Sudan government investiges attack on USAID worker

KHARTOUM, March 25 (AFP) — Sudanese authorities in cooperation with the US embassy have launched an investigation into an incident in which a USAID worker was shot and wounded in the troubled Darfur region, a senior official said Friday.

A displaced Sudanese man guards humanitarian aid from the World Food Program at Kalma refugee camp near Nyala town in Sudan’s south Darfur region. (AFP) .

Humanitarian Affairs Minister Ibrahim Mahmud Hamid, quoted by the independent Akhbar Al-Youm daily, said a probe had been launched into Tuesday’s incident and blamed rebel movements for the attack.

A woman working for the US Agency for International Development was wounded while traveling in a humanitarian convoy traveling on a road which was supposed to be safe.

US officials said the woman, an information officer whose named was withheld, was shot in the face but her wounds were not life-threatening.

“The government is sure it was the rebels who attacked the USAID convoy,” said Hamid, explaining that the attack took place in an area where rebels had repeated violated security protocols.

Following the attack, the United Nations on Wednesday declared that the Kass-Nyala road where the attack occurred in South Darfur state was closed to UN staff until further notice.

One of the two main rebel movements in Darfur, the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM), rejected the government’s accusation and charged that non-Sudanese Arab gunmen had infiltrated the area and may be responsible for the shooting.

“We have reason to believe that foreign elements are operating in the region. We think they could have links to Al-Qaeda and are part of a group in favour of Sharia (Islamic law). They are probably behind the attack,” SLM spokesman Mahjub Hussein told AFP.

The spokesman did not elaborate on his claim.

Aid workers have repeatedly come under attack in the Darfur region of western Sudan, with the government and the rebels exchanging accusations over security violations.

An estimated 9,000 aid workers operate in Darfur, which has been torn by civil strife for the past two years and by what the United Nations has termed the world’s worst ongoing humanitarian crisis.