tried to wipe the tears from her eyes as she described how she lost six of her children when armed men rode into her West Darfur town, killing, shooting and looting.
“I have only this child,” she said, pointing to the three-year-old on her back as she sobbed.
The other children, aged between five and 20, fled terrified into the hills near Sirba town during the militia attack two weeks ago and she has not seen them since.
Fighting has continued in Sudan’s Darfur region despite an agreement to deploy the world’s largest U.N.-funded peacekeeping operation there and people say they are losing faith in the international community’s will or ability to help them.
As in many of the raids during almost five years of rebellion in Darfur, families in Sirba got separated in the chaos of the attack, part of a government offensive to reclaim the area from Darfur rebels.
“One of the most stark messages we will take back from here is the issue of children who are missing who have separated from their families,” said Sudan’s U.N. humanitarian chief Ameerah Haq. “Mothers had to run out and children just fled in whichever way they probably could.”
Mostly non-Arab rebels took up arms in early 2003 accusing the central government of neglect. But rebel divisions and the government’s mobilisation of mostly Arab tribal militia has created a chaotic mix of armed groups and a breakdown of law and order in Sudan’s remote west.
Sudan’s army said it battled the Darfur rebel Justice and Equality Movement in Sirba. It says many of the almost 50 people killed were insurgents in civilian clothes, a claim the residents fiercely dispute.
FEAR
Some children made their way back after days traipsing barefoot through the thorny underbrush, barely clothed during bitterly cold nights and exhausted from a lack of food.
Those who returned found new problems. Two of five water pumps and the main water loading system had been destroyed. Women seeking water from less clean sources were attacked by marauders still nearby. Some were raped.
Fearful residents demanded the immediate deployment of international peacekeepers, voicing doubts over whether help would come quickly enough.
“Either the United Nations brings peacekeepers here to protect us or we will leave and go anywhere else that is secure, another town, another country,” said Sirba student Abu Bakr Eissa Mohamed.
But full deployment of the joint U.N.-African Union force, known as UNAMID, has been repeatedly delayed and Western countries accuse the Khartoum government of dragging its feet by placing restrictions. Only 9,000 of up to around 26,000 peacekeepers have been deployed so far.
After the attack on Sirba, residents sought protection from Sudanese regular troops who moved into the town after the militia attack.
But only a few remained and residents said they were too afraid of the militia to even go out to collect bodies hidden in the high grass.
International experts estimate some 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million been driven from their homes in Darfur. Khartoum puts the death toll at 9,000, accusing Western media of exaggerating the conflict.
U.N. local aid chief Haq urged the warring parties to return to the peace process.
“We just cannot go from village to village and see these stark images and the stark realities of what has happened,” she said. “The world has to wake up to that.”
(Reuters)