Government vows to crack down on rebels as officials tour villages destroyed in western Sudan fighting, looting
By MOHAMED OSMAN, Associated Press Writer
TARINGA, Sudan, April 19, 2004 (AP) — Firing guns into the air, armed rebels on camels and horses galloped into this dusty village four months ago, sending villagers fleeing for their lives and leaving a trail of destruction in their wake.
“When we returned (five days later), we found our houses burned down, properties looted and sorghum (food staple) stolen,” Mohammed Eissa Suleiman, the chief of this remote village near Sudan’s border with Chad, told an Associated Press reporter Monday.
Taringa’s story is like those of many other villages and towns in Sudan’s impoverished western Darfur province, where 14 months of fighting between two main rebel groups have killed thousands of people and forced more than 860,000 others to flee.
The United Nations and human rights groups have accused Sudan’s government of backing the “ethnic cleansing” of Africans by Arab tribes people and keeping aid groups and journalists out of Darfur to hide human rights abuses.
The government denies the allegations, despite accusations by refugees and the two rebel groups that Sudanese military forces have bombed and attacked civilians.
Humanitarian Affairs Minister Ibrahim Hamid, speaking Monday to reporters accompanying him on a tour of the region, said aid agencies were welcome because a 45-day cease-fire signed April 8 by the government and Darfur rebels was holding.
The cease-fire followed peace talks in Chad between Sudanese government officials and rebels seeking a permanent solution. The Darfur fighting is unrelated to a 21-year civil war in southern Sudan, which has claimed more than two million lives, mainly through famine.
Sudan on Monday also launched what it said would be a major reconstruction and rehabilitation campaign for areas affected by fighting.
“As you can see, the psychological effect of this cease-fire is tremendous and since Sunday there has been no violation of this cease-fire,” Hamid said in Nyala, 1,300 kilometers (800 miles) west of Sudan’s capital, Khartoum.
“We hereby declare that all NGOs (non-governmental organizations) and agencies are welcome to come to Darfur.”
Hamid said a high-level U.N. mission was expected in Darfur Tuesday to assess humanitarian needs.
The same 10-member mission, led by U.N. undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs Jan Egeland, was expected to start a four-day visit of Darfur’s three states Sunday. Hamid did not explain the delay.
Western aid agencies complained over the weekend that government officials were denying access to Darfur’s hardest hit areas.
One aid worker, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear his group would be blacklisted, said the government ordered aid workers allowed into some parts of Darfur not to bring cameras.
Egeland has described the violence against Africans in Darfur as “ethnic cleansing, but not genocide.” He also has called the situation “one of the most forgotten and neglected humanitarian crises.”
There was little sign of recent fighting in Nyala, a bustling regional capital. But officials in Nyala said two camps nearby sheltered 40,000 people who had fled their homes because of the violence. Officials said the displaced people were afraid to return home despite the cease-fire.
In Taringa, some 180 kilometers (108 miles) southeast of West Darfur’s provincial capital of al-Geneina, chief Suleiman said he and his village’s roughly 200 inhabitants have begun rebuilding their devastated home, which he said was one of six villages along Sudan’s border with Chad that were destroyed by unidentified rebels.
“It was 8 a.m., even before we had breakfast, and a group of people riding camels and horses attacked our village,” Suleiman told the AP of how the January attack began.
“They started shooting in the air, so I told my people to run for their lives before they reached the village.”
Five days later, the villagers crept back into Taringa to find their homes razed to the ground and food stocks stolen.
On Monday, about 5,000 people from nearby villages brought material to rebuild their destroyed homes and pledged not to fight each other, an initiative launched by the leader of a prominent local tribe and supported by the government.
“This is a good thing that people come together and try to forget the past,” Suleiman said.
West Darfur’s governor, retired Maj. Gen. Suleiman Abdullah Adam, blamed “armed robbers, bandits or outlaws” for sacking the villages.
“The whole thing was related to the lack of security in the region.”
Adam said the government has formed militias from various area tribes, already seen on foot or riding camels carrying small fire arms and wearing traditional Sudanese white robes or paramilitary uniforms, to “repulse anyone … who would undermine security.”
“This is the image we want people to see,” he said. “Our people living together.”