Sudanese slam genocide resolution
By Nima Elbagir
KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Sudanese Arabs have criticised a U.S. congressional resolution declaring genocide in the Darfur region, while Darfuris asked what Washington would do to make it safe for them to go back home.
"Is Iraq not enough? Do they want to destroy us too? ... America wants everyone who is Arab (in Sudan) to pay. They do not understand anything," said Ismail Gasmalseed on Friday, a 34-year-old driver in Khartoum.
The U.S. Congress approved the resolution on Thursday and its supporters hope it will help mobilise the international community to protect Africans in Darfur from Arab militias.
But the accusation of genocide is highly controversial. The United Nations has declared the situation in Darfur the world's worst humanitarian crisis but has not called it a genocide, which would force it to take action.
The world body estimates that the 15-month conflict between Arab nomads and non-Arab farmers has killed at least 30,000 people and displaced more than 1 million people, many of them driven from their homes by marauding Arab militia.
Ibrahim Ahmed, a Sudanese political analyst, said it was clear there was no legal basis for declaring a genocide in Darfur, otherwise the Bush administration's lawyers would have adopted the term.
"But what is equally obvious is that the American public thinks that it is genocide, and therefore getting Congress to rule on this was a politically expedient way of mollifying public opinion while circumnavigating the legalities," he added.
Yasir Abdullah, a journalist from northern Sudan, said the U.S. Congress and administration did not understand the roots of the Darfur conflict and were dealing with it very superficially.
"They are biased and have their own agenda. Sanctions will not harm the government, they will harm the people. Have they not learnt this yet?" he told Reuters.
A PLAN IN STAGES
The Bush administration has drafted a U.N. resolution threatening sanctions if the Sudanese government does not disarm the Janjaweed and remove all restrictions on access to Darfur.
The Sudanese government says it is trying to comply but it will take time to implement its plans.
"There exists a real problem which has to be resolved on a humanitarian, political and security level and we intend to do that," Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman Ismail told the French daily Le Monde in an interview published on Friday.
"But one has to understand that we are applying a plan that is working in stages," he added.
Rebels and human rights groups say Khartoum has armed and backed the Arab militia, known as the Janjaweed, who have been forcing non-Arab villagers off their land in Darfur in an extension of a long conflict over farmland and grazing.
Tens of thousands of people are now threatened with hunger and disease in squalid, overcrowded refugee camps inside Sudan and over the border in Chad.
The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR reported on Friday that two refugees had died in an operation by Chad's army inside one of the camps close to the Sudanese border on Thursday.
The agency said the troops had moved into the camp to stem unrest and find people involved in recent attacks on humanitarian workers. There was no immediate explanation for how the refugees died.
MORAL RESPONSIBILITY
French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier will visit Chad and Sudan's Darfur region next week to show support for an African Union observer mission, which is receiving some 12 million euros in European Union aid, his ministry said on Friday.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who has called on the international community to take moral responsibility for resolving the crisis, is sending his foreign secretary, Jack Straw, to the region next month.
But displaced Darfuris in Khartoum said they had some doubts about the international community's commitment to intervene.
"We were told that the United Nations would make us safe, but we waited so long in Darfur and no one came to make us safe. I'm not sure if we will be safe. Can America sleep with us in our houses?" asked Khadija, an 18-year-old woman who said she was abducted by militiamen in Darfur but escaped.
"I think if they say they will make us safe then they will, but why did they wait so long?" added Hawaa, another abductee.
Ismail said the Sudanese authorities expected to send 6,000 policemen into Darfur and 3,000 of those were now ready to work.
But a rebel spokesman in Darfur said the new policemen were Janjaweed in disguise, issued with uniforms and new weapons.
The Arab militias attacked twice in Darfur this week despite government promises that it is cracking down on them, Abu Bakr Hamid al-Nur, general coordinator of the rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), said.
Nur told Reuters by telephone that Janjaweed killed more than 30 people and kidnapped many women and children on Monday at Kfour, between el-Fasher, capital of North Darfur state, and Kutum, about 120 km (75 miles) to the northwest.
By Nima Elbagir
KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Sudanese Arabs have criticised a U.S. congressional resolution declaring genocide in the Darfur region, while Darfuris asked what Washington would do to make it safe for them to go back home.
"Is Iraq not enough? Do they want to destroy us too? ... America wants everyone who is Arab (in Sudan) to pay. They do not understand anything," said Ismail Gasmalseed on Friday, a 34-year-old driver in Khartoum.
The U.S. Congress approved the resolution on Thursday and its supporters hope it will help mobilise the international community to protect Africans in Darfur from Arab militias.
But the accusation of genocide is highly controversial. The United Nations has declared the situation in Darfur the world's worst humanitarian crisis but has not called it a genocide, which would force it to take action.
The world body estimates that the 15-month conflict between Arab nomads and non-Arab farmers has killed at least 30,000 people and displaced more than 1 million people, many of them driven from their homes by marauding Arab militia.
Ibrahim Ahmed, a Sudanese political analyst, said it was clear there was no legal basis for declaring a genocide in Darfur, otherwise the Bush administration's lawyers would have adopted the term.
"But what is equally obvious is that the American public thinks that it is genocide, and therefore getting Congress to rule on this was a politically expedient way of mollifying public opinion while circumnavigating the legalities," he added.
Yasir Abdullah, a journalist from northern Sudan, said the U.S. Congress and administration did not understand the roots of the Darfur conflict and were dealing with it very superficially.
"They are biased and have their own agenda. Sanctions will not harm the government, they will harm the people. Have they not learnt this yet?" he told Reuters.
A PLAN IN STAGES
The Bush administration has drafted a U.N. resolution threatening sanctions if the Sudanese government does not disarm the Janjaweed and remove all restrictions on access to Darfur.
The Sudanese government says it is trying to comply but it will take time to implement its plans.
"There exists a real problem which has to be resolved on a humanitarian, political and security level and we intend to do that," Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman Ismail told the French daily Le Monde in an interview published on Friday.
"But one has to understand that we are applying a plan that is working in stages," he added.
Rebels and human rights groups say Khartoum has armed and backed the Arab militia, known as the Janjaweed, who have been forcing non-Arab villagers off their land in Darfur in an extension of a long conflict over farmland and grazing.
Tens of thousands of people are now threatened with hunger and disease in squalid, overcrowded refugee camps inside Sudan and over the border in Chad.
The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR reported on Friday that two refugees had died in an operation by Chad's army inside one of the camps close to the Sudanese border on Thursday.
The agency said the troops had moved into the camp to stem unrest and find people involved in recent attacks on humanitarian workers. There was no immediate explanation for how the refugees died.
MORAL RESPONSIBILITY
French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier will visit Chad and Sudan's Darfur region next week to show support for an African Union observer mission, which is receiving some 12 million euros in European Union aid, his ministry said on Friday.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who has called on the international community to take moral responsibility for resolving the crisis, is sending his foreign secretary, Jack Straw, to the region next month.
But displaced Darfuris in Khartoum said they had some doubts about the international community's commitment to intervene.
"We were told that the United Nations would make us safe, but we waited so long in Darfur and no one came to make us safe. I'm not sure if we will be safe. Can America sleep with us in our houses?" asked Khadija, an 18-year-old woman who said she was abducted by militiamen in Darfur but escaped.
"I think if they say they will make us safe then they will, but why did they wait so long?" added Hawaa, another abductee.
Ismail said the Sudanese authorities expected to send 6,000 policemen into Darfur and 3,000 of those were now ready to work.
But a rebel spokesman in Darfur said the new policemen were Janjaweed in disguise, issued with uniforms and new weapons.
The Arab militias attacked twice in Darfur this week despite government promises that it is cracking down on them, Abu Bakr Hamid al-Nur, general coordinator of the rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), said.
Nur told Reuters by telephone that Janjaweed killed more than 30 people and kidnapped many women and children on Monday at Kfour, between el-Fasher, capital of North Darfur state, and Kutum, about 120 km (75 miles) to the northwest.
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