INTERVIEW: US diplomat urges peace, implementation of DPA

By Daniel Van Oudenaren

November 23, 2008 (WASHINGTON) – The top United States diplomat posted to Khartoum, Chargé d’Affaires Alberto Fernandez, on Sunday emphasized the U.S. commitment to guarding the peace agreement that ended one of Sudan’s civil wars in 2005, and the need for a solution to Sudan’s other civil war in Darfur.

Fernandez, who served in the U.S. army and later as a diplomat in places including Syria, Guatemala, Jordan and Afghanistan, assumed charge of the U.S. embassy in Khartoum on June 5, 2007.

The diplomat, speaking by phone from Khartoum, explained the U.S. support for the Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA) of 2006, which only one prominent rebel leader signed, Minni Minawi. Fernandez acknowledged that the agreement had not been implemented, but nevertheless called it “a building block towards peace in Darfur.”

Fernandez downplayed the significance of a potential Sudan-wide arms embargo, which a panel of UN experts recommended to the UN Security Council last week. He instead focused on political process and implementation of agreements, but warned against “phantom agreements” that do not address the needs of “three million people living and suffering miserable lives in internally displaced persons camps in Darfur.”

The same hesitation informed his view of the Qatari-led mediation effort, which Fernandez supported but indicated might not be well received in Darfur. He noted as well that the U.S. had not yet seen evidence of the ceasefire declared unilaterally by Sudanese President Omer Al-Bashir on Nov. 12.

The chargé d’affaires agreed with President Bush’s determination that genocide occurred in Darfur, but distanced himself from debate on the right term for the present situation, instead emphasizing that violence continues to this day and “it has never been set right.”

Fernandez concluded, “there is still a need for action to be taken to correct this horrific historic record. That’s the way I see it. Something needs to change which hasn’t changed yet.”

The full text of the interview is below.

ST: What are the primary U.S. objectives in the Sudan?

Fernandez: I think U.S. policy in Sudan is complex and multifaceted. The key issues that subsume the greatest part of American interest in Sudan are the full implementation both in word and in spirit of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) of 2005 which ended the longest running civil war in Africa, and secondly, finding a real solution to the problem of Darfur. Those are basically the two big parts of the U.S. policy. There are many other issues but they’re all tied to those things one way or the other.

ST: What was the purpose of your visit to Darfur last week?

Fernandez: It was nothing special in the sense that we have U.S. embassy people in Darfur all the time. I think people are there every week, and I try to be there at least every month, sometimes more than that. I also try to go to the south at least once a month. Sudan is a very large country and there is no substitute to being on the ground and talking to people on the ground, so that was the reason for my visit.

So I consulted with UNAMID, I talked to Minni Minawi, I talked to different Darfuris, outside the government and also inside the government, for example, the Wali (governor) of North Darfur. So it’s just part of the normal process of follow-up, seeing the situation on the ground, evaluating progress in the deployment of the UN-AU hybrid force (UNAMID). That was the reason for the visit. And also to see the whole question of the ceasefire—the reality on the ground versus the rhetoric.

ST: What is your impression of what the reality (of the ceasefire) on the ground is?

Fernandez: Our sense from talking to international forces, and to Darfuris and to others is that regardless of the statement (by Al-Bashir), there have been aggressive actions over the past week by both government forces and rebel forces. For example there were, it seems like, rebel-initiated actions in places like Guereda and Tine over the past week and there certainly has been aerial bombardment by the government in places in Darfur, including North Darfur.

So we’re not seeing a ceasefire yet and there is an urgent need for some sort of mechanism so that such claims of violence, claims of aggression can be monitored, can be stopped before they happen and blame can be assessed, so one can say, this was the government doing this, or the rebels doing this or these were bandits who attacked a food convoy. There’s a real need for ground truth. Many times this information comes out but it comes out over time.

ST: How do you characterize U.S. support for the former rebel Minni Minawi and the Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA)?

Fernandez: All of us think the DPA is a building block towards peace in Darfur, and Minni Minawi had the courage to sign this agreement over two years ago now, but as he himself has said, the majority of the agreement has not been implemented, and I know that by the time of the follow-on meeting that occurred in September 2008 in El Fasher to try to facilitate and implement the DPA, that many of the things that were agreed to in that meeting on September 19 between Vice President Taha and Minni Minawi—I attended that meeting—many of those things have not been done yet.

It’s a challenge. We believe that there needs to be a facility on the ground which actually changes the dynamic in Darfur for the better. The DPA has not done that. It doesn’t mean that it can’t, but whether improvement comes about as a result of the DPA or as a result of the Sudan People’s Initiative or as a result of the Qatari initiative, or something else, the challenge is to transform whatever is written on the paper into improvement on the ground. And there hasn’t been enough or consistent improvement on the ground in Darfur yet—it doesn’t satisfy anyone, least of all the United States.

ST: What perspective did you gain from attending the “People’s Initiative” (a Sudanese government-initiated forum for peace in Darfur)?

Fernandez: Well it was an interesting insight into Sudanese history. It was in some ways heartening and in some ways depressing. How was it heartening? I think the spectrum of people there was much more inclusive than in the past in other Darfur-related meetings. So that’s a good thing: it was much more inclusive, there were many more voices than there have been in the past.

But the voices of IDPs and refugees were not represented and that is a huge gap. It’s hard to see how you can come to an agreement on Darfur without including the voices of the three million people who are IDPs.

The recommendations that came out of it were good and there were some positive elements that came in it—in writing. But again the gap between process and results, the gap between what is written on the page and implementation … so this is a challenge. We are not opposed to the Sudan People’s Initiative per se, but we want to see actions and implementation of policies that improve things in Darfur, and not just another empty agreement. There have been too many of those, two many paper agreements or phantom agreements in the past. So this is the challenge with the Sudan People’s Initiative, and that’s true of the DPA or many other things. Something can sound good on paper, but if it doesn’t transform the situation on the ground for the better, then it’s worthless.

ST: There was a recent UN experts’ report that alleged gross violations of the arms embargo on Darfur. Is this a problem in your perspective, and what is the U.S. prepared to do about it?

Fernandez: The larger point is obvious, and that is that there is daily violence in Darfur carried out by all parties, by the government, by rebels, and this is a huge problem.

ST: What about the specific recommendation of an arms embargo on the whole of the Sudan?

Fernandez: I think that looks at part of the problem and not the whole problem. In other words, you can have weapons and not use them. The problem is violence and not necessarily weapons. It seems to me the problems are decisions, policies, actions by people that inflict violence on others. Whether people are killed by machetes or by machine guns to me is less important than the fact that people are being killed in a situation, in Sudan or somewhere else. So it seems to me, that kind of the misses the point. The point of our policy is to stop the violence, by governments or by rebel movements or by bandits, whoever they are.

ST: Does the U.S. stand behind the Qatari initiative?

Fernandez: We will stand behind something which can change the situation for the better. In other words, the problem is not the nationality or origin of the initiative. The challenge is: is whatever initiative going to be able to change the situation for the better or not? Not to focus on the Qataris per se, but one has to be frank about this: there are problems with initiatives that have a label from the Arab world, and that is that many people in Darfur see these initiatives as not really taking into account the sufferings and the reality of the people of Darfur. And many in the Arab world—and I’m talking not about individuals, I’m talking about governments—authorities in the Arab world have minimized or discounted or been silent before the sufferings of the people of Darfur just as in decades past they were to the reality of violence in South Sudan.

So there is a credibility gap that needs to be overcome, and that can be overcome. And I know the Qataris are reaching out aggressively toward some rebel movements, some political leaders in Sudan, and that’s a good thing. We think that it can be a helpful initiative but the challenge is, again, it has to be more than a conference, it has to be more than a piece of paper. It has to be something that addresses root causes and addresses real concerns.

For example, you have three million people living and suffering miserable lives in internally displaced persons camps in Darfur, kept alive by the international community, especially the United States, which provides $500 million a year in food aid for Darfur, to keep these people alive. Something which does not address that reality, the future of these people, can they go home, how do they go home, under what conditions, issues of compensation and restorative justice—if these issues are not addressed or if they’re just addressed and papered over, as some of these issue perhaps were in the DPA, it doesn’t matter if it’s a Qatari initiative or another initiative, it doesn’t matter what label you put on it, it’s not going to work. So it has to be something which is real, which actually changes things for the better.

ST: What steps are being taken on UNAMID deployment?

Fernandez: UNAMID deployment is actually something that we can look at and see some relatively positive action. It’s still moving much too slowly, but last week UNAMID passed for the first time the 50% mark. They’re at 50.3% deployment as of last week, so that is a positive benchmark. Also the cooperation of the Sudanese government with UNAMID has improved considerably over the past couple of months, so they’ve cleared up a lot of the issues related to land, to aircraft approvals and movements and with visas. There have been agreements on access to airports and other things, so there has been a lot of progress in the last couple of months but it is still far behind schedule and still moving too slowly and there are still of course limitations on some of the equipment which is needed, such as helicopters for UNAMID. So the progress has speeded up over the last couple months, the kind of obstacles which existed on the ground have dissipated, have improved. So it’s improving but we have a long way to go.

To give you one short example of one thing which is good, some of the most useful units which are deployed in Darfur are what’s called the FPUs, the Formed Police Units. These are armed international police who patrol and protect IDP camps. This is a huge issue to prevent rapes or to prevent murder caused by irregular forces or militias or whoever are attacking defenseless civilian populations. So far only three of those 19 FPUs have deployed. The ones that have deployed have made a real difference, are improving the situation.

For example, in September, I saw the first one deployed in Kalma Camp in South Darfur. It has improved the situation greatly in that camp, which has had a lot of problems and a lot of violence. But only three of the nineteen have deployed so we have a long way to go to getting those formed police units. So we’re making progress, moving in the right direction. We expect 2500 more troops there in Darfur by the end of December. But progress needs to continue, it needs to be intensified. The United States is ready, willing and able to do its part to improve deployment.

ST: Regarding the helicopters you mentioned, the U.S. Senate this February unanimously resolved—actually in a measure introduced by Senator Biden—that the U.S. itself should provide tactical and utility helicopters to UNAMID. Is this still a possibility that the administration would consider implementing?

Fernandez: That’s a question for people in Washington, not for me. Obviously we will implement whatever is decided there. As far as I know that’s not on the table right now, but anything is possible.

ST: Who would make that decision in Washington?

Fernandez: The Defense Department, the State Department, the administration—either this administration or the next one.

ST: How is the U.S. preparing to support elections for 2009?

Fernandez: We’re heavily involved in supporting that. The U.S. supported the census in South Sudan and is planning on supporting the electoral process in Sudan very, very strongly, I think especially in the south, but in general we’re looking for ways to be helpful.

There is a long way to go. There is not a lot of time, and there are still some major elements missing. We had a very positive breakthrough last week with the announcement of the long-delayed National Electoral commission. But there are still some very important building blocks missing to have free and fair elections in Sudan in 2009. There needs to be a respectable press law, there needs to be a reformed national security law. And those are issues which need to be urgently addressed if we’re to have good elections; you can’t have elections if you have censorship. So we are supporting the electoral process.

Obviously this is something that the two parties that signed the CPA have to put forward themselves, but we’re going to help with funding, we’re going to help with supporting international observers and we’re going to be helpful any way we can, as the international community is.

ST: The courts that recently issued death sentences for more than 50 Justice and Equality Movement rebels—should they be considered legitimate?

Fernandez: We have concerns about the administration of justice in Sudan, and those concerns are detailed greatly in the human rights report. We do have concerns about the issue. We noticed, for example, the apparent quick and rough justice in sentencing these people to death, and yet 35 people were machine-gunned down in Kalma camp in August, and we haven’t heard a word about justice in that case. So we do have concerns about justice in Sudan.

ST: In your estimation as an official, is genocide occurring in Darfur?

Fernandez: I am a U.S. government official, and President Bush has called what happened in Darfur genocide, and I am not going to disagree with that label. It seems to me in a way that that misses the point, which is that terrible suffering happened in Darfur and the consequences of that terrible suffering and that terrible violence continue to this day, and it has never been set right. It has never been fixed.

So, people who say, “well, the violence occurred from 2003-2005, it’s not continuing today,” or those others who say, “the genocide continues to this day”—it seems to me that the appropriate answer would be, whether this is something that ended in 2005 or something which continues to this day, it has never been set right.

It has never been corrected, to this day. And this is something which any peace agreement has to address, this is something the DPA sought to address, but as I said, it has not been implemented. So there is still a need for action to be taken to correct this horrific historic record. That’s the way I see it. Something needs to change which hasn’t changed yet.

(ST)