What’s needed if peace is achieved in southern Sudan
By Joe De Capua
WASHINGTON, 28 June 2004 (VOA) — Talks between the Sudanese government and SPLA rebels resumed yesterday (Sunday) in Naivasha, Kenya, in hopes of ending more than 20 years of civil war. The latest round of talks is expected to focus on security and a permanent ceasefire, following agreements on power sharing and autonomy for the south. A humanitarian official says as peace talks continue the humanitarian needs of the people loom large.
Denis Caillaux – secretary general of CARE International – says he’s beginning to see evidence of hope and expectation in Southern Sudan. But hope and expectation, by themselves, don’t fill empty stomachs or cure diseases.
“Well the conditions are tremendously improved because there is a general feeling that peace is getting closer. But the physical conditions of the people have not changed. What struck me as I was there was the huge expectation by the people that peace is at hand and they really want to seize the moment. And on the other hand, conditions have to be put on the ground so that living conditions improve, that returnees can go back to their villages and so on,” he says.
Mr. Caillaux says, “The first dividend of peace is peace. People need to be reassured that the war is over and security exists.” Therefore, he says, one of the first things that must be done is to clear the many mines that have been laid over the past 20 years.
Then there’s the matter of the four million people who have been displaced and want to return home.
He says, “You know, going back is not a trivial proposition for these people. They’ve been away for so many years. They don’t really know how they will be received back home precisely because they’ve been away for so long and so on. So what we’re talking about there is a process of bringing people together, facilitating the reunification of families, and the rebuilding of communities. It won’t happen overnight. However, if we could really have, which would be a tremendous step forward, a tremendous change in the Sudan, a free movement of people because there is peace precisely. If people can move around, we would be on the right track, no doubt.”
But the secretary general of CARE International says the current peace talks are just the first step to bringing stability to southern Sudan – and he says the situation in Sudan’s Darfur region should serve as a warning.
“What we have has been an agreement between the authorities in Khartoum – the government of Sudan – and the major power in the south. Now you have many, many other stakeholders to the peace process who now have to be brought into the peace process itself. What we have had in Naivasha (site of talks in Kenya) is a fundamental first step in the process. But there are many additional steps that we need to take now. If you take the terrible situation, the dramatic situation, that we have in Darfur now. And you have many potential smaller Darfurs that could erupt in other parts of Sudan. Because you have many groups that have not yet been included in the peace process. And it is vital now to do so,” he says.
Already, a southern rebel commander is reported threatening not to join a coalition government if the violence in Darfur continues.
The United Nations has called Darfur the worst humanitarian situation in the world right now. One million people have been displaced – many thousands have died – and US officials have described the situation there as ethnic cleansing. The U-S Congressional Black Caucus calls it genocide. Black African rebel groups are fighting government forces, including the Arab militias known as janjaweed. Sudanese refugees have accused the militias of murder, rape and robbery.
Mr. Caillaux says those literally on the fringes of Sudanese society must not be left out of the peace process.
“What we should do is to start action now in what is called the garrison towns. These are sometimes no more than big villages, in fact. But these are areas all over the country where the peace dividends have to show literally as soon as we possible can. And then we will evolve by concentric circles almost around these places covering a broader and broader territory as we move along,” he says.
The CARE official says he doesn’t have an estimate yet on the cost of rebuilding southern Sudan, but he says it will be substantial.
“This is the biggest country in Africa; you’re talking about 37-million people. It’s going to be quite a financial commitment that the international community will have to provide. And in these days and age where donor countries are under pressure from a lot of other angles, you know, I’m concerned about that,” he says.
Currently, CARE is operating in greater Khartoum, North and West Kordofan, Unity State, Western Bahr El Ghazal and Darfur among others.