The West shows renewed interestAPPARENTLY, according to Sudan's president Omar al-Bashir, everyone has been getting all steamed-up about nothing in Darfur. In fact most of Sudan's western region is "secure and enjoying real peace", he announced after a rare visit to Darfur last weekend. "People are living normal lives", he said. That will come as a surprise to more than 2m desperately poor, vulnerable and hungry internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Darfur itself, and to the 200,000 or so refugees who have fled over the border to camps in neighbouring Chad. Their misery comes on top of an estimated 200,000—400,000 people who have died since 2003 when fighting erupted in Darfur; many of the deaths have been caused by forces controlled by the Sudanese government. But then Mr Bashir and his ministers have spent much of the past year leading a concerted campaign to downplay the severity and significance of what the UN calls the "worst humanitarian disaster" anywhere. Instead, Sudan's rulers have been trying to get outsiders to focus on the investment opportunities in the oil and financial-services sectors in the booming capital of Khartoum. So, as ever, the Sudanese government has been trying to weaken foreign efforts to intervene in Darfur to protect the IDPs and the humanitarian workers who largely keep them alive. They have faced what is widely reported to be a rising tide of violence and lawlessness since a failed peace agreement of just over a year ago. Having finally agreed in principle last month, after over a year's worth of unremitting diplomatic pressure, to let in a "hybrid" African Union-UN force of 26,000 troops and police, the Sudanese government and its allies at the UN have been softening the new resolution that would actually allow the deployment of such a force. The UN and DarfurThe UN's inaction on DarfurAT A summit in 2005, all the member countries of the United Nations agreed on a principle of a "responsibility to protect" civilians from atrocities. The fine idea suggested that if a state would not protect its own, outsiders must step in, with force if necessary. That same UN summit created a new Human Rights Council which would replace a discredited predecessor, and name and shame abusers of human rights. These facts could give the impression that the world in general, or the UN in particular, has grown serious about putting an end to murder and repression in Darfur, in western Sudan. Yet almost nothing has changed there, except for the worse. International aid agencies reckon that the humanitarian situation has deteriorated markedly since last year's partial peace deal. (Only one big Darfuri faction has signed on, and may now be helping the Sudanese government carry out its crimes.) The Sudanese government continues to refuse the actual deployment of the UN force. Rape and murder remain commonplace, along with the slow starvation of many more victims.…
The worsening chaos of DarfurInternecine fighting makes peace look even less likely than before
As usual in the shadowy world of the Darfur war, what is certain is that plenty of people have been killed and many more displaced in these incidents, but no one can be sure who the attackers were or what their motive was. The AU peacekeepers' Nigerian commander in Darfur blamed a splinter group of the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), one of three main rebel groups fighting against Sudan's government in Khartoum, for killing the AU men. Others suspect another splinter of one of those rebel groups, the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM).
Why would Sudan's government want to collude in killing AU peacekeepers? Because, so the argument goes, Mr Bashir may want to stymie peace talks due to take place in Libya at the end of this month and discourage foreign peacekeepers from venturing into the Sudanese maelstrom. He has reluctantly agreed to accept a "hybrid" peacekeeping force of AU and UN troops, totalling some 26,000. At present, the AU's 6,000 or so troops plainly cannot cope. Letting a bunch of them be killed may deter others from coming along.In any event, the government is still sponsoring groups of janjaweed (Arab militiamen on horseback) who continue to rape and pillage in Darfur and southern Sudan, where a separate shaky peace between the Arab north and the black African south is holding up, just. Amnesty International, a human-rights lobby, says it has evidence that the Sudanese government is preparing a military offensive in north Darfur, with troops readying themselves in at least six towns.But the Darfuri rebels, now split into as many as a dozen factions, may themselves be increasing the chaos. If a rebel group did kill the AU peacekeepers, it would not be the first time. Since the AU troops arrived in 2004, they have increasingly come to be regarded by the rebels as instruments of the Sudanese government rather than as even-handed. Sudan is a prominent member of the AU, and is seen as having a big say over its deployment of troops. So what started as a fight between Darfuris and Arabs may be turning into a free-for-all, not least for profiteers. Quite a lot of the violence, such as the frequent attacks on aid convoys and UN food dumps, is now sheer banditry.This stalling will, at the least, delay the deployment; at worse, it may undermine the force's capacity to operate effectively at all, as happened to the AU force. For frustrated Darfur-watchers, it is an all too familiar situation.
The worsening chaos of DarfurInternecine fighting makes peace look even less likely than before
As usual in the shadowy world of the Darfur war, what is certain is that plenty of people have been killed and many more displaced in these incidents, but no one can be sure who the attackers were or what their motive was. The AU peacekeepers' Nigerian commander in Darfur blamed a splinter group of the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), one of three main rebel groups fighting against Sudan's government in Khartoum, for killing the AU men. Others suspect another splinter of one of those rebel groups, the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM).
Why would Sudan's government want to collude in killing AU peacekeepers? Because, so the argument goes, Mr Bashir may want to stymie peace talks due to take place in Libya at the end of this month and discourage foreign peacekeepers from venturing into the Sudanese maelstrom. He has reluctantly agreed to accept a "hybrid" peacekeeping force of AU and UN troops, totalling some 26,000. At present, the AU's 6,000 or so troops plainly cannot cope. Letting a bunch of them be killed may deter others from coming along.In any event, the government is still sponsoring groups of janjaweed (Arab militiamen on horseback) who continue to rape and pillage in Darfur and southern Sudan, where a separate shaky peace between the Arab north and the black African south is holding up, just. Amnesty International, a human-rights lobby, says it has evidence that the Sudanese government is preparing a military offensive in north Darfur, with troops readying themselves in at least six towns.But the Darfuri rebels, now split into as many as a dozen factions, may themselves be increasing the chaos. If a rebel group did kill the AU peacekeepers, it would not be the first time. Since the AU troops arrived in 2004, they have increasingly come to be regarded by the rebels as instruments of the Sudanese government rather than as even-handed. Sudan is a prominent member of the AU, and is seen as having a big say over its deployment of troops. So what started as a fight between Darfuris and Arabs may be turning into a free-for-all, not least for profiteers. Quite a lot of the violence, such as the frequent attacks on aid convoys and UN food dumps, is now sheer banditry.This stalling will, at the least, delay the deployment; at worse, it may undermine the force's capacity to operate effectively at all, as happened to the AU force. For frustrated Darfur-watchers, it is an all too familiar situation.
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