Bashir’s congratulation for Trump remains double-edged sword
By Mahmoud A. Suleiman
This is a note to the readers of this article about my use of the phrase double-edged sword. It means that Omar al-Bashir’s Speedy congratulation offer to Donald Trump might turn out with negative results such as a miscalculation that recoils on its maker – like a boomerang! This assumption is based on the unpredictability and fame of President Donald Trump in the Issuance of Controversial Executive Orders with far reaching consequences. Travel ban for citizens of majority Muslim countries to the US for ninety days, an example par excellence. And of course, we should not turn a blind eye to his views on the construction of the fence between his country and Mexico and that he does not recognise the climate change and his unjustified hostility towards the media and journalists for no apparent reasons and so forth. Perhaps we have not wronged the US president in his right if we brought some of the aforementioned examples of the actions of the new US President Donald Trump.
AS for the NCP regime president Omer Hassan Ahmed al-Bashir, he feels a little glee and pleasure these days for the positions taken by the so-called international community, which began to flirt with the ruling regime in Khartoum, according to the intersecting interests. This is more so especially the wave of migration coming from the Horn of African countries – Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia and Djibouti to European beaches and shores across the Mediterranean Sea, Libya, as well as the fight against terrorism coming from the state Islamist in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in exchange for millions of euros from the European Union (EU). It is noteworthy that the regime of the NCP built camps in the far East region of Sudan to imprison refugees from the Horn of African countries in dire humanitarian conditions similar to the Nazi camps to prevent them crossing into Europe. And worst, they are denied of access to the money which is estimated in the millions obtained from the EU. It is reported that there are about 35 thousand refugees in the states of Eastern Sudan., The most famous and most influential among the camps is “Shejarab” Camp in Kassala State ???? – ????? ?????. https://www.alrakoba.net/news-action-show-id-41320.htm.
With regards to the favourable report of the outgoing the U.S. Special Envoy for Sudan and South Sudan Donald E. Booth about the Sudanese regime, political analysts thought that Mr. Booth was a frustrated envoy and never achieved anything tangible during the tenure of his office. He tried to reward the genocidal criminal regime! Moreover, Mr Booth’s master of grace, former President Barak Obama, also rewarded the (NCP) regime partial lifting of economic sanctions before his departure, which the people of Sudan’s War-Torn Darfur region – survivors of genocide – would not shed tears as he (Obama) failed to honour his pledges and promises he made 8 years ago.
It is regrettable that the international community represented in the UN Special Panel for Darfur on behalf the UN Security Council, visiting the National Congress Party (NCP) government in Khartoum has been writing reports the source of information of which is the ruling regime of the NCP without their visits to areas of conflict in Darfur. The people of Darfur strongly believe that the UNSC armchair report writers have been depending in most cases on false information in their accounts. And even worst is hat the UN Security Council issues allegations against the armed movements of Darfur based on those biased reports and incriminates them of alleged recruitment of Child Soldiers without verified evidence free from suspicion and falsehood. It is regrettable that the UNSC unfortunately, has brought itself into disrepute and to the degree of lack of credibility through the reports based on information gathered from the criminal genocidal regime of the National Congress Party (NCP) in Khartoum that playing the roles of judge, jury and executioner.
Based on the foregoing, the people of Sudan in the war-torn region of Darfur would like to express their disappointment regarding the lack of attention to the grievances underlying the current conflict in Darfur. Still, injustice from the (NCP) affects the people of Darfur especially the students from Darfur in universities and other higher education institutions throughout Sudan, discrimination against the people of Darfur in cities, government institutions, civil and military service and business. The NCP regime deliberately failed to disarm or disband the Janjaweed militias – the NCP recycled Janjaweed the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) which wreaked havoc on the villages, towns and cities including the Sudanese Capital Khartoum and of course the region of Darfur leading to more displacement and migration of the population. Therefore, no lasting peace is expected in Sudan without addressing the underlying causes of the conflict and their resolution. The Darfur crisis has continued as it were 14 years on without a tangible hope. The people of Darfur in particular and Sudan, in general, expect the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to take greater notice of the need to resolve the causes of the ongoing woes and other issues facing the civilian population. Moreover, among what makes political observers surprised and frustration for the citizens is the silence of the international institution (UNSC) on the use of chemical weapons by the Government of Sudan against the civilian population of Darfur in the Jebel Marra locality and certainly there are other unresolved grievances. And, of course, there is still non-stop talk about the genocidal criminal and the fugitive from the international justice, leader of the NCP regime, Omer Hassan Ahmed al-Bashir who continues freely travelling widely even to countries considered signatories and ratified the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), and his arrest warrant. The first warrant for arrest for Omar Hassan Ahmad Al Bashir was issued on 4 March 2009, the second on 12 July 2010. However, the suspect is still at large. https://www.icc-cpi.int/darfur/albashir. The Popular proverb says that snakes no matter how long they age, they cannot dispense with their deadly poison. Accordingly, the ruling regime of the NCP remains dependent on harbouring terrorists. And all the reports confirm the existence of their evil hands in Libya and Egypt joining the forces with fellow jihadists of multitude names. The international community’s reliance on the ruling regime of the NCP to fight terrorism is nothing but running after the mirage thinking there was a sea of water, so to speak.!
Now we enter in some details to the subject of the title of this article. News Media outlets carried a lot of commentaries and criticisms of the recent news about the US new President Donald J. Trump’s myriad Executive Orders (EO) that have so far affected many people’s lives around the globe. Opinions on the (EOs) of President Trump have been diverse. As for the people of Sudan in Darfur, they wish President Donald Trump in Washington to issue a new Executive Order (EO) to link the lifting of economic sanctions on Sudan to sustainable Peace and Democratic reforms. As we know very well that the lifting of economic sanctions on Sudan, which is decided by the former US President Barack Obama will only benefit the parasitic capitalists, vampires and the consumers of public coffers affiliated to the ruling regime of the NCP and will not benefit the Sudanese people in Darfur who suffer from poverty, disease, killing and forced displacement from their original homes to bring in foreigners in their place for preparation for the crime of demographic change of the region. But the people of Sudan do not object in principle lifting of economic sanctions on Sudan in the event that would benefit the members of the general disenfranchised Sudanese public. But with respect to President Trump’s controversial Executive Orders (EOs), some quarters considered them as blessings whereas others might have called them as a “Disaster in the Making “. In that, as if the President is offering Cart Blanche to the extremist terrorists to target the US. The latter referring to the travel ban for Seven Muslim-Majority Countries of Sudan, Syria, Somalia, Iran, Iraq, Libya, and Yemen. Most of the criticism towards the travel ban strategy came from people within the US, EU and Iran. The rest of the world including the National Congress Party (NCP) regime in Sudan which earlier praised the coming of Donald Trump as a US President and successor to President Barack Obama, who lifted partially the economic sanctions imposed on Sudan since the era of the rule of former President Bill Clinton then, in 1997. President Bill Clinton issued that Executive Order to stop the National Islamic Front (NIF) in Sudan from sponsoring ‘terrorism’ for harbouring extremist Islamists, among them Osama Bin Laden and as well as to its violations of human rights. To be more precise, the U.S. placed Sudan on its list of countries sponsoring terrorism in 1993, and in 1997 President Clinton imposed a comprehensive trade embargo against Sudan and blocked the assets of the Sudanese government, claiming it was sponsoring international terrorism. Osama bin Laden was living in Khartoum, as a guest of the Sudan’s government, when he was suspected of responsibility for the bombings of the United States Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, in 1998, killing more than 200 people. In 1995, sanctions led Sudan to cut its ties with terrorists and expelled Osama bin Laden on May 18, 1996, to Afghanistan. Peter Bergen the American journalist, author, documentary producer, professor, think tank executive and CNN’s national security analyst has been quoted as said that – at one point people in al Qaeda were actually drawing monthly paychecks when they were based in Sudan. https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/p/peterlber432542.html. Furthermore, Barton David Gellman the American journalist and bestselling author known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning reports on the September 11 attacks has been reported as had indicated that the government of Sudan, employing a back channel direct from its president to the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), offered in the early spring of 1996 to arrest Osama bin Laden and place him in Saudi custody, according to officials and former officials in all three countries https://www.google.co.uk/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=Barton+Gellman+and+sudan. In retaliation, President Bill Clinton ordered a cruise missile strike against what turned out to be a pharmaceutical factory in Khartoum, named ‘Al-Shifa’. The US administration, at the time, claimed the plant was actually a disguised chemical weapons factory. The US officials said that soil samples taken outside the Al-Shifa plant had shown the presence of a substance known as Empta, whose only function was to make the nerve gas VX. The plant, moreover, was heavily guarded, the President Clinton Administration said, and it showed a suspicious lack of ordinary commercial activities. Since 1997 the US has regularly renewed sanctions quoting the continuing conflicts in Darfur, Blue Nile and South Kordofan regions and humanitarian issues as well as a number of outstanding issues between Sudan and South Sudan including the dispute over the oil-rich area of Abyei. http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.mfa.gov.et/-/united-states-announces-its-intention-to-lift-economic-sanctions-on-sudan&gws_rd=cr&ei=qRCWWKreNojDgAa5x4WgBw
Many people wonder about the possibility that the new American President Donald Trump to issue an Executive Order to cancel former President Obama’s decision to lift economic sanctions on Sudan in part as he tried to cancel Obama’s previous decisions, and particular in the area known by the term Obamacare which is the plan for health care and health services. And what making its likelihood stronger is the re-inclusion of the name of Sudan among the countries that have been prohibited from entering its civilians to the United States for a period of ninety days. In the period 1990–1991 the National Islamic Front (NIF) under the leadership of the late Dr. Hassan Abdalla al-Turabi established the Popular Arab and Islamic Congress Conference (PAIC) that sought to unify Mujahideen and other Islamic elements in the wake of the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan and the Iraqi defeat in the Gulf War. Al-Turabi’s move was thought as an attempt of forming a Pan-Arabism and Pan-Islamic union. It was estimated to have brought together 500 people among them Osama Bin Laden, from 45 nations; Hassan al-Turabi, as Secretary-General of the Conference. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popular_Arab_and_Islamic_Congress
The NIF slogans at the time were very hostile to the West in general and to the United States of America in particular. The NIF considered the US as its arch-enemy; and that its demise has had been nearing! Moreover, the NIF affiliates boasted that their ideology emanated from what they called the “Cultural Project and Apostolic Orientation”. Moreover, they strongly thought that both America and Russia their Torment has been brought near!
Today there is a Sudanese citizen who has said in a letter to both America and Russia Let’s open a new avenue for securing food for many of the inhabitants of the earth, to all humanity without any sort of religious affiliation, race, colour creed, gender, age or locality and open the new page or interests and to fight hunger, poverty and ignorance, not only in Sudan but in many parts of the globe!
The foregoing Logos of hatred which were raised by the NIF and traded in the name of the Islamic religion only for the acquisition of empowerment, corruption and enrichment to defraud the ordinary Muslim people and those logos have now gone unheeded! Moreover, the National Congress Party (NCP) regime and its predecessor National Islamic Front (NIF) have long claimed their Arab ancestry and contempt and disdain for the rest of the citizens and residents of the country of Sudan on the basis of racism and condescension in spite of their physical Negroid features. Racism goes on in the souls of those staunchly affiliated to the Supremacist Muslim Brotherhood Movement in Sudan as the blood that runs in their bodies! Nevertheless, the phrase “the pot calling the kettle black” is applicable to them. Leila Aboulela, the Sudanese writer who writes in English and Her latest novel, The Kindness of Enemies is inspired by the life of Imam Shamil, who united the tribes of the Caucasus to fight against Russian Imperial expansion has been quoted as saying: (Sudan is not Arab enough for Arabs and not African enough for Africans).
http://www.quotter.net/sudan-is-not-arab-enough-for-arabs-and-not-african-enough-for-africans-quote-by-leila-aboulela_1188001
Dr. Mahmoud A. Suleiman is an author, columnist and a blogger. His blog is http://thussudan.wordpress.com/