Sudan, Oil, and African Muslim vs. African Muslim

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Some may recall Enver Masud's early premonitions regarding the plan for invading Iraq in "Why Iraq May be Next" which he sent out in his newsletter (The Wisdom Fund) on November 20, 2001:

http://www.casi.org.uk/discuss/2001/msg01022.html

"WASHINGTON, DC--Iraq may be next in line for a U.S. attack. Iraqi oil is the coveted prize. (...)"



He now comes up with another suspicion in another conflict ... (quoted here in full length according to his request, see copyright notice below and at www.twf.org)

http://www.twf.org/News/Y2004/0807-Darfur.html


Sudan, Oil, and African Muslim vs. African Muslim

Are the U.S. and Britain seeking a pretext for intervention in order to take advantage of Sudan's oil?

by Enver Masud

The situation in Darfur is tragic, but it is not genocide - oil may be the real target for those promoting military intervention.

According to Alex de Waal, the "world authority" on Sudan,

"Characterising the Darfur war as 'Arabs' versus 'Africans' obscures the reality. Darfur's Arabs are black, indigenous, African and Muslim - just like Darfur's non-Arabs . . . Until recently, Darfurians used the term 'Arab' in its ancient sense of 'bedouin'. These Arabic-speaking nomads are distinct from the inheritors of the Arab culture of the Nile and the Fertile Crescent." (The Observer, July 25, 2004)

Sudan's 40 million population is 70% Sunni Muslim, 25% indigenous beliefs, and 5% Christian. Sudan's African Muslims killing African Muslims in tribal warfare is tragic, but cannot correctly be described as genocide - the systematic destruction by the government of Sudan of a national, racial, ethnic, or religious group.

Tensions in Darfur, in western Sudan, have existed since the 1970s. Forced by drought and scarce resources, the nomadic cattle herders in the north ventured into lands populated by the more settled communities in the south.

Renewed fighting broke out at the very moment when a peace agreement was about to be signed which would have ended 21 years of conflict between the government of Sudan, and the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) in southern Sudan.

Darfur's tribes rebelled against the government complaining that the Sudan government had failed to develop the area. It is alleged that the rebels, aware of the terms of the proposed peace agreement between the government of Sudan and the SPLA, hoped to strike a favorable deal for themselves.

Southern Darfur, like southern Sudan, is rich in oil. The Chinese National Petroleum Corporation holds the large oil concession in southern Darfur. Chinese soldiers are alleged to be protecting Chinese oil interests.

It is also alleged that the rebels in southern Darfur are getting weapons from outside Sudan. "UN observers say they have better weapons than the Sudanese army, and are receiving supplies by air," according to Crescent International (UK).

The government of Sudan, after agreeing with UN Secretary General Kofi Anan to a 90-day period to end the conflict, was given 30 days under a UN resolution pushed through by the U.S. and Britain.

Sudan, largely undeveloped, and barely emerging from colonial oppression, has been given a virtually impossible task of pacifying an area the size of France. This may be the pretext for yet another U.S.-British intervention for oil.

In 1996, the U.S. sent nearly $20 million in surplus U.S. military equipment to Ethiopia, Eritrea and Uganda to topple the government of Sudan (The Washington Post, November 10, 1996), and it would appear that the U.S. and Britain are now competing with China, Sudan's largest trading partner, for Sudan's oil.

What Sudan, and Darfur in particular, need now are humanitarian assistance - not avarice masquerading as altruism.

Meanwhile, the international community remains largely silent about Uganda.

There the Lord's Resistance Army has killed tens of thousands of people, often mutilating their bodies, displaced more than 1.6 million people in northern Uganda, kidnapped thousands of children, forced many to become soldiers or sex slaves. (Voice of America, July 29, 2004)

---
"China's Involvement in Sudan: Arms and Oil," Human Rights Watch, November 2003

"UN Urges Global Action in Darfur," BBC News, April 3, 2004


. . . there are reports that some of the groups are supported by Israel, European countries, and the US.--Cumali Onal, "Oil Underlies Darfur Tragedy," Zaman Daily, July 6, 2004]

Nima Elbagir, Sudan Says to Accept African Forces, No Peacekeepers," Reuters, August 7, 2004

Sam Dealey, "Misreading The Truth In Sudan," New York Times, August 8, 2004

"Arab League backs Sudan on Darfur," BBC, August 9, 2004

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Copyright © 2004 The Wisdom Fund - Provided that it is not edited, and author name, organization, and web address (www.twf.org) are included, this article may be printed in newspapers and magazines, and displayed on the Internet.
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1. "fairly impressive and modern equipment"

It is puzzling that in articles in which it is taken for granted that in Sudan a new Holocaust is taking place the role and objectives of the insurgent DEM and SLA is hardly, if ever, reflected.

To the unsuspicious reader it would thus appear that -- to the extent that these groups are even mentioned -- they just defend themselves against a genocidal government campaign.

Only in some in-depth articles we find -- if rarely -- the acknowledgement that these groups have a deciding role in the chain of events. Take for instance this article (from an undisclosed source, but at a site that is mainly featuring such icons of the human rights approach as Jerry Fowler, also John Ryle, and others, the "Crimes of War Project"). It even goes so far as to mention that these groups have availed themselves of "fairly impressive and modern equipment". Isn't this an astounding feat, given that they are recruited from poor peasants in the most neglected regions of one of the poorest countries in the world?



http://www.crimesofwar.org/onnews/news-darfur.html

>> (...)

There are two rebel movements struggling against the Khartoum forces. One is the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM), which was initially named the Darfur Liberation Movement but chose the broader appeal of a “national” name to increase its potential reach. The SLM is based mostly on the Fur and Masaleet tribes and is politically moderate. It has tried to ally itself with the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), the Asmara-based umbrella organization which unites all Sudanese opposition groups, whether North or South.

The second rebel group is the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), based mostly on the Zaghawa tribe. It is linked with the radical Popular Patriotic Congress party led by the veteran Islamist Hassan al-Turabi who has now fallen out with his former NIF disciples. (At the end of March 2004, Sudanese authorities arrested al-Turabi, ostensibly for involvement in a plot to overthrow the country's president.) The relationship between JEM and SLM remains one of the obscure points of the Darfur conflict, even if the two organizations claim to be collaborating militarily. The JEM is by far the richer of the two and the one with the greater international media exposure, even if its radical Islamist connections make it an unlikely candidate for fighting a radical Islamist government.

The insurrection started slowly in February and March 2003 and went into high gear on April 25 when the SLM rebels attacked the provincial capital at el-Fasher, killing 72 troops of the garrison, destroying four aircraft on the ground and capturing General Ibrahim Bushra, the garrison commander. The reaction of the Khartoum government was a mixture of panic, unrealistic accusation (Israel, the United States, the southern Sudanese rebel movement the SPLA and Eritrea were all held responsible for the uprising) and denial of the political reality. The insurgents were either called “armed bandits” or else described as nomadic groups fighting each other in “traditional conflicts over grazing rights”. Although this last claim contains more than a grain of truth (the “Arabs” are nomads while the “Africans” are settled peasants and in a drought period part of the motivation for fighting is indeed related to grazing) it is far from a full account of the situation. Economic deprivation, cultural spite and administrative marginalization are the key causes of the conflict.

Although SPLA intervention appears to have been minimal and that of the United States or Israel belong to the domain of fantasy, Eritrean involvement has been confirmed, albeit at a low level. The main financial support for the uprising comes either from contributions from the Fur diaspora to the SLM (there are many Fur working in the Gulf countries, in Khartoum, in Port Sudan and in the Gezira) or, in the case of the JEM, from foreign funds under the control of Hassan al-Turabi. It is the importance of this last financial source that explains the fairly impressive and modern equipment of the rebel forces.

(...) <<

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2. Support from foreign countries for Darfur insurgents?

Another possible source for the "fairly modern and impressive equipment" of the insurgents might be the Southern SPLA. Supported by the US for a very long time, Mr. Garang may be striving now for more than just the Vice-Presidency of Sudan he was promised in the peace talks ending the conflict in the South.

Observes Tom Masland in

>>'A Struggle For Power'

Did a split in the ruling clique lead to the Darfur crisis?
By Tom Masland
Newsweek International

(...)

Although widely understood as purely an ethnic conflict, this tragedy stems from politics mixed with tribalism. Darfur is home to 85 tribes, roughly divided between farmers and herders forced to compete as the Sahara advanced. The most influential are the Zagawa, Muslim Africans whose homeland straddles the Sudan-Chad border. In 1998, the ruling Islamist clique in Khartoum split. The winner of this power struggle, President Omar al Bashir, jailed or purged important Zagawa Army commanders and government ministers, core supporters of Islamist dissident Hassan al-Turabi. They then made common cause with John Garang, a former enemy who heads the southern-based Sudan People's Liberation Army, which had been at war with the Khartoum government since 1983. The dissidents joined the top ranks of the Darfur-based Sudan Liberation Army and the smaller Justice and Equality movement, both of which seek regional autonomy. The breakaway group also cultivated ties with Chad President Idriss Deby, himself a Zagawa, and Eritrean President Isaias Afawerki, who supports a separatist group on Sudan's eastern border.

Under intense U.S. pressure, Khartoum and the southern rebels two years ago agreed to a ceasefire and entered peace talks. Soon the Darfur rebels, not bound by the ceasefire, began to attack government police garrisons and airports in the region, using new weapons and vehicles. (Musa Hilal, 43, whom Washington calls the "coordinator" of the Janjaweed, says he simply let his followers serve in uniform in the Army and government militia after the attacks provoked a general mobilization. "Some innocent people were really affected by the war," he told NEWSWEEK. "Politicians are exploiting this.") Opposition sources in Khartoum say a prominent adviser to the SPLA raised $1 million for the Darfur offensive, and that both Eritrea and the southern rebels secretly backed the uprising. The SPLA and Eritrea deny supplying the Darfur dissidents with weapons or money. Asked whether SPLA leader Garang inspired the rebellion as a negotiating ploy, Annan said, cryptically, "That idea is there." The U.S. State Department's top Africanist, Charles Snyder, says he sees no evidence of such provocation.

Garang, who under the terms of a framework peace agreement signed in May will join the central government, clearly wants allies in Darfur. If the accord is smoothly implemented—by no means a certainty—he can run for president in three years. Garang could win if he can add enough Arabs to his core African constituency, which includes about a third of the country's voters. "Darfur is a contingency plan," says an opposition source in the capital. "In a nutshell, it is a struggle for power in Khartoum."

(...) <<

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/5411829/site/newsweek/


Foreign countries are already conducting business, not only with Khartoum (pipelines, Mercedes, trucks and busses), but also with the rebel leader, Mr. Garang, himself! Just recently, for instance, the German company Thormaehlen signed a multibillion contract with him for the construction of a railway to Kenia that is supposed to transport oil from Juba to Mombasa.

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3. "weapons, vehicles, and modern satellite communication"

claims of outside assistance to the insurgents(see footnotes):

http://www.darfurinformation.com/p_looking_beyond.shtml

>> (...)

In any instance, it is clear that the gunmen who have caused so much havoc in Darfur have had considerable outside assistance. The 'Sudan Liberation Army' were reported by Agence France Presse to have "weapons, vehicles and modern satellite communications". (12) UN media sources have also noted claims by tribal leaders that the rebels have better weapons than the Sudanese army. (13) The rebels have also been receiving military supplies by air. (14) And, in a disturbing resonance of the gunmen who have dominated parts of Somalia in four-wheel drive "technicals", the gunmen have also been operating in groups of up to 1,000 men in four-wheel drive vehicles.(15)

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12 "New Rebel Group Seizes West Sudan Town", News Article by Agence France Presse, 26 February 2003.

13 "The Escalating Crisis in Darfur", News Article by Integrated Regional Information Networks, UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 31 December 2003.

14 See, for example, "Sudan Accuses Southern Separatists of Supplying Arms to Darfur Rebels", News Article by Agence France Presse, 28 April 2003, and "Sudanese Armed Forces Attack an Unidentified Plane for Helping Western Rebels", News Article by Associated Press, 28 August 2003.

15 "Dozens Reported Killed or Wounded in Attack in Western Sudan", News Article by Agence France Presse, 6 October 2003.

(...) <<