First batch of UN force arrives in Sudan

Via IndianMuslims.info Khartoum, Dec 28 (NNN-SUNA):

The first batch of the assistance package provided by the UN to the AU contingent in Darfur consisting of 20 policemen and 18 military experts, mostly from African and Asian developing countries, will arrive in the town of Al Fashir Thursday.

Sudan rejects joint AU-UN force for Darfur

Dec 28 2006 VOA news report by Peter Heinlein - excerpt:

Sudanese U.N. Ambassador Abdalmahmood Abdalhaleem Wednesday poured cold water on Secretary General Annan's hopes for a diplomatic breakthrough in his last days in office.

"It is not a joint force. Let there be no confusion about it. We are not talking about any joint force by the United Nations and the African Union," he [Abdalhaleem] said.

Sudanese media says UN fails to provide first batch of support to AU

Via Sudanese Media Center:

UN Fails to Provide the First Batch of Support to AU
Wednesday 27 December 2006
Khartoum (Sudanvisiondaily)

The United Nations has failed to provide the first batch of support to the African Union forces in Darfur that include providing experts and technicians.

The Tripartite Mechanism meeting, yesterday, reviewed the three batches of assistance and the commitment of the United Nations to provide equipments, civil experts and technicians to the African Union forces operating in Darfur.

The government coordinator in the Tripartite Mechanism and the Director of Peace Department in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Alsadiq Almagli told Sudan Vision that the United Nations has provided only 43 experts out of the 105 promised.

Almagli revealed that the United Nations did not provide any civilian experts from the planned 45 and has provided only 24 civil police personnel out of the 33 promised Almagli said that the United Nations will hand those experts to the African Union this week, adding that the list provided by the United Nations was not complete, confirming that the government will provide all the necessary facilitation for the United Nations support to the African Union.

Almagli stated that the experts provided by the United Nations are Africans, confirming that the government has expressed its readiness to provide all the necessary facilities for the United Nations.

On his part AMIS Spokesman Nouraddin Mezni stated that the meeting is considered to be the real beginning for implementing the support batches, confirming that the government and the African Union have provided a joint list of the needs for the first batch.

Mezni revealed that there are 9 civil police experts in Al Fashir and 15 others in Khartoum. Mezni stated that the government of Sudan has expressed its readiness to facilitate the United Nations support to AU.

On his part the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Spokesman Ali Al -Sadiq said that the second meeting of the Tripartite Mechanism aimed at coordinating activities, noting that the next meeting will be convened in next January.

UN advisers to be deployed this week in Darfur

Dec 26 2006 AFP report via ST - excerpt:

Forty-three military advisers will be deployed in Darfur as part of a three-phase UN plan aimed at bolstering the struggling AU force there, AU spokesman Nourredine Mezni said Tuesday.

"The first group of this contingent composed of nine policemen is already in place, and this week 43 military advisers and 15 police advisers will follow," Mezni said.

It was agreed that UN military and police officers will wear their national uniforms with a blue UN beret. In addition, they will wear an AU armband, the UNMIS bulletin said.

Janjaweed destroy village in N Darfur

Dec 26 2006 via Sudan Tribune - excerpt:

A joint UNMIS and OCHA assessment mission on 23 December visited the village of Abu Sakin in North Darfur. The village was found to be completely deserted and looted, with more than 50 houses burned to the ground, the UNMIS bulletin reported Tuesday.

"There are reports that Arab militia continue to loot and patrol the area to deter villagers from returning. There are reports that several thousand villagers are hiding in nearby hills" the bulletin said.

Government police and National security have stepped up the number of road blocks in El Fasher (North Darfur), following the shooting on 23 December of a police officer and an increase in the number of carjackings.

Last month, the African Union blamed Khartoum for worsening security situation in Darfur. The African Union said on Saturday 16 November the situation in Sudan's troubled Darfur region was worsening due to the return of re-armed Janjaweed militia and Khartoum's resolve to use military force.

"The security situation in Darfur is fast deteriorating mainly because of the re-emergence of Janjaweed militias," said an AU communique issued at the end of a meeting on Darfur.

"(They) seem to have been supplied and rearmed and have been carrying out nefarious activities with impunity in parts of Darfur, particularly in areas controlled by the government of Sudan."

The statement added that another cause for the decline was Khartoum's insistence on a military option to quell the conflict.

Note the AU describes the militia as Arab. Sorry, I still don't get it: why are they called Arab and not Sudanese?

Sudan's Bashir 'backs UN plan on Darfur'

President Bashir says Sudan agrees to the first two parts of the UN plan - deployment of new staff and equipment to the African Union force followed by a larger support package. However, the third part of the UN plan - the size and command of the new force - is not finalised in the letter. Full story BBC Dec 27, 2006.

Dec 27 2006 AP report by Edith Lederer (via Guardian) - Sudan President Accepts U.N. Peace Deal:

Al-Bashir said peace talks aimed at a political settlement should be expedited, blaming rebels who have not signed the peace agreement for continued attempts to undermine the accord and overthrow the Sudanese government.

He told Annan that the next step should be a Security Council resolution endorsing the agreements reached at the November meetings in Ethiopia and Nigeria "and authorizing immediate financial support for peacekeeping in Darfur."

Note Mr Bashir never blames the janjaweed.

John Garang's security proposal for overseeing Darfur ceasefire - Child soldiers in Janjaweed and NMRD

Snippet from Sudan Watch archives dated Feb 9 2005 - Child soldiers in Janjaweed and breakaway Darfur rebel group NMRD:

Leader of the SPLM/A John Garang has proposed the deployment of a tripartite force -- one-third each from the government, the SPLA and the AU -- to oversee the Darfur ceasefire and end the bloodshed. "You really do need a robust force in order to be able to sufficiently protect the civilian population," Garang said Monday in New York.

[SLA rebel leader] Nur welcomed the participation of the SPLA in such a force, but said the government, which he accused of complicity in attacks against civilians in Darfur, cannot be part of that force. "We cannot accept that," he said.

Video profile: Mark Hanis GIF

National Geographic has a video profile of Mark Hanis of the Genocide Intervention Network - see Coalition for Darfur: Darfur: The Activist. Sorry can't open it using my browser.

Egypt welcomes Security Council statement on Darfur

Dec 21 2006 Sudan Tribune - excerpt:

Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit welcomed a statement issued by the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) two days ago on means of handling the Darfur crisis.

He considered the statement as an important step to reach an international agreement on the optimal means of dealing with the repercussions of the Darfur stand-off., the state-run MENA reported.

In press statements Thursday 21 December, Aboul Gheit asserted that the statement reflected the international community's inclination to overcome the differences that ensued from Resolution 1706.

- - -

Dec 19 2006 Security Council statement

SECURITY COUNCIL CALLS FOR IMMEDIATE DEPLOYMENT OF UNITED NATIONS
SUPPORT FOR AFRICAN UNION'S SUDAN MISSION, INCLUDING HYBRID OPERATION IN DARFUR

Darfur: It Is Best to Stay Out (Christopher Caldwell)

This blog author concurs with opinion piece here below, especially where it says

"Darfur is not just sadists on one hand and victims on the other. It is a war. We have only the vaguest picture of what kind of war it is ...

Darfur is a problem the west should touch only with a very long stick."

Note also, the piece correctly refers to the Sudanese government as Islamist (unlike many other journalists who choose to use the words "Arab-led") and tells us only 7 per cent of Americans consider Darfur a top foreign policy priority, according to an NBC News poll in October.

Dec 18 2006 commentary by Christopher Caldwell, Finanical Times - Darfur: It Is Best to Stay Out [hat tip CFD]:

Those urging military action in Darfur have in recent days been joined by influential US and UK policymakers. The Islamist government of Sudan has not only encouraged so-called Janjaweed militias to run riot in the rebellious province, where roughly 200,000 have died. It is also refusing to admit 20,000 United Nations peacekeepers, who would supplement 7,000 overburdened African Union soldiers already there. The west is showing signs that it has had enough. This week, Tony Blair, prime minister, urged a no-fly zone over Darfur. There have been hints of a US "Plan B" to be implemented in the new year, and this newspaper reported on Wednesday that the US had drawn up plans for a naval blockade.

There is a hitch, though, to any international intervention. China buys two-thirds of Sudan's oil and has invested $7bn (£3.6bn) there. Hence Khartoum's double-digit growth, its stock exchange, its new office buildings. China - like Russia before the Kosovo war or France before the Iraq one - might exercise its veto on the UN Security Council. Therefore, some Nato "coalition of the willing" might have to "go it alone" in Darfur. Prominent former officials from the Clinton administration have urged just such a course. But Darfur is a problem the west should touch only with a very long stick.

Omar Hassan al-Bashir, Sudanese leader, says there are fewer than 9,000 dead and that all this talk of mass killings is only the pretext for invading a Muslim country. He is either lying or mistaken, but that does not matter. Much of the Muslim world believes the US attacked Afghanistan for its natural gas reserves, not because of 9/11. Anti-Americanism is such a powerful force that whenever the US involves itself in anything, US power becomes the issue. American public opinion, sensing this, has grown isolationist. A common strand of thought in the wake of November's elections is that the world - not just the Muslim world but an important part of Europe, too - has pronounced its verdict on US influence; now let the world see how it likes the consequences. Americans may have enough patience to unravel the misadventure in Iraq, but they are not calling for an encore. Only 7 per cent of Americans consider Darfur a top foreign policy priority, according to an NBC News poll in October.

George W. Bush, US president, tried to raise the temperature by describing Darfur as a "genocide" at the UN in September. This was a mistake. Genocide, as most people understand it, means trying to exterminate a race. But under the 1948 convention that the UN uses, it means a variety of acts, including non-lethal ones such as "causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group", that are "committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group". The words "in part" mean that almost any indiscriminate killing of civilians can constitute genocide. Meanwhile, International Criminal Court prosecutors announced on Thursday that they were preparing the first Darfur-related arrest warrants, another mistake. Threatening leaders with life sentences in the Hague turns a situation that might conceivably be resolved by diplomacy into a fight to the death.

One can argue about whether this is a genocide, but the pictures being evoked in western minds are oversimplifications. Darfur is not just sadists on one hand and victims on the other. It is a war. We have only the vaguest picture of what kind of war it is. Is it a race war, pitting the Arabs of Khartoum against the blacks of Darfur? Is it a civil war over money and natural resources? (The rebels, too,have looted aid convoys and clashed with African Union peacekeepers.) Is Khartoum running a classic, Guatemalan-style, dry-up-the-fishpond counter-insurgency? Or is this just one front in a brewing east Africa-wide war of Islamist expansion, of which the guerrilla war in Chad and the threats of Somalia's new fundamentalist leaders against Ethiopia are all a part?

Which of these wars do we think we are joining? On whose side? The aftermath of toppling Saddam Hussein shows this question to be nearly unanswerable. But it would be hard to intervene without making enemies. The one action with the best chance of changing the mind of Khartoum - destroying or blockading its oil industry - would greatly impoverish the 35m Sudanese who are not Darfuri.

The decision about which war to fight would be taken out of western hands the moment troops started landing. The number of troops necessary to pacify Darfur is often placed at 20,000, with only 5,000 elite western troops necessary to do the "heavy lifting", as The New Republic puts it.

These numbers may be wild underestimates. What if Khartoum attacked the Christian south again, confronting Nato - much as Slobodan Milosevic did when he began razing Kosovar villages after air attacks - with a choice between exposure of its hypocrisy or a massive commitment of ground troops?

Some people seem to be nostalgic for the pre-September 11 days when the west could fight symbolic wars against marginal countries in the name of human rights. Others see a chance to restore the west's humanitarian credentials, after the political quagmire in Iraq. This betrays a short memory and mistakes the war's outcome for the war's rationale. Iraq, too, was once a humanitarian cause.

But the lesson - not just of Iraq but also of the debacles in Somalia and Kosovo that made it possible - is that there is no such thing as a humanitarian invasion. The west can destroy the Sudanese government and punish its leaders, as in Iraq. It can support one group of brigands over another, as in Kosovo. It can feed people for a while, as in Somalia. However, humanitarian their motivations, though, military operations turn political the moment they are launched, with consequences that are wildly unpredictable.

I wonder what Werner would think of that article.

France, steeped in genocidal blood, must face trial (Andrew Wallis)

So far, 29 comments at Dec 05, 2006 Times Online opinion piece by Andrew Wallis entitled France, steeped in genocidal blood, must face trial.

The Darfur Wall and The Darfur Foundation

New website named the darfur wall lists Eric Reeves among the organisations it supports and, for more information about the Darfur conflict, recommends two other sites: Eric Reeves' and Wikipedia.

Sudan agrees to U.N. role in Darfur but commander must be African and peacekeepers must be mostly African

Dec 23 2006 AP report by Mohamed Osman, Khartoum - Sudan agrees to U.N. role in restive Darfur (via PG) - excerpt:

Mr Annan said he had received an optimistic report from an envoy sent to Khartoum, encouraging him to "think we may tomorrow receive a green light from President Bashir for a full cease-fire, a renewed effort to bring all parties into [the] political process and deployment of the proposed African Union-United Nations hybrid force."

[Sudanese FM spokesman] Mr Magli said his government had not yet seen Mr Annan's statement, but it was true that "Sudan has confirmed to the [U.N.] envoy that it would sit down for peace talks with the rebel factions any time, anywhere."

He said the world should pressure rebel factions that did not sign a May peace accord "to come to ceasefire talks and to stop attacking. But for us in the government, yes, we have confirmed our commitment to the ceasefire."

Earlier this week, Mr Annan wrote to Mr Bashir, saying the United Nations would make every effort to find African peacekeepers, but, if that proved impossible, it would use "a broader pool of troop-contributing countries."

Mr Annan said the first phase of the plan would enhance the AU force by 105 military officers, 33 UN police and 48 international staffers, according to a copy of the letter released by the UN. But he said the mission would eventually have a minimum strength of 17,300 troops, 3,300 civilian police and 16 additional police units.

Mr Magli said his government accepted that phase, but insisted that the number of troops would be negotiated by the force commander and delegates from the United Nations, the African Union and Sudan.

- - -

Dec 23 2006 BBC report: Sudan 'to accept UN Darfur force'

UK provides extra 15 mln pounds to AU Darfur force

The United Kingdom said Friday that it was providing an additional GBP15 million to African Union peacekeepers in Darfur.

International Development Secretary Hilary Benn said the new funds will help fund the African Union Mission in Sudan's operations in the first six months of 2007. The funding is besides the 20 million pounds (A29.8 million, US$39.3 million) the British government provide for this year's operations.

"There is an urgent need for the international community to provide sufficient funds to support the force. The U.K. is fully committed to playing its part in meeting that need," Benn said in a statement.

He said that the humanitarian situation in the Darfur would be even worse if the 7,000-member AU force weren't there and urged other donors, particularly the Arab League to commit further funds to the force.

Full story by AP 22 Dec 2006 via ST.

What's wrong with AU-UN hybrid force in Darfur?

Mark Hanis of the Genocide Intervention Network (www.GenocideIntervention.net) in the United States, recently commented at Werner's Soldier of Africa blog from Darfur, saying: "it would be great to hear your [Werner's] thoughts on how concerned citizens can help you and your fellow peacekeepers protect the people of Darfur.

And Werner replied...

"Mark, I think the most they can do is raise public awareness. The UN and international community are not doing what they should. They are trying to stay out of Darfur, more so than with any other previous international hotspot. The only way to combat this is by means of public pressure. Pressure your government to act. I had a quick look at your organisation's website and what it does goes a long way to doing this. Once Darfur is on everybody's lips nobody will be able to ignore it anymore.

Am I being dim today or is Werner saying the only way to combat the international community and UN trying to stay out of Darfur is via public pressure calling for a UN force? My stance is that I am against armed people entering Sudan uninvited, especially any military force without a UN resolution.

Who is now running Kalma Camp, South Darfur?

Sorry I still cannot find more of latest news from Kalma camp, South Darfur. What is happening to the Norwegian Refugee Council team in Darfur? If it's not the NRC, who is now coordinating Kalma camp and caring for its 93,000 residents? A News briefing from Ekklesia Dec 16 reminds us that:

"on 9 December, Norway's Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Store had protested against the expulsion of the Norwegian Refugee Council, the non-governmental coordinator of the largest camp for internally displaced people from South Darfur. The NRC was officially expelled from South Darfur on 16 November.

This came after the Sudanese authorities had suspended the organisation from humanitarian relief operations in Darfur in September without any formal explanation. Together with other countries and the UN, Norway has sought to get Sudan to reverse its decision.

"More than half of the population of Darfur is dependent on emergency relief, and the expulsion of the NRC ... It is unacceptable that the Sudanese authorities continue to obstruct humanitarian workers in their efforts to help those in need," Store said.

Then, on 12 December the UN Mission in Sudan flew 134 humanitarian staff out of El Fasher, the provincial capital of North Darfur, following several days of clashes in the city."

Surely it is unacceptable that the Sudanese authorities AND THE REBELS continue to obstruct humanitarian workers in their efforts to help those in need.

THINKPIECE: Questions of Darfur justice

Following the Prosecutor's speech at the security council on the 14th of December 2006, the Darfur situation is most likely to be on top of the agenda for the coming year.

What are your thoughts on that and what do you hope 2007 will achieve for the people of Darfur?

What more can the Office of the Prosecutor do to bring expeditious justice for the people of Darfur?

Comments invited (and appreciated) via here below, email or blog entry (I'll link back to your response and list it here) - thanks.

PS Drima, if you are reading this, I hope you can chivvy up some feedback re above two questions, it'd be interesting to know what those at Mideast Youth blog are thinking. I wonder what American readers' responses would be. If an American blogger picks up on this post and attracts some responses, I'd be grateful. Thanks. More later.



Photo: Luis Moreno Ocampo. Source SudanTribune article : ICC: "No Sudanese official immune from Prosecution"

Further reading:
The Hague Justice Portal

Sudan Watch: ICC Prosecutor says 1st case against Sudan crimes is ready

Dec 18 2006 FT op-ed by Christopher Caldwell: Darfur: It Is Best to Stay Out - International Criminal Court prosecutors announced on Thursday that they were preparing the first Darfur-related arrest warrants, another mistake. Threatening leaders with life sentences in the Hague turns a situation that might conceivably be resolved by diplomacy into a fight to the death.

The Silence

Good luck. See Soldier of Africa.

Push China to "save Darfur"

A meme to push China to save Darfur.

See Darfur: An Unforgivable Hell on Earth.

YouTube - The True Islam #1

See YouTube - The True Islam #1 - via The Sudanese Thinker: Who's This Filthy Retard? - gem of a comment by CommonSense says:

"...the guy in that video is from a group in the UK called muhajiruun, they have made life difficult here for other muslims (and everyone else), he's a nobody who gets a lot of headlines i have encountered him a few times. he's usually ignored by most."