Is Darfur sliding back into hell? Spate of violence in ‘ungovernable’ Darfur, Sudan stokes fears of war

NOTE from Sudan Watch editor: Sadly, here we are again… (Thanks CW!) 

Is Darfur sliding back into hell? 

Spate of violence in ‘ungovernable’ region stokes fears of war. 

Hopes for lasting peace scatter as the region barrels towards a series of tit for tat tribal attacks – a grim echo of a not-so-distant past. 

A local power struggle is ongoing in Darfur. 

As the Sudanese currency tanks, the control of gold supplies has become incredibly important and many experts believe that Hemeti is the most powerful man in the country. 

He is also perhaps Russia’s top ally in the region, and spent a week in Moscow at the beginning of the Ukraine invasion. Read more:

Tens of thousands of people have been displaced – a grim echo of the past
CREDIT: RAMZI HAIDAR /AFP

From: The Telegraph, UK

By WILL BROWN, AFRICA CORRESPONDENT

Published Monday 23 May 2022; 4:21pm

Is Darfur sliding back into hell? Spate of violence in ‘ungovernable’ region stokes fears of war

Hopes for lasting peace scatter as the region barrels towards a series of tit for tat tribal attacks – a grim echo of a not-so-distant past

It was the first genocide of the 21st century. A once peaceful land governed by traditional leaders split along tribal fissures and turned into a killing field the size of France. Some 300,000 people were shot, brutalised or starved to death.

After two decades of horrors in Iraq, Syria, Myanmar, Ethiopia and now Ukraine, the name Darfur has fallen out of the international consciousness – a distant memory of famished children and men on horseback with Kalashnikovs that the world would rather forget.

But last month, events in southwestern Sudan scattered hopes of a lasting peace and sent Darfur barrelling towards a series of tit for tat tribal attacks.

On April 22, the small town of Kreinik and some 16 villages around it in the West Darfur region were surrounded by hundreds of armed men. Some came on horses, others on motorbikes or in Toyotas decked out with high calibre machine guns.

The men came from the Arab Reizegat tribe. The townsfolk were mainly members of the black ethnic Massalit community. Two Arabs had been recently killed in the town and the gunmen were out for revenge.

The attackers went on a killing spree and then stormed into the Geneina, the region’s capital. The UN said more than 1,000 armed Reizegats swept into the town. According to the governor of the region, the vastly outgunned regular government forces withdrew into the local garrison.

The Reizegats pillaged the town and by the time it was all over, some 200 people had been shot or butchered including medical staff at the main hospital. Tens of thousands had been displaced, a grim echo of a not-so-distant past.

“It is destined to continue and escalate. I don’t expect the violence to subside any time soon. Darfur is ungovernable right now for any armed security force,” said Suliman Baldo, at the International Centre for Transitional Justice and a top expert on Darfur. But why now? Why is Darfur slipping backwards after years of peace negotiations and tens of billions of dollars spent on peacekeeping and humanitarian efforts?

Unresolved tribal competition

The borderland area between Sudan, South Sudan, Chad and the Central African Republic is probably the most ungoverned space on earth. Much of what’s going on is a mystery – but there are clearly several factors at play behind the spate of violence.

First, a local power struggle is ongoing. While Darfuri history and communal relations defy simplistic stereotypes, a key factor at the root of the recent spate of violence is a longstanding and unresolved tribal competition for access to resources, according to Mr Baldo.

Darfur is not the endless barren desert portrayed in glossy NGO brochures pleading for funding. Parts of the region are incredibly wealthy with good pasture, arable land and vast quantities of gold.

As Sudan’s tattered economy struggles with global shocks of the pandemic, war in Ukraine and a regional drought, competition over these scarce resources is increasing.

“This is strongly reminiscent of the conflict we’ve seen in Darfur before running along tribal and racial fissures,” said Jonas Horner, an independent expert on Sudan. “The root causes of those conflicts were never addressed.”

Events some 700 miles away in the Sudanese capital are also playing a major role.

For much of the last century, Darfur has been a periphery area that elites in the bustling metropole Khartoum have tried to dominate for resources. The current situation in Khartoum is tense and experts say power struggles are spilling out into the periphery.

Sudan’s old Islamist dictator, Omar al-Bashir – who once played different Darfuri groups against each other and terrorised Darfur with bands of Arab janjaweed militiamen – was swept away in a revolution in 2019 after almost four decades in power.

A liberal former UN-staffer, Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, was charged with guiding Sudan along the road to full democracy as part of a complex transitional government. But he was ousted in a coup in October 2021.

Now two major groups are tussling for control. On one hand, is the Sudanese Armed Force (SAF), headed up by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan – who is now the de-facto head of state and in many ways represents the old interests of the old centralised elites.

On the other hand there is Hemeti, a Darfuri warlord from the same Arab Reizegat tribe who carried out last month’s massacre. Hemeti heads up a well-armed militia movement called the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which was formed out of the old janjaweed raiders and controls some of Darfur’s major gold mining areas.

Locked in a simmering struggle

As the Sudanese currency tanks, the control of gold supplies has become incredibly important and many experts believe that Hemeti is the most powerful man in the country. He is also perhaps Russia’s top ally in the region, and spent a week in Moscow at the beginning of the Ukraine invasion.

Both the SAF and RSF are locked in a simmering struggle which keeps coming perilously close to outright conflict. There are multiple eyewitnesses and media reports indicating that uniformed RSF soldiers supported the Rizeigat Arabs when they attacked the Massalit last month.

Even though the SAF forces have a duty to protect Sudanese civilians, they did not want to confront the RSF in Darfur – most probably because it could have escalated into an even larger fight.

Mr Baldo said the recent attacks shows just how incompetent and ethnicised Sudan’s security forces are, and how little control the Sudanese state has in rural areas.

“The massacre is an indictment of the military-led government in Khartoum, in place since the October 25, 2021 coup. When the military seized power their claim was that they – as security forces – needed to step in to provide security,” Mr Horner said.

“Recent evidence in Darfur and elsewhere sees them failing completely in their most fundamental task,” he added.

Russian mercenaries could also be a factor in the recent spate of violence. Mercenaries working for the Wagner group are involved in diamond and gold mining in the Central Africa Republic and have been accused of carrying out massacres close to the Sudanese border.

This could be feeding into local power dynamics in the Darfur area, upsetting a complex web of local interests in ways which are not fully understood.

Another factor is Chad. The country’s former dictator Idriss Déby used to be the West’s go-to strong man in Central Africa. Mr Deby’s well-trained desert army helped keep a lid on many of the nastiest groups in the region for years, guaranteeing his dictatorial regime strong Western support.

But since Mr Déby was killed last year, allegedly while fighting with his troops on the frontline, his son Mahamat Idriss Déby has struggled to fill his father's shoes. The Chadian security forces are struggling to exert the same amount of influence in Chad’s borderland areas.

This could, Mr Horner says, be giving oxygen to some of the more violent groups in Darfur.

PHOTO AND CAPTION: Darfur has fallen out of the international consciousness – a distant memory that the world would rather forget CREDIT: Zohra Bensemra/Reuters

PHOTO AND CAPTION: A child refugee from the Darfur region of Sudan pictured at a refugee camp in Chad in 2004 CREDIT: Scott Nelson/Getty Images

PHOTO AND CAPTION: A local power struggle is ongoing in Dafur CREDIT: MARCO LONGARI,/AFP

PHOTO AND CAPTION: Supporters of Sudan's former President Omar Hassan al-Bashir protest in Khartoum in 2008 CREDIT: MOHAMED NURELDIN ABDALLAH /REUTERS

View the original here: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/terror-and-security/darfur-sliding-back-spate-violence-ungovernable-region-stokes/

Sudan mediators hit 'hurdles' after coup

Here is a copy of a news report in full by Agence France-Presse (AFP) News 

Dated Tuesday, 2 November 2021 at 1:36 PM - reprinted by International Business Times.com

Sudan Mediators Hit 'Hurdles' After Coup

Just over a week after Sudan's top general locked up political leaders and seized power sparking mass protests and a deadly crackdown, mediators are seeking to restore the transition to civilian rule.

But experts warn that Sudan's military and civilian leadership are deeply divided, senior figures remain under military guard, and rebuilding trust between rival factions is a mammoth task.

"We sat with all actors from the military and civilian sides," one mediator said on condition of anonymity.

That intermediary is among a stream of leading Sudanese figures -- including businessmen, academics and journalists -- who have been trying to break the stalemate.

"We secured initial consent for talks, but hurdles remain in the way," the mediator added.

Sudan has enjoyed only rare democratic interludes since independence in 1956 and spent decades riven by civil war.

Since August 2019, the northeast African country had been ruled by a joint civilian-military council as part of the now derailed transition to full civilian rule.

But in a move widely condemned internationally, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan -- Sudan's de facto leader since the 2019 ouster of autocratic president Omar al-Bashir -- last week dissolved the government, detained the civilian leadership, and declared a state of emergency.

It triggered nationwide mass protests against the military -- demonstrations met by a deadly crackdown by security forces, resulting in at least a dozen people killed and scores wounded.

After armed troops were sent to crush protesters, street demonstrations have faded, although the situation remains volatile.

World powers demanded a swift return to civilian rule, and made punitive aid cuts that will hit hard in a country already mired in a dire economic crisis.

Last week, Burhan, a veteran general who served under Bashir's three-decades long iron fisted rule, vowed to form another civilian government.

Yet the two sides remain far apart.

"The civilians feel burnt by what their military partners did on October 25th," and will have "a high expectation" of guarantees to trust the military again, said Jeffrey Feltman, the US special envoy for the Horn of Africa.

Both sides, however, are going to need to work together, Feltman added.

"One's not going to be able to sideline the military, just as the military should not be trying to sideline civilians as they are now."

He told reporters the US has been in touch with Egypt and the United Arab Emirates to discuss Sudan's crisis.

The main civilian bloc, the Forces for Freedom and Change (FFC) which led anti-Bashir protests, had just before the coup divided into two opposing factions, with a splinter group supporting the military.

The mainstream FFC remains committed to civilian rule. It says civilian leaders -- including Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, who is effectively under house arrest -- must be freed before negotiations can progress.

"We insisted on the release of civilian detainees and resumption of the power-sharing deal as a prerequisite for talks," said Kamal Ismail, an FFC leader, after meetings with African Union officials.

"We believe these are not conditions. They are simply our rights."

The AU last week suspended Sudan's membership "until the effective restoration of the civilian-led transitional authority", and a team from the bloc's Peace and Security Council is expected in Khartoum on Wednesday.

United Nations officials and Western diplomats have called for the return of the government.

"We're engaging with all Sudanese across a very broad political spectrum," said Volker Perthes, UN special representative to Sudan, said Monday.

Neighbouring South Sudan, which contributes significantly to Khartoum through fees for sending its oil to export through a pipeline in Sudan, sent presidential adviser Tut Gatluak to try to help broker talks.

"We seek to bring all sides to hold a comprehensive dialogue on all issues," Gatluak said.

Other senior Sudanese mediators have held two meetings with Burhan on behalf of the FFC.

"He listened to the demands, and said he would take them into consideration," one mediator said on condition of anonymity.

However, the mediator warned they did not expect a resolution any time soon.

"We don't expect the military to heed these demands on the first attempt," he added, citing "ongoing tensions and the lack of trust."

PHOTO: A man walks past gas cylinders in Sudan's capital Khartoum on November 2, 2021 as talks to broker peace between rival factions continue Photo: AFP / Ashraf SHAZLY

IMAGE: Key economic indicators for Sudan. AFP / Jonathan WALTER

PHOTO: AFP / - Sudanese anti-coup protesters gathered in their thousands on October 30, 2021 to express their support for the country's democratic transition 

PHOTO: AFP / ASHRAF SHAZLY: Sudanese Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, seen here in August 2020, has been pressing for the United States to delist his nation as a state sponsor of terrorism 

Copyright AFP. All rights reserved.

View original:  https://www.ibtimes.com/sudan-mediators-hit-hurdles-after-coup-3329722

Sudan: Hamdok says solution hinges on return of govt

NOTE from Sudan Watch editor:  Although there is a lack of news about Sudan’s cabinet ministers, their current whereabouts and how well they are being treated, it is clear that the UN Security Council and many ambassadors and diplomats round the world are following events closely and doing everything possible to ensure Mr Hamdok and his detained ministers and politicians are being kept safe and well.

Shortly after the military coup, a news report stated that a cabinet minister had been arrested at home during the night and taken to an unnamed location still wearing his night clothes. 

The following copy of a news report by AFP says PM Hamdok is quoted as saying "the release of the cabinet ministers and the full reinstatement of the government could pave the way to a solution”. The source of the quote is the Facebook page of Sudan’s information ministry.

The report reveals that the coup leader Gen Burhan said the detainees were being kept in "a decent place" and that those facing charges "will be moved to where the accused are usually taken while the rest will be released."

I have no verifiable news about current internet access in Sudan, cut off by the junta during the coup.

Here is a full copy of a news report written by Agence France-Presse (AFP)

Published at France24 dot com

Dated Monday, 1 November 2021, 9:23 pm

Sudan's ousted PM says solution hinges on return of govt: ministry

Sudan's ousted Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok said Monday [Nov 1] the reinstatement of his government, dissolved in a military coup, could pave the way to a solution in the country, the information ministry said.

Hamdok spoke during a meeting at his home, where he is under effective house arrest, with the ambassadors of the United States, Britain and Norway, the ministry which remains loyal to the prime minister said.

On October 25, Sudan's top general Abdel Fattah al-Burhan dissolved the cabinet as well as the ruling joint military-civilian Sovereign Council which had been heading Sudan's transition towards full civilian rule following the 2019 overthrow of autocrat Omar al-Bashir.

In a move widely condemned internationally, Burhan declared a state of emergency and detained Sudan's civilian leadership, including Hamdok and members of his government.

Hamdok, an international economist, was later released and placed effectively under house arrest.

The ousted prime minister "insisted on the legitimacy of his government and transitional institutions", the information ministry said on its Facebook page.

He added that "the release of the cabinet ministers and the full reinstatement of the government could pave the way to a solution," the ministry said.

Hamdok, according to the statement, demanded that the situation in Sudan return to what it was before the coup, refusing to negotiate with the military rulers.

The statement added that the three ambassadors also informed Hamdok that the US special envoy for the Horn of Africa, Jeffrey Feltman, would arrive at dawn Tuesday in Khartoum "to pursue efforts to ease the crisis".

'Dangerous legal situation'

Earlier Monday [Nov 1] a Sudanese lawyer representing the detained civilian leaders said their whereabouts is unknown and that they are in a "dangerous legal situation".

Kamal al-Gizouli is the lead defence lawyer on a team of attorneys which has come forward to represent them with the backing of their families.

Gizouli said his team went to an agency "where they were believed to have been held but we found that they were not there."

Gizouli expressed concern about the well-being of the detainees and called on those holding them to reveal their location.

"These detainees are in the most dangerous legal situation" since nothing was known about their case nor who was heading the investigation, he added.

Little is known about the whereabout of his cabinet and the members of the council that had been tasked with paving the way to full civilian rule.

Burhan had since August 2019 chaired the council, working alongside Hamdok's government under a power-sharing deal that outlined the post-Bashir transition.

The arrangement came under strain, however, as splits deepened between the civilians and the military.

Jonas Horner, senior analyst for Sudan at International Crisis Group think tank, speaking to AFP earlier Monday, said Hamdok will "find that his political cache has been boosted" by recent events, "and that he is in fact strengthened from what was a relatively weak position previously."

Horner cited, for example, Hamdok's "principled stance" prior to the putsch in refusing to dissolve his government.

In a news conference last week, Burhan defended the military's takeover, saying it was "not a coup" but a move to "rectify the course of the transition".

The general also said the detainees were being kept in "a decent place" and that those facing charges "will be moved to where the accused are usually taken while the rest will be released."

Sudanese and international efforts have been made to mediate a way out of the crisis since the coup.

"We call on all sides mediating to resolve the crisis to demand that the whereabouts of these ministers and politicians be known," said Gizouli.

On Sunday, the UN special representative to Sudan, Volker Perthes, said options for mediation have been discussed with Hamdok and other Sudanese stakeholders.

Photo and caption: Sudan's ousted Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, pictured in September 2021, has been effectively under house arrest since the military coup (AFP/-)

bur-mon/hkb/it

View original: https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20211101-sudan-s-ousted-pm-says-solution-hinges-on-return-of-govt-ministry