Chad, Sudan agree to joint border force-Chad radio
N’DJAMENA, July 10 (Reuters) – The presidents of Sudan and Chad agreed on Saturday to set up joint border patrols following complaints from Chad that violence in Sudan’s Darfur region has spilled over onto its territory, Chadian state radio reported.
The two leaders met in the town of Geneina in Darfur, the area of western Sudan where fighting has forced more than a million people from their homes and created what the United Nations says is currently the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir and his Chadian counterpart, Idriss Deby, also agreed to create a joint security commission and another group to assess damage caused by cross-border raids, the state broadcaster said.
“It was important for us to put in place a security structure which is going to play a role at the border so we can stop these incursions from one side or the other by people conducting raids,” Deby said.
Sudanese reporters who travelled to Geneina with Bashir quoted him as saying the agreement was on a joint verification committee to look into complaints and assess the losses in lives and in property from the cross-border incursions. The journalists did not mention joint patrols.
“We will be working to secure the border between the two nations in coordination with the tribal and popular leaderships as well as parliamentarians from both sides,” Bashir added.
After long conflict between Arab nomads and black African villagers, a rebellion broke out in Darfur last year. U.S. and U.N. officials have accused the mounted Arab Janjaweed militia of a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the villagers.
Local people and human rights groups have alleged Sudan’s Islamist government is backing the militia, a charge it denies.
The Janjaweed have also carried out cross-border raids, according to rights groups and people in the area. Deby said this week 300 Chadians had been killed and thousands of cattle had been taken away.
The new joint border force would be set up in the shortest possible time, Chadian radio said.
Bashir said Sudan had also agreed to assemble the rebels in specific garrisons while simultaneously disarming the Janjaweed, all under the supervision of African Union observers.
The African Union agreed this week to send a military force of around 270 soldiers to protect 60 AU ceasefire observers.
AU leaders said the troops would also intervene if civilians came under attack but analysts have questioned how much a small force would be able to achieve in a region the size of France.
On Saturday Sudanese Interior Minister Abdel Rahim Mohamed Hussein issued a new decree setting up a system for ensuring that humanitarian aid reaches Darfur, as demanded by the United States and the United Nations.
A group of officials will monitor the flow of assistance from an office set up at Khartoum airport and will send daily reports to the minister, named by Bashir as his special representative for the three Darfur states, the decree said. (Additional reporting by Nima Elbagir in Khartoum)