Focus on Sudan President yields Mixed Results for Human Rights Situation in Darfur | Voice of America - English
Human rights activists are appealing to the international community not to ease pressure on the Sudan government from instituting reforms in Darfur. According to the United Nations, at least 300,000 people have so far died and more than two million displaced in the region. The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court ? the ICC ? recently accused Sudan?s President Omar al-Bashir of orchestrating the killings of members of black ethnic groups in Darfur. The activists say the international attention on the controversy surrounding the ICC action against Mr.
Three ICC judges, from Ghana, Brazil and Latvia, arepresently considering whether or not to issue an arrest warrant for Mr.al-Bashir. In the meantime, international activist groups are concerned thatinsufficient attention is being paid to the suffering people of Darfur, withthe world spotlight firmly trained on the president himself. Thousands ofpeople are languishing in poor conditions in displacement camps, and militiagroups continue to launch fatal attacks on Darfuris and peacekeepers. A jointUnited Nations and African Union force is still vastly under-funded, understaffedand under-resourced, with extremely limited capabilities for civilians. Says Darfurian human rights activist, Omer Ismail: ?It?strue that now that we?ve had this big news about the possible indictment ofal-Bashir, all the world media and governments are talking about is al-Bashirthis, al-Bashir that. No one is talking about the abuses still beingperpetrated against our people. They have been forgotten?. That is ironic,because the ICC action against the president is based upon what the people themselveshave suffered.? ButColin Thomas-Jensen, a former member of the United States Agency forInternational Development?s response team for Darfur and currently a policyadvisor at the Enough Project, says there are plenty of good reasons for thesustained focus on the president. He points to the following paragraphcontained in ICC chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo?s draft of charges againstMr. al-Bashir. ?Theevidence establishes reasonable grounds to believe that al-Bashir intends todestroy in substantial part the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa ethnic groups?. Forcesand agents controlled by al-Bashir attacked civilians and towns and villagesinhabited by the targeted groups, committed killings, rapes, torture anddestroying means of livelihood.? Activists say it?s extremely unusual for such directallegations to be made against a sitting president, by a high-profileinstitution like the ICC -- a situationcontributing to the unwavering attention on Mr. al-Bashir himself. Ismail says the Sudan president?s alleged creationof one of the ?most brutal militias in modern times? ? namely the janjaweed ?is also ?fuel enough? to ensure that Mr. al-Bashir will remain at the center ofthe Darfur debate, even if the requests from the AU and Arab League for the UNSecurity Council to suspend the action against the Sudanese leadersucceed. JohnNorris, the executive director of the Enough Project and a former chiefpolitical affairs officer at the UN, says Ocampo?s move highlights what?s beenobvious to diplomats, activists and the people of Darfur themselves for a longtime, ?And that?s that the Sudanese government of president Bashir is directlyimplicated in the crimes that are occurring on the ground, that they?ve[backed] the janjaweed as a proxy military force, that the Sudanese militaryand intelligence services have aided and abetted the janjaweed at every step,and that there?s been a very calculated effort to go after civilians todepopulate parts of western Sudan.? Legal experts say the charge that Mr. al-Bashireffectively created the janjaweed will form a large part of his trial for warcrimes, if he eventually does appear in the dock in The Hague. That?s why, says Ismail, the president?s supporters are?doing all they can? at the moment to establish distance between Mr. al-Bashirand the janjaweed. Dr. Bakri Osman Saeed, a senior member of Sudan?s rulingNational Congress Party, denies that the president armed an Arabic militia to?exterminate? the black people of Darfur. Rather, he maintains, the janajweedare an ?independent? group that?s always had a ?warrior culture? that?sresulted in them joining militias to protect their interests against theirperceived enemies. ?Many of these groups didn?t have land, they didn?tcome from settled communities, so it suited them to get involved in theseformations and get paid?. You can call them mercenaries, or whatever,? Saeedsays. He denies, though, that the janjaweed are on the Sudan government?spayroll. Jensen says there seem to be many people ready andwilling to defend Mr. al-Bashir, but that it?s ?interesting? that ? apart froma visit to Darfur itself where he railed against his so-called ?Western?enemies ? the president himself has ?stayed largely silent. And I think that?s in large part due to realnegotiations and deliberations within the regime about how best to deal withthis.? Darfuradvocates say ongoing suggestions by president al-Bashir?s supporters that theICC?s actions will lead to a surge of violence in the region, are attempts todeflect attention from him. Norrissays the same rumblings of outbreaks of violence because of the ICC were heardin 1999 and 2003 when the former president of Yugoslavia, Slobodan Milosevic,and Liberian leader Charles Taylor were indicted for war crimes. But,he continues, both men eventually ended up in The Hague: ?The situation on theground in both countries steadily improved, opposition figures in both Liberiaand Serbia were ultimately empowered by these decisions, and saw themselves ashaving more latitude given that the international community had staked out astrong position.? Ismailsays the ICC proceedings against Milosevic and Taylor entrenched democracy. ?Thisis why the ruling party in Sudan is so afraid of the ICC action,? he says.?They?re scared that it will ultimately entrench real democracy in Sudan, anderode the Sudanese elites? current monopoly of political power and economicpower.? Norrissays the ICC action, far from taking Darfur further away from peace, willcompel the government of Sudan to enter ?meaningful? peace negotiations in theregion. ?Thechief prosecutor has unleashed a very powerful change in dynamic?. It sends avery useful message to president Bashir?s cronies, his bagmen, the peoplewho?ve kept him in power all of the years, that they may be lashed to a sinkingship over time, and that president Bashir may not have the best interests oftheir country at heart, and may not be the best representative for their nationon the international stage.? Norrisdescribes the ICC action as a ?moment of truth? for all concerned ? especiallythe government of Sudan. ?Theyface a very stark choice. They can be more confrontational, they can cut offhumanitarian access, they can go after peacekeepers, and simply ensure thatthey push themselves further and further into a corner, and encourage a morerobust response from the international community, and essentially turn Sudan increasinglyinto a pariah state.? Or,he says, the authorities in Khartoum can take a ?more constructive approach.They could change their leadership; they could continue on with their existingleadership and seriously engage in credible peace talks, allow the peacekeepingforce to be fully deployed and not try to haggle it to death ? truck by truckand person by person?. And they could institute the provisions of the north-south peace deal.? Norrissays pressure from UN Security Council permanent member states Russia andChina, as well as the AU and Arab League, to suspend the probe against Mr.al-Bashir is ?regrettable,? but ultimately will not stop the ?wheels ofjustice? from turning. ?Atthe end of the day, I think there are very few politicians, there are very few(UN) member states, there are very few diplomats who want to stand on a stageand vigorously defend the interests and activities of someone who isself-evidently a war criminal and belongs in the dock.?