Darfur: Committing atrocities under pretext of peace
By Ngor Arol Garang
June 19, 2009 — In Sudan, each day passes with Reports about the situation in Darfur, western Sudan. The destructive armed conflict in that part of Africa continues unabated with rampant military activity, violence, indiscriminate destruction of lives and livelihoods and forced displacement of civilians. Insecurity, expulsion and aggressive government measures including delay and withholding of visas and travel permits for alien relief workers are placing unsupportable burden on relief organizations often forcing them to reduce their humanitarian intervention in Darfur or abandon it altogether thus depriving millions of hungry war-victims of first aid.
Under the circumstances the humanitarian situation in Darfur can plausibly be qualified as too dangerous. It is so acute and so dire that the lives of about 2.5 to 3 million civilians who currently languish in the miserable slums referred to as internally displaced persons’ (IDPs) camps across Darfur are at stake. Those unfortunate fellow Africans are facing the impossible situation of a rapidly diminishing life-saving relief material after the Government of Sudan (GoS) chased away some major international relief organisations (NGOs) that provide or distribute over 50% of the relief material in the region. It is possible that within 2 to 3 month interval the humanitarian situation in Darfur would witness dramatic deterioration. Almost all the IDP populations in Darfur entirely dependant for their survival on the food distribution programmes and other services provided by NGOs. The lack of potable water, medicine and food is now felt in all parts of Darfur. Malnutrition and malnutrition-induced diseases are expected to have a high tool in the near future especially among children that are dependent on nutrient-rich therapeutic and supplementary food provided by the expelled NGOs. The direct result of Sudan’s cruel measure would be a dramatic increase in the mortality and morbidity rates among the war-affected civilians in Darfur.
The irony of it all is that GoS is now extorting money from foreign humanitarian NGOs under the threat of detaining their staff if they fail to pay ransoms. The 13 foreign NGOs expelled by Khartoum recently are making pay-outs of more than US$11 million in addition to about US$10 million as payment for termination-without-notice and US$20 million in seized assets.[i] The extortion campaign is a calculated policy to ensure that with their assets seized and infrastructure dismantled the expelled NGOs cannot restart their work in the region in the near future.
On the political arena the picture is equally gloomy. Attempts for a negotiated end to the conflict in Darfur are facing many hiccups. Since its eruption in 2003, parties to the conflict have not shown genuine commitment for a negotiation process that yields a sound peace accord. GoS is accused of fostering splits among the Darfur insurgent movement. The Doha (Qatar) round of political negotiations between GoS and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) was not inclusive. The Qatari mediator, GoS and JEM have deliberately alienated other movements during those talks. The Doha talks would not, therefore, conclude with a peace agreement acceptable to important segments of the people of Darfur. Recently JEM has decided to pull out of the Doha talks accusing the government of violating the “Good Will Agreement” signed between them last February.
The man-made tragedy in Darfur is a scar on Africa’s conscience. Available reports from the African Union (AU), United Nations Organisation (UN) and other literature on the atrocities committed in Darfur depict an impossible situation. “This report demonstrates, beyond all doubt, that the last two years have been little short of hell on earth for our fellow human beings in Darfur. And despite the attention the Council has paid to this crisis that hell continues today.” These words were uttered by Africa’s great son and former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan on Wednesday, 16th February 2005 before members of the UN Security Council.[ii] Mr. Annan made those incriminating remarks when he introduced the report of the International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur (ICID) to members of the Security Council. The report which he described as: “… one of the most important documents in the recent history of the United Nations” was drafted by a team of five independent experts – including three Africans: Mohammed Fayek (Egypt), Thérèse Striggner-Scott (Ghana) and Dumisa Ntsebeza (South Africa). The ICID report is the most authoritative and comprehensive document ever produced on the extent of the crisis in Darfur.[iii] ICID has based its findings on more than 8 weeks of in situ investigations and eyewitness accounts including evidence provided by Sudanese army generals and other officials. The report thus factually reflected the situation on the ground and established beyond doubt that large-scale and systematic crimes against humanity and war crimes have been committed in Darfur and that GoS and its allied militia groups bear the prime criminal responsibility.
The arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) against Marshal Omar Al-Bashir on 4th March 2009 – on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity – was an inevitable step. It should be supported by all peace-loving people in Africa and the world. The arrest warrant was issued by the ICC’s Pre-Trial Chamber No 1 presided by an African Judge and former law professor Ms. Akua Kuenyehia (Ghana).
Justice done and seen to be done is one of the main demands of the victims of the armed conflict in Darfur. Fundamental justice that overarches the suffering of the civilian victims of the conflict in Darfur commands that individuals responsible for authorising, organising or executing these crimes be held accountable. Prosecution of the perpetrators of the massive criminal acts committed in Darfur is therefore based on fundamental justice. This is because an injustice without accountability, relief and atonement is abhorrent to the spirit of law and good conscience as vacuum is abhorrent to nature.
Africa would definitely be a better place to live in without brutal dictatorships and state-sponsored criminality as we witness in Darfur today. GoS is unrepented and unrepentable. It has a bloody history against its citizens. Genocide was in fact committed in South Sudan and the Nuba Mountains where over two million civilians were killed and 4 millions displaced in the last 20 years during which Marshal Al-Bashir reigned over Sudan. That crime went unpunished hence Khartoum saw no deterrence to commit similar crimes in Darfur. GoS’s decision to expel relief NGOs from Darfur confines millions of war-victims to silent death by depriving them of life-saving relief material provided by the expelled organizations. It testifies to Khartoum’s cruel nature, intransigence and total disregard to the lives of Africans in that beleaguered region of our continent.
Africa’s efforts to end the conflict in Darfur – both through the political negotiations and protection of civilians – are marred with structural deficiencies designed by Sudan’s North African allies within AU institutions such as the Peace and Security Council. The mediation led by UN/AU Chief Mediator on Darfur Djibril Yipènè Bassolé (Burkina Faso) seems to be sailing onto unchartered waters with no way out of the current stalemate. Africa – as a collectivity represented by its continental organisation the AU – disgracefully chose to support GoS and oppose the indictment of Marshal Al-Bashir. By doing so some African governments are consolidating the mistaken perception among nations of the world that sub-Saharan Africans do not care about the plight of their brothers and sisters in Darfur.
Some African statesmen and scholars enjoy the notorious distinction of spreading endless casuistry and blatant misrepresentation of facts about Darfur. They use all kinds of self-defeating arguments blaming everyone from Sudan’s former colonial masters to the most junior soldier for the crimes committed in Darfur yet conspicuously spare Marshal Al-Bashir and his aides of responsibility. Such insinuation encourages GoS to maintain the status quo and continue its carnage in Darfur. They falsely claim that the ICC process threatens peace in Darfur and that political stability in Sudan should be given priority over justice. In this trade-off between peace and justice the disillusioned tend to overlook the fact that, through victimization and brutal oppression of its citizenry, the 20-year old dictatorship in Khartoum exhausted all moral imperatives for its raison d’être. It has no vision to return the country to democratic governance or to uphold the rule of law and justice for its citizens without discrimination as to religious, ethnic or tribal backgrounds. Khartoum is, in fact, prepared to sacrifice the country rather than to relinquish power to the Sudanese masses in a free election process.
However, a glimpse of hope is on the horizon that official Africa is awaking up to the tragedy in Darfur and has the courage to speak loud and clear against it. Some African leaders are becoming increasingly aware that solidarity with Khartoum in the crimes it has wilfully committed in Darfur amounts to complicity. A spokesperson for South Africa’s President-elect Jacob Zuma made it clear that General Al-Bashir will not be invited to the inaugural ceremony in Pretoria on 9th May 2009 and that he may be handed over to the ICC if he touches South Africa’s soil while Zuma is president.
Now that African leaders like South Africa President Jacob Zuma are more than being cognizant of Bashir being War criminal to attend important functions like his inaugural ceremony in May, why allow Sudanese armed groups exterminate Darfurians to extinction under the pretext of peace?
The author is the Juba Post Journalist. He can reached at [email protected]
Sudanthinker
Darfur: Committing atrocities under pretext of peace
Dear Ngor Arol Garang
Before you launch your ill researched barrage of accusations, perhaps it would be wise to examine the facts on the grounds. The GoS of which I am not a big fan, didn’t start the bloody conflict in Darfur, the so called rebel groups did.
No one in their right mind would dispute that it was the civilian population in Darfur that bore the brunt of these armed hostilities, which and I reiterate, were started by the armed bands of Darfur such as JEM and SLA.
War is hell, as a Sudanese Southerner, you should know that better than anyone else for you have suffered the consequences of war far longer than any other African people in the recent history of Africa.
There is o such thing as a clean war, were only combatants shoot it out and die in the process, if you can show me one conflict in the last 50 years anywhere in the world, where the vast majority of causalities were not civilians, I would very much like to hear about it.
What concerns your claims that the expulsion of the 13 NGOs has or would create a humanitarian catastrophe did not and are not going to materialize, according to the US envoy to the Sudan, the situation has been stabilized and the UN is now looking to increase the relief capacity of existing NGO in the Country to plug any gaps left.
Furthermore, I would like to remind you that after the expulsion, JEM and SLA advised their followers not to accept aid from the government, so it’s not that the government is not doing its part in providing aid but it’s simply that these people want their aid from European and western countries, ever heard of the proverb: Beggars can’t be choosers?
Aid Mr.Garang, is like a drug, those people who have been living on aid for many years have become an unsustainable community, because they produce nothing, they just consume.
In fact, numerous researches into the role and effect that foreign food aid has on communities in Africa has proven beyond doubt that although they keep people alive, they tend to have a very negative long term affect as the communities who depend on aid tend to lose the skill to sustain themselves and become a permanent burden on the international community and the governments of their countries, just like drug addicts do.
The ICID report that you refer to concluded that there is no, and was no Genocide in Darfur, although all parties to the conflict are guilty of war crimes and crimes against Humanity.
The last report presented by UNAMID to the security council clearly stated that Darfur has become a low intensity conflict, and that the only thing disturbing the peace are attacks by so called rebel groups.
What concerns the ICC, even the panel of judges concluded that there is no evidence of Genocide in Darfur, so please stop peddling this discredited lie of Genocide in Darfur.
The so called rebels started this war, and they refuse, to date, to sign any peace or seize fire agreement which would pave the way for negotiations and a settlement to this conflict, in fact, as you have noted yourself, JEM the French/Chadian backed armed group is now insisting that only it has the right to negotiate on behalf of the people of Darfur.
Even though they only represent a single Tribe Zagawa which is not the biggest by any means, as for SLA, well it seems that their porky faced leader Abdel Wahid Nur has gotten so used to living in Luxurious Paris hotels he has no intention of winding down this conflict anytime soon.
That, despite the fact that he no longer has a military presence in Darfur and has become nothing more than a media bluff supported by the French government and various lobby groups in the US, most of which have an interesting connection to Israel.
Your leader, the late Honorable Mr.Garang was a true rebel with a true cause, but he realized that there was no military solution to this problem and in the end he negotiated a peace treaty.
So if the so called rebels in Darfur had an ounce of brains or mercy on their own people, wouldn’t they do the same? Well they haven’t, because they are just pawns in a much bigger geostrategic game.
They are gambling with and subjecting their own people to all this misery for personal gains and for the benefit of global powers who have special interests in the region.
Darfur is a tragedy no doubt, but it’s being prolonged and extended because the so called rebel groups are benefiting from the fact that there is a conflict, Abdel Wahid Nur is day dreaming about becoming the newly appointed (as opposed to elected ) president of Sudan.
Khalil Ibrahim is fighting for his deposed Sheikh Hassan al Turabi, who by the way declared Jihad on the people of the South during the war and Khalil was amongst the first to head his call.
As for African leaders who you claim are waking up to the fact that supporting Sudan in face of the onslaught of Neo-colonialism is tantamount to being complacent in their crimes in Darfur, like Jacob Zuma of South Africa?
What do you expect from a man with such colorful history, a man who was accused of corruption but silenced the courts and who was accused of raping an HIV positive girl? Is that your standard of new conscious African leaders?
Finally, the war in Darfur could end in one day, if the so called rebels really realize that fighting wars for western interests never pays those who fight them only those who manage them, but I dont see this happening anytime soon.