Britain dismisses Sudanese denial
By MARGARET NEIGHBOUR
LONDON, June 02, 2004 (The Scotsman) — Claims by the Sudanese government yesterday that it has played no part in the ethnic cleansing of hundreds of thousands of black Africans in the west of the country were dismissed in Britain yesterday.
International charities and humanitarian groups have consistently suggested state complicity in a campaign waged by Arab militia to force out the black population from the Darfur region of Sudan.
Tens of thousands of people have been killed and more than 120,000 have been forced to flee across the border into Chad. Those who have survived attacks talk of the Arab militiamen being supported by gunfire from helicopters.
Yet in a radio interview, Sudan’s ambassador, Dr Hassan Abdin, insisted the government had never condoned or armed the Janjaweed militia which has been involved in the killings, mass rapes and village burning.
Dr Abdin told Radio 4’s Today programme: “These militias are self-armed groups. They have never been armed by the Sudan government, their activities have never been condoned by the Sudanese government.
“The government has never, is not, pursuing ethnic cleansing policies at all.”
The Janjaweed had been proclaimed illegal, he added.
He said the use of the term ethnic cleansing was “unfortunate” and said the displaced people had simply been “caught in the crossfire” of the civil war.
The government’s main aim was to stop the war “without going into blaming and shaming”, he said.
“The war has practically stopped. There is a ceasefire. As we speak, monitors are taking their place on the ground.
“What remains to be done is to alleviate the suffering.”
But John Bercow, the shadow secretary of state for international development, called the denials “utterly unconvincing”.
“There is growing evidence, gathered not least by the international aid agencies, of a policy of remorseless ethnic cleansing in the Sudan,” he said.
“It is time that the world woke up to the danger that Sudan could be the next Rwanda, unless the international community acts decisively to stop this evil in its tracks.”
Meanwhile the United Nations said yesterday it will need $800 million to cover the humanitarian crisis in western Sudan and a separate programme to return thousands of refugees to their homes after the end of the civil war in southern Sudan.
An estimated 800,000 southern Sudanese displaced during 21 years of war will return to villages in the south lacking water, roads or housing according to Bernt Aasen, the UN deputy humanitarian co-ordinator in the region.