Sudan peace talks begin in Chad with new Darfur rebels
NDJAMENA, Dec 14 (AFP) — Talks between Sudan’s government and a rebel group from the strife-wracked western Darfur region began Tuesday in Ndjamena, with Chad mediating.
Chad’s Foreign Minister Nagoum Yamasoum said the aim of negotiations between Khartoum’s delegates and those of the National Movement for Reconstruction and Development (NMRD) was to help with peace talks already in hand for Darfur in Nigeria.
The NMRD has recently appeared on the scene in Darfur, as a dissident wing of the rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), which is engaged in peace talks alongside the rebel Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) in Abuja, Nigeria.
“All your African brothers will have their eyes turned on you in hoping that the Ndjamena meeting, aimed at strengthening the Abuja talks, can contribute to bringing a definitive solution to the conflict in Darfur,” Yamasoum said at the start of talks.
When rebels in the region on Sudan’s border with Chad took up arms in February last year, the large Arabic-speaking government cracked down mainly through a proxy militia known as the Janjaweed, blamed by foreign powers and humanitarian organisations for atrocities against local people of black African origin.
The conflict has led to what the United Nations calls the world’s worst current humanitarian crisis, with an estimated 70,000 people killed and about 1.6 million driven from their homes.
Sudan’s Minister for Investment Cherif Ahmat Badopur said in Ndjamena that “the Sudanese government wants peace. If we’re here, it’s to find an solution with our brothers in the NMRD to serve as an example.”
The secretary general of the rebel force, Nourene Manawi Barcham, said the NMRD also wanted a “clear settlement”.
Ndjamena agreed to host the talks at the request of the Khartoum government.
An informed source said that the JEM and SLM had refused to let the NMRD take part in their own lengthy and difficult negotiations with Khartoum, which resumed in the Nigerian capital on Monday.