Muslim clerics reach out to Pope

Oct 13 2006 BBC report - excerpt:

An open letter to the Pope from 38 top Muslim clerics in various countries accepts his expressions of regret for his controversial speech on Islam.

But the lengthy letter carried on the website of Islamica magazine also points out "errors" and "mistakes" in the Pope's speech.

The clerics' letter is due to be passed to the Vatican on Sunday.

Pope Benedict sparked an uproar in September by quoting a mediaeval text which linked Islam to violence.

Strange how Muslims can find it within themselves to get up in the air about old writings but say very little about their brothers' perishing in Darfur.

AU launches Darfur dialogue to revive moribund peace deal

At long last, news of Darfur-Darfur Conference. AFP report via ST Oct 13 2006:

Hundreds of officials, rebel and tribal leaders and foreign mediators will meet in Sudan's war torn Darfur in an effort to improve an ailing peace agreement signed earlier this year, the African Union announced Thursday.

No date was set for the so-called "Darfur-Darfur Conference" but the fresh dialogue attempt comes amid huge international pressure on Khartoum to accept peacekeepers in the western region and fears of worsening humanitarian crisis.

"As far as the African Union is concerned we are not going to reopen the DPA (Darfur Peace Agreement) but we are going to see how to enhance it," AU political negotiator Sam Ibok told reporters.

In May, the Sudanese government and the largest Darfur rebel faction signed a peace agreement. But the AU-brokered deal was rejected by other rebel groups and it has failed to make an impact on the ground.

The idea of a wide reconciliation conference had been floated a year before the peace agreement was signed.

"The outcome, the recommendations of the conference will of course have a moral weight, they will not be legally binding, but then they would have the force of reflecting the views of the people in Darfur," said rebel representative Ali Hussein Dossa.

Ibok said the dialogue would look into issues which participants feel are not addressed in the Darfur peace agreements.

The question of how to disarm the pro-government Janjaweed militia, as requested by the peace deal, is expected to top the agenda, he said.

At least 200,000 people have died as a result of fighting, famine and disease, and more than two million have fled their homes in Darfur since the conflict erupted between local rebels and pro-government militia.

A report by the International Crisis Group think tank released Thursday said that international diplomacy had failed to solve the crisis and argued tough sanctions should be imposed on President Omar al-Beshir's regime.

Chris DeWolfe, CEO of MySpace announced that it is sponsoring "Rock for Darfur"

Via arabesquespress Oct 13 2006:

The networking site MySpace announced that it is sponsoring "Rock for Darfur," a fundraising project including concerts across the United States. At least 20 concerts are scheduled on Oct.21.

MySpace also plans a public service commercial featuring Samuel L.Jackson to be shown in movie theaters in October and has created a "Rock for Darfur" page on its site with video footage from George Clooney's trip to Darfur and footage from an upcoming documentary, "The Devil Came on Horseback."

"The crisis in Darfur is a global concern and as a global community we have a responsibility to take action," said Chris DeWolfe, CEO of MySpace

"MySpace's reach gives us an extraordinary opportunity to spread the word and empower individuals to help address the horrors in Darfur."

Eastern Sudan rebels obtain post of presidential assistant

In a statement released in Asmara, which has been hosting and mediating the negotiations, Eritrea's foreign ministry said the pact between Khartoum and the Eastern Front rebels would be inked on Saturday. - ST 11 Oct 2006.

France, Germany urge UN Forces deployment in Darfur

France and Germany Thursday urged the international community to focus more attention on the conflict in Darfur and to press the government to accept UN peacekeepers. - ST/AP 12 Oct 2006.

Egypt, Libya discuss Sudan's Darfur crisis

Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit discussed Wednesday with Ali al-Treiki, head of African affairs department at the Libyan foreign ministry, on Sudan's Darfur crisis. ST 12 Oct 2006.

UN's Malloch Brown says world must act quickly on Darfur

Oct 12 2006 Irish Examiner report:

A senior United Nations official today said the Sudanese government had been able to reject the proposed deployment of a UN peacekeeping force in Darfur because the US and Britain had not done enough to sell the idea to countries around the world.

Deputy Secretary-General Mark Malloch Brown credited US president George Bush and British prime minister Tony Blair for the lead role they have taken in highlighting the suffering in Darfur.

However, he gave them low marks in their efforts to persuade countries to pressure Sudan's President Omar el-Bashir to accept UN peacekeepers.

Speaking to a gathering at the Brookings Institution, Malloch Brown said pressure must be applied to African and Asian nations to convince el-Bashir to change course. He said the world must act quickly lest the grave situation in Darfur deteriorates further.

"We fear the worst because of the massive amount of Sudanese armament in the area," Malloch Brown said.

The United Nations wants to deploy 20,000 troops and police in Darfur, but el-Bashir has been inflexibly opposed.

Sudanese national anthem: the call to arms

Sudanese blogger Black Kush thinks Sudan's national anthem shows how much the Sudanese love to fight each other. Excerpt from Sudanese national anthem: the call to arms:

ARABIC LYRICS

Nahnu Djundullah Djundulwatan.
In Da A Da Il Fida Lam Nakhun.
Natahaddal Maut Endalmihan.
Nashta Ril Madjd Bi Aghlathaman.
Hathihil Ard Lana! Falyaish Sudanuna,
Alaman Bayn Al Umam.
Ya Benissudan, Hatharamzukum;
Yah Miluleb, Wa Yahmi Ardakum.

ENGLISH TRANSLATION

We are the army of God and of our land,
We shall never fail when called to sacrifice.
Whether braving death, hardship or pain,
We give our lives as the price of glory.
May this Our land, Sudan, live long,
Showing all nations the way.
Sons of the Sudan, summoned now to serve,
Shoulder the task of preserving our country.

Sounds like they are their own worst enemies.

'Genocide' developing in Darfur - Nigeria's Obasanjo

African politics in action. The African Union's chairman announced to the press today that genocide is developing in Darfur and AMIS must be handed to the UN but retain its African character. Maybe this news will enable more African leaders to offer African peacekeepers for AMIS - or better still, the "African Union Plus" (= AU mission in Darfur + UN support). See Oct 10 2006 ST - 'Genocide' developing in Darfur - Nigeria's Obasanjo - excerpt:

Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo urged Sudan Tuesday to accept a UN role in its troubled western Darfur region, where he said "genocide" was developing and African peacekeepers are overwhelmed.

In some of the strongest comments by an African leader to date about the situation in Darfur, Obasanjo said the African Union mission must be handed over to the United Nations but retain its African character.

"It is not in the interest of Sudan, nor in the interest of Africa nor indeed in the interest of the world for us all to stand by and see genocide being developed in Darfur," he told diplomats and AU officials at the pan-African body's headquarters here.

Note the report tells us, the US and some relief agencies characterized Darfur as "genocide" in the past, but Obasanjo is believed to be the first African leader to use the word.

Amnesty International's new report

Andreas Kiaby of The Oslo Blog commented here at Sudan Watch, saying ...
Speaking of new reports, amnesty just released a report which can be found here; http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGAFR540552006

Thanks Andreas! Sorry the link appears to lead nowhere. If I can find the report, I'll insert correct URL later on.

Wireless internet tower at AMIS HQ Darfur, W Sudan

See photo and caption at Soldier of Africa: Wireless.

The Right Time To Declare Victory (Drima)

Another gem by Drima The Sudanese Thinker (from The Right Time To Declare Victory):

The day every Sudanese regardless of color or religion has an opportunity to live in peace, get a decent education, a decent healthcare, is well-fed, has access to clean drinking water, has a decent shelter and last but most certainly not least has self-worth is the day I shall proudly stand up and declare victory. For a country with huge amounts of natural resources and with a population of only about 30 million, it's easily achievable. All we desperately need is responsible leadership and a change of the "blame it all on the Joooz" attitude. I hope the progressive recovery takes place in my lifetime because I sincerely wish to be a part of it.

Good luck with your exams Drima! Surely the UN could find a seat for you!

Why Egypt Won't Press Sudan: the Nile

News reports re water in Sudan ought to be regarded as important. See blog entry 8 Oct 2006 by Drima The Sudanese Thinker titled Why Egypt Won't Press Sudan: the Nile.

DARFUR Dying For Heroes - Myspace is organising 20 concerts for Sudan

See links at The Sudanese Thinker: Americans Increasingly Concerned about Darfur.

UN OHCHR Report - Darfur: Hundreds Killed in August Attacks

Not yet had a chance to read this - via Coalition for Darfur 9 Oct 2006:

Darfur: OHCHR Report.

And this [from Reuters via CFD] Darfur: Hundreds Killed in August Attacks.

Sudan accepts to compensate Darfur IDPs - AU official

Here's an interesting development. How else to breathe life into a truce and get civilians onside with Darfur's peace agreement? News of money travels fast. Holdout insurgents refusing Darfur's peace deal, insisted on certain sums of money per displaced person. Surely if compensation could be agreed, they could get behind a ceasefire agreement and hammer out details later, using non violent means? Shan't hold my breath. Darfur's so called "rebels" are greedy thugs who use women and children as cannon fodder. Give them them an inch and they take a mile. Next thing they'll insist on will be from a long list of other stuff they want before agreeing to disarm. I favour non-violent conflict resolution but think these guys deserve a slap on the head. But if money talks and saves even one child, so be it. Bring it on, enough money has been wasted on this war.

Oct 10 2006 Sudan Tribune news article [author unknown, unsourced] from Khartoum, Sudan - excerpt:

The African Union announced that Sudan accepted the individual compensation for the affected people in Darfur, saying this would help to convince the holdout rebel groups to join the peace deal.

Chairman of the African Mission in Sudan and head of Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA) implementation team Ambassador Sam Ibok has affirmed that the African Union is endeavouring to convince rebel groups that did not sign DPA to join the DPA.

He indicated in a statement to the official SUNA that the government's readiness to compensate the affected people. The question of the individual compensation is one of the majors' demands of the rebel groups.

Actually, the Darfur displaced persons have lost any thing during the Janjaweed militias attacks against their villages. When official speak about peace to them, the IDPs say what peace it is. We are still under militia attacks and we have no money to rebuild our home or cultivate our land.

Ibok said there are consultations between the government and some African countries to contribute to resolving Darfur crisis, pointing out that heads of state of some African countries will arrive in Sudan in the coming days.

The presidents of Senegal, Nigeria and Gabon are to travel to Khartoum "shortly" for talks with their Sudanese counterpart Omar el-Bashir about ending the crisis in Sudan's western Darfur region, the Senegalese foreign ministry said Saturday.

He said the expected visit of an AU envoy to Khartoum in the coming days comes in the framework of the continuous consultations between the government and the AU to remove impediments affecting implementation of the DPA.

Ibok further said that the UN Secretary General and the Chairman of the AU have presented proposals to President Al-Bashir to support the AU in logistic fields, explaining that UN experts would arrive in Sudan in this context.

The AU official pointed out that Sudan's al-Bashir welcomed during meetings with his counterparts during the recent UN General Assembly session in New York any efforts aiming to boosting the African Union mission.

S Korean proposed as new UN chief

Ban Ki-moon could be the first Asian UN chief since 1971, BBC reported today:

South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon has been nominated by the UN Security Council as the successor to Secretary General Kofi Annan.
The General Assembly is now expected to endorse the choice in a vote likely to take place later this week.

Mr Annan is due to step down on 31 December after heading the UN for two five-year terms.

UK Blair wants to lead a "coalition of the willing" ready to step into Darfur

Oct 8 2006 Scotland on Sunday - UK Blair insists for Sudan troops plan despite militarys reluctance [via ST] by Brian Brady:

British Prime Minister Tony Blair has astonished defence chiefs by ordering them to draw up plans to send hundreds of troops to strife-torn Sudan despite Britain's huge military commitments to Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Prime Minister has signalled his intention to back up his demands for international intervention to prevent "genocide" in Darfur by sending a large British force to help protect the black African population.

The proposal for at least 1,000 troops to play a core role in an international protection force has been under consideration by military planners for several months, although senior officers have repeatedly expressed their doubts about such a force's effectiveness.

But Blair is continuing to press for the move as a gesture of intent, particularly amid the continuing failure of the international community to agree on a multi-national force - and the Sudanese government's refusal to accept any intervention.

The proposed extension of Britain's military commitment overseas comes as the Prime Minister pledged that British forces in Afghanistan will be provided with whatever resources they need.

Addressing military personnel on the fifth anniversary of operations in the country, he promised "every support and every protection", including more armoured vehicles and more helicopters.

Scotland on Sunday understands that the proposal to send a non-combat force to Darfur was first investigated - at Blair’s insistence - at the military’s planning headquarters at Northwood earlier this year, when John Reid was defence secretary.

But the Prime Minister has maintained his interest in the issue, which he singled out during his Labour conference speech as a priority for action.

"What is happening now in the Sudan cannot stand," he told delegates last month. "If this were in the continent of Europe we'd act."

A senior military source last night said the military option was a "very real prospect", as Blair attempts to force the hands of the European Union and the United Nations.

He added: "This has been on the boards at Northwood for several months. The planners have told the prime minister that Britain cannot spare the troops easily, but he is committed to it.

"He has come back to it now. I think he would prefer this to happen as we draw down our forces elsewhere, especially Iraq, but he wants to do it anyway."

The conflict began in early 2003 when two new rebel groups began attacking government targets in Darfur.

Other nations, including Britain and the United States, claim Sudan's military is helping carry out a genocidal war against Darfur's black African residents. The Khartoum government denies the charge or backing the Arab Janjaweed militias, which are accused of attacking villages, killing, raping and looting.

Some 200,000 people have died and two million people have fled their homes as the crisis has escalated over the past three years. A number of aid workers have also been killed while attempting to bring relief to the oppressed people of Darfur. The UK is the second largest donor in Darfur, providing more than £96m in aid since the conflict began. The funds have been channelled into providing shelter, food, water and basic health care for Darfur's citizens, through UN agencies and non-governmental organisations (NGOs).

The Department for International Development has committed a further £67m towards humanitarian relief in Sudan in the next year.

The political and military crisis has worsened in recent days, as the Sudanese government has resisted UN plans for a 20,000-strong peacekeeping force to stop the conflict in Darfur, claiming it would be a cover for an invasion by Western countries. A 7,000-strong African Union force has failed to end the conflict.

In a report to the UN last week, Secretary General Kofi Annan said humanitarian access to Darfur was at its lowest level since 2004, and that a peace deal agreed in May had had little effect.

"Instead of reconciliation and building of trust, we are witnessing intensified violence and deeper polarisation," he warned. "The region is again on the brink of a catastrophic situation."

Although the UK has deployed around 5,600 service personnel to Afghanistan, and still has some 8,000 in Iraq, Blair wants to lead a "coalition of the willing" ready to step into Darfur, to present the UN and the Khartoum government with a fait accompli.

Tory leader David Cameron made clear his own hopes for an end to the impasse during his Conservative conference speech last week, when he told delegates: "I support humanitarian intervention."

However, an Opposition spokesman last night warned that the government should "think long and hard before committing more of our forces to another expedition overseas"

Eyewitness account: What I saw in Darfur (by Paul Salopek)

The following excerpts, from excellent commentary by Paul Salopek (copied here below) echo some of what I've pointed out here many times before:

"...negotiators on the ground [in Sudan] worry that a well-intentioned human-rights campaign, launched by Western activists on behalf of Darfur's civilians, may actually be locking in the violence."

Also:

"...Insurgents I interviewed on the Chad border had little vision for the future of their people. Some resembled warlords from such dismal places as eastern [DR] Congo: sleek businessmen of war using children as cannon fodder."

Note, Paul tells us:

"... our dusty little party was driven off in an SUV with tinted windows and a Sudanese Humanitarian Affairs Ministry logo emblazoned on the doors."

I wonder if the logo says SHAM or HAM. Pity no photo.

Jailed for 34 days, Tribune reporter writes: What I saw in Darfur (by Paul Salopek) - Oct 8 2006 AP report - via Guardian via POTP:

One cloudless Sunday morning in early August, while traveling on a desert road in the remote Darfur region of western Sudan, a teenager sporting dreadlocks and an AK-47 rifle stopped my vehicle. My translator, Suleiman Abakar Moussa, stepped out and offered the youth a cigarette -- standard etiquette in African war zones. But Moussa immediately returned to the car, frowning.

In this incidental way, I learned that we had just lost our freedom.

The young gunman belonged to a pro-government militia. And his patrol, after beating us and stealing our car and equipment, handed us over to Sudanese military intelligence. Moussa, my driver, Idriss Abdulrahman Anu, and I spent the next 34 days behind bars in Darfur, ending up hostage to a regime accused of mass murder. The government in Khartoum charged us with espionage, spreading "false news" and entering Africa's latest killing field without a visa.

It was hard not to feel, however, that our real crime was unspoken: reporting on a humanitarian catastrophe that is largely invisible to the outside world, and that is poised to grow worse in the weeks ahead.

Thousands of villagers will likely die soon in Darfur, the arid homeland of millions of farmers and herders who have been targeted in a ruthless civil war that some call genocide. Their torched huts, seen from the air, look like cigarette burns on a torture victim's skin.

Currently, a peace deal between the government and a major insurgent group is coming unglued. With the advent of the dry season, the Sudanese army and the fractious Darfur rebels are primed for a new military showdown. And, paradoxically, negotiators on the ground worry that a well-intentioned human-rights campaign, launched by Western activists on behalf of Darfur's civilians, may actually be locking in the violence. With Khartoum tarred as the bully, there is scant hope for any last-minute dialogue before the offensives begin.

Ironically, I wasn't focused exclusively on the Darfur tragedy when I crossed the desolate border separating Sudan and Chad on Aug. 6.

My Chadian colleagues and I were working on a much broader freelance assignment for National Geographic on the Sahel, the immense and turbulent band of savanna that runs across northern Africa, home to some 90 million struggling people.

Darfur was a side trip. Other journalists and aid workers had described how some Darfur refugees in Chad were drifting back to their ruined villages to rebuild their homes. It seemed a rare chance to profile civilians clinging to life in an intractable war zone. With our arrest, we unwittingly became part of that survival story.

For years, foreign correspondents have covered the Darfur crisis by slipping into rebel-held territory from Chad. Sudanese officials in Khartoum are stingy with journalist visas. Thus, much of what the world knows about a conflict that has killed at least 200,000 people comes from quick reportorial forays into the beautiful, lawless, corrugated plains and rocky escarpments controlled by Darfur's half-starved rebels.

Unfortunately for us, those insurgents can no longer be relied upon to guarantee our safety.

Fluid loyalties

A cease-fire accord signed in May, brokered partly by the U.S., has shattered the rebel movement into dozens of small, competing bands. Loyalties are fluid. Confusion and treachery are common. Case in point: We were captured by a unit answering to Minni Minnawi, a pro-peace former rebel who only two weeks earlier had shaken President Bush's hand in the White House.

Minnawi's field commander along the northern border, a skinny, rakish guerrilla named Ibrahim Garsil, initially threatened to kill us. Luckily, his demoralized, war-weary men disregarded those orders. Instead they deserted by twos and threes every night, leaving their rifles propped against the nearest thorn tree. Others got drunk on date wine gulped from old automotive antifreeze jugs. Still others went on impromptu safaris with my stolen vehicle, taking potshots out the windows at wild cranes and storks. (They missed.) After holding us in lice-infested huts for three days, Garsil traded us to the Sudanese army for a large box of new uniforms.

Our Sudanese military helicopter ride to the garrison town of El Fasher offered a rare glimpse into Darfur's secretive air war, in which government pilots are accused by groups such as Human Rights Watch of strafing and bombing civilian villages. Only this time, the tables were turned.

Our chopper took ground fire over the contested town of Kutum. Bullets pinged through the passenger compartment. With my hands tied behind my back, I felt doubly helpless. A spent round knocked a Sudanese officer out of the seat opposite me. He clawed at his back, feeling for blood, and guffawed with relief when he discovered he was only bruised.

Off to the 'ghost house'

After wobbling to a hard landing on the airfield at El Fasher, our dusty little party was driven off in an SUV with tinted windows and a Sudanese Humanitarian Affairs Ministry logo emblazoned on the doors. Our destination was a "ghost house," one of Sudan's notorious clandestine jails. For the next 10 days we were held incommunicado and interrogated. I spent my time in solitary confinement, in a barren room with a cot and a permanently buzzing fluorescent light. During my five-minute morning walks around the perimeter of a sandy courtyard, I managed to fling several distress notes scribbled on cigarette paper over the high wall. These ridiculous calls for help may have bounced off the heads of government soldiers; I learned later that our prison was in the middle of a large army base.

Obviously, Moussa, Anu and I saw little of Darfur: a succession of pestilential huts, mud-brick prison cells and interrogation rooms.

Still, we kept our ears and eyes open while inside the belly of the very security agencies that were helping prosecute the government's war in Darfur. And our keyhole view of the conflict offered some bleak insights into the future:

Vastly oversimplified as a good-versus-evil contest between African farmers and rampaging Arab herdsmen armed by Khartoum, the complicated struggle in Darfur is about to get a lot murkier -- and more unstoppable. Once loosely united by the neglect and cruelty of the central government, the region's squabbling rebels now maul each other. They are a messy obstacle to peace. Many have devolved into ethnic militias, or worse, simple bandits. Insurgents I interviewed on the Chad border had little vision for the future of their people. Some resembled warlords from such dismal places as eastern [DR] Congo: sleek businessmen of war using children as cannon fodder.

Flouting the peace deal, the Sudanese government has unleashed an offensive that is supposed to crush the remaining rebels. Whispered conversations with our jailers confirmed that, so far, it has failed miserably. Khartoum reportedly lost dozens of vehicles and hundreds of soldiers. That said, troop planes roared nightly over our prison in El Fasher. Military activity is set to escalate when the battlefields dry after the rains. Even our pudgy guards were being mobilized.

An African Union peacekeeping force can't stanch the bloodshed in Darfur, despite a promised addition of 4,000 troops. Sources as varied as Sudanese military officers, rebels, refugees and even frustrated AU officials themselves said the ill-equipped force remains outgunned and overwhelmed. Moreover, their credibility as an honest broker is in tatters. A typically depressing incident overheard in prison: In August, pro-government raiders called janjaweed attacked women and children gathering wood within sight of an AU firebase in southern Darfur. Several women were shot down. I was told that the AU contingent of Nigerian soldiers didn't lift a finger. Only when infuriated villagers surrounded the peacekeepers' base, chanting and waving sticks, did the AU at last react--dispersing the civilians with armored personnel carriers.

"Abuja? What is Abuja?" a slender woman named Fatim Yousif Zaite, 40, asked in a destroyed village where I was briefly held by the ragged militia, early in my ordeal.

Abuja is the popular name for the Darfur peace accord, signed in the Nigerian capital of the same name. Zaite had never heard of it.

She wore a yellow wrap and a luminous smile, and she was planting a small plot of sorghum in fields that, by her estimate, had been cratered nine times by government bombers since the outbreak of the war in 2003. Five of her relatives had been killed in the war. Standing in the field, she kept gently pulling her 3-year-old daughter's hand away from a small bucket of seed grain. The girl was hungry. She was eating the seeds.

A fruitless hunger strike

I knew hunger briefly in prison in Darfur.

For seven days I refused food in the ghost house in El Fasher. I was protesting my separation from Moussa and Anu, and our secret incarceration. This was the only weapon I could muster. But the bored duty officers simply shrugged, mentioning Guantanamo, the U.S. military base in Cuba, where several Sudanese are being held as terror suspects. Disheartened, I resumed eating on the eighth day.

I believe that our arrest in Sudan was a billboard-size warning to foreign journalists: Khartoum is fed up with the drumbeat of negative news emanating from Darfur.

Yet moderates within the regime must have ultimately prevailed in our case. For on Aug. 19, we three scruffy "spies" were transferred to a civilian jail. We still faced a penalty of 20 years in prison. But now we enjoyed access to Sudanese attorneys. Better yet, Moussa, Anu and I were reunited, albeit sometimes with 16 other men--pickpockets, con men, gun runners--in a 15-by-15-foot cell. We were delirious with relief. I traded my wristwatch for a cell phone call to my wife. Our police guards acted like human beings.

Six days later, the U.S. vice consul in Sudan and several American military advisers to the AU negotiated even better conditions for us at a courthouse jail. There, the affable judge who was to try us as enemies of the state bought us sickly sweet mint tea. By the end, I even was playing chess with the jailer who administered 40 lashes to town drunks under Shariah, the religious laws enforced under conservative Islam. The whip-man's name was Salah. To him the beatings were a job. At night he studied microbiology.

On Sept. 9 we were pardoned by President Omar al-Bashir, thanks to the humanitarian intercession of New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson and the Herculean efforts of the U.S. Embassy in Khartoum. Worldwide pressure from the journalistic community, in particular our tireless colleagues at the Chicago Tribune and National Geographic, gave us heart. So did letters of support from public figures as diverse as Bono and former President Jimmy Carter.

Yet for the hapless people of Darfur, there appears to be no such happy ending.

Reacting to public outcry, the Bush administration has classified Darfur's almost incomprehensible suffering as genocide. The White House is pushing hard for a UN force of 20,000 police and soldiers to replace the weak African Union peacekeepers. And Sudan is resisting bitterly. On Thursday, Khartoum sent threatening letters to nations promising troops to a UN force.

In truth, there are no guarantees that even a powerful UN force will do much better than the AU in Darfur.

The violent badlands of western Sudan are larger than Texas. And the proliferating gangs of rebels and pro-government militias, whether steered by Khartoum or renegade commanders, recall the nightmare of Bosnia. There, blue-helmeted UN troops hunkered down and performed abysmally.

Roots of discord run deep

Meanwhile, the ancient roots of Darfur's feuding will remain: racism between ethnic Arabs and Africans, and competition for threadbare natural resources--water and pastureland.

"A political settlement has been completely overlooked or downplayed by the U.S.," insists Alex de Waal, co-author of the book "Darfur: A Short History of a Long War." "The whole debate has gone off on a red herring--UN troops. From experience, we know that, ultimately, there is no real military solution to these kinds of complicated ethnic wars."

Yet relations between the West and Sudan are now so polarized that negotiating a new peace accord before the killing flares anew seems like a pipe dream.

During my last night in the ghost house in El Fasher, I endured my longest interrogation at the hands of an army colonel named Abdallah. He grilled me for nearly six hours, bludgeoning me robotically with accusations of espionage, absurd charges that I knew even he didn't believe. At 1 a.m. he finally played the good cop, and asked if I had any questions of my own. I did. I wanted to know the fate of Darfur.

"More war," he said without hesitation. He stared hard down at his desk.

After days of lies and mind games, these were the first honest words that escaped his lips.

psalopek@tribune.com

Chapter Eight - Jonathan Steele: Be honest: the west isn't sending troops to Darfur

Here's some excellent must-read commentary to leave at the top of this page during a short intermission. Bye for now. Back soon.

"Bush and Blair are raising false hopes among rebels and refugees, at the same time as blocking the best mechanism for peace," writes Jonathan Steele in Darfur, Oct 6, 2006, The Guardian. Copy in full:

A cruel hoax is being perpetrated on the desperate people of Darfur. With their constant demands for UN troops to go to Sudan's western region as the only way to protect civilians, George Bush and Tony Blair are raising hopes in a grossly irresponsible way. When reality dawns and new despair takes over, Washington and London will have to take the blame.

It is not just that the Khartoum government rejects the idea of UN troops. More important, Bush and Blair know that, even if Khartoum were to back down, they will not be sending US or British troops to replace the African Union (AU) force. Nor will other European governments. Why does this matter? Because hundreds of thousands of displaced villagers who sit in miserable camps across Darfur are under the impression that European soldiers will soon be riding over the hill to save them.

After spending hours talking to homeless families and their community leaders, I can report that the demand for the UN to send troops to Darfur is overwhelming. The Arab-dominated government in Khartoum has orchestrated demonstrations in the capital denouncing US and UK interventionism, and warning of "another Iraq". The Arab press hammers the same theme, which may well resonate among its readers.

In Darfur's camps, however, the mood is different. It explains why Jose Manuel Barroso, the European commission president on a trip here on Sunday, was not allowed to make the usual camp tour. No reason was given, but EU officials said they were sure it was to prevent him hearing pleas for a UN force.

If UN troops are sent here, where do you think they will come from, I asked everyone I met. "British, American, all the European countries," said Abdullah Hassan Karamidin, an elderly imam in a white knitted cap who sat with six other men in a clearing between their miserable homes in the Abu Shouk camp at El Fasher. What if the UN troops turned out to be from India, Bangladesh, or Turkey? "No, they can't solve our problem. They're like Arabs. Arabs can't protect us," the imam replied, while the others nodded in agreement.

In Zamzam camp, south of El Fasher, I came across four guerrilla fighters, unarmed but wearing trademark white scarves wrapped into their turbans. Two were festooned with small leather pouches, each carrying a verse from the Qur'an. The amulets they were wearing protected them from bullets, they said. The fighters belonged to a faction that signed a peace deal with the government in May, which allows them to protect the camp. They and most of the camp's inmates are from the Zaghawa tribe.

The rebels are known to fellow-Africans as "Tora Bora". My translator laughed at my surprise. "They don't like the phrase mujahideen because they are Muslims, not Islamists. But they know Tora Bora is a place of caves in Afghanistan where the Americans hunted local fighters and couldn't find them, just as the government here couldn't do."

One of the ex-rebels said: "The African Union troops only go along the main roads. If there's an incident, they do nothing except write it down. They're useless." Asked where the UN would get its troops from, he said: "Why not British or American?" His friend was one of the few people I found who was willing to have troops from India, Bangladesh or Turkey, "as long as they can protect people. If that's the case, we have no problem".

A group of community leaders sat under a tree. "We're in need, and we want UN troops," said Sheikh Ali Ishag Hamid. "They should come here even if the government refuses. The government cannot confront the UN." Where would the UN get its troops from? "Britain, America, Nato." And if they were from Asia? "We will only welcome Europeans," he insisted.

Bush and Blair should get the message. Unless they deliberately intend to disappoint Darfurians, it is time for honesty in place of grandstanding. Let's have some constructive nimbyism. Next time they thunder on about the need for UN troops, they should add the qualifier: "Of course, we won't be sending our own soldiers. Other countries will have to send theirs." The two leaders should also start looking for a compromise. Both sides have backed themselves into a corner. Sudan refuses to have a UN force. Washington insists there is no alternative. With three months until the AU force's mandate expires, common sense requires that this interval be used to negotiate a solution.

The first principle should be a security council commitment to extend the AU mandate indefinitely, until it is safe for the displaced to go home. Last month's brinkmanship, when it looked as if the AU would withdraw, leaving a security void, must not be repeated in December. The threat of a pullout creates new fears for traumatised people.

The second principle should be that the AU's contingents are transformed into a robust force from the demoralised units that have not been paid for the past two months. Western governments must fund more AU troops and better equipment, particularly helicopters and surveillance technology. At the moment the AU reacts slowly, if at all.

Darfur was hardly heard of when the UN's founding fathers drew up its charter in 1945. Unwittingly, they wrote seven paragraphs that offer the best mechanism for bridging the gap between Washington's and Khartoum's intransigence. Known as chapter eight, these allow the UN to subcontract peacekeeping to a regional organisation. Instead of the current wrangling over UN troops, why not let the UN give the AU a mandate for Darfur, while requesting that rich member governments, either western or Arab, fund a stronger AU-led force?

In Kosovo and Afghanistan, Nato took charge in a similar way, though under a different chapter and without the request that non-Nato members chip in. Nato, after all, is richer than the AU.

At the UN, senior officials are aware of chapter eight. Jan Pronk, the secretary general's special representative in Sudan, mentioned it in New York a fortnight ago. Sudanese leaders have hinted they would accept it. Shamefully, however, Washington and London are trying to suppress the idea. They reject any suggestion that UN resolution 1706 (which called for UN troops) might be superseded. It would let Khartoum off the hook, they say. But the real people on the hook are Darfur's 2 million displaced. They need quick international agreement on better protection, rather than the mischievous illusion that western troops are on the way.