Sudan’s southern rebels deny involvement in crisis in Darfur region
NAIROBI, Sept 16 (AFP) — The rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) strongly denied a Sudan government allegation that the group and its leader John Garang are involved in the conflict in the western Darfur region.
“The SPLA has no hand in what is happening in Darfur. The crisis is a creation of the Sudan government and therefore to accuse us is only to look for a scapegoat,” SPLA spokesman Samson Kwaje told AFP by telephone in Nairobi.
Kwaje was reacting to an earlier report quoting Sudan Deputy Foreign Minister Fidail el Tijani of accusing the SPLA and Garang in Paris of involvement in the ongoing bloody rebellion in Darfur.
“He is not distant from what’s happening in Darfur: directly or indirectly, he is there,” Tijani said on Radio France International, referring to Garang.
But Kwaje denied this, saying “Khartoum has to address the crisis in Darfur objectively, as they created the situation by their actions and policy of marginalisation.”
“When the people of Darfur presented their grievances, the government reacted with heavy-handedness by first sending large numbers of troops to Darfur, followed by recruitment and arming of Arab militia, the Janjaweed,” Kwaje pointed out.
“The Janjaweed were instructed by the government to burn villages, kill civilians in general and humiliate civilians by raping women and girls and taking young men into slavery,” Kwaje charged.
“The SPLM/A has nothing to do with the present rebellion in Darfur,” Kwaje stressed.
“We have no common border with Darfur and, therefore, the Sudan government must resolve the problem in Darfur, accept international assistance or right to intervene with humanitarian assistance, and much more, to help the government troops to disarm the Janjaweed militia and arrest their leaders” Kwaje added.
The Sudan charges come as long-running talks to end a 21-year war in southern Sudan, sparked when Garang’s rebels rose up against the government in Khartoum to end domination of the south, are at an advanced stage, but have been bogged down over security issues.
The talks adjourned in July and are due to resume next month to try to iron out differences between Khartoum and the southern rebels over the military aspect of a power-sharing pact.
El Tijani, who was in Paris for talks on the conflict in Darfur, in which some 50,000 people have died in 19-months of war, said Khartoum was putting off signing a definitive peace pact with the southern rebels because “we feel there should not be peace if, at the same time, they are backing a rebellion somewhere else.”