VIOLENT CLASHES BREAK OUT IN DARFUR

Sudanese soldiers have been fighting with rebels in the Darfur region in recent days, the army has confirmed.

The clashes, in Korma in northern Darfur, were the first major battles since a UN commander said last month that the region was no longer at war.

The joint African Union-United Nations force Unamid is investigating.

Sudanese officials say 10,000 people have died since the conflict broke out in 2003. The UN says 300,000 have died and 2.7 million have been displaced.

From 2003 to 2005, when the conflict was at its height, aid agencies labelled the situation in Darfur as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

A faction of the main rebel group, the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), said the latest clashes broke out on Thursday and continued into Friday.

The group said 20 civilians were killed during the fighting.

In a statement, the Sudanese military confirmed the clashes but said nothing about casualties.

DISPLACED IN DARFUR

2006 547,420 people fled their homes

2007 302,794

2008 317,000

2009 (first six months) 137,000

Total to date: 2.7m Source: UN humanitarian agency Ocha

The statement said only that government forces had “purged the areas of the remnants” of the SLA.

None of the claims have yet been independently verified.

Unamid said it was planning to send an investigation team to the area.

“We are waiting to sent an urgent mission there to verify and assess the security and humanitarian situation,” said spokesman Nourredine Mezni.

The clashes are the first of any note since Unamid’s outgoing military commander Gen Martin Agwai said the war in Darfur was effectively over.

The Nigerian officer characterised the violence in Sudan’s Western province as closer to criminality than an outright war.

Next month peace talks on Darfur will continue in the Qatari capital Doha.

But the BBC’s James Copnall, in Sudan, says SLA leader Abdulwahid El Nour has made it clear he is very unlikely to attend.

On Sunday President Omar al-Bashir appealed to all the armed movements in Darfur to join the talks.

He called on “the remaining sons of Darfur who took up arms against the government” to stop fighting and join the peace process.

The war broke out in the arid and impoverished region early in 2003 when rebel groups attacked government targets, accusing Khartoum of oppressing black Africans in favour of Arabs.

Pro-government militiamen hit back with brutal force, which the US and some rights groups have labelled genocide.

Khartoum denies supporting the militias, but the international court in The Hague issued an arrest warrant earlier this year for Mr Bashir, accusing him of war crimes.

SOURCED FROM BBC

SUDAN’S POLICE TEAR-GAS PROTESTERS

Police have fired tear gas at supporters of a Sudanese woman charged with wearing “indecent clothing”, shortly after her trial was postponed.

Lubna Ahmed Hussein says she was arrested for wearing trousers.

She has adopted a defiant attitude, urging authorities to try her although she faces up to 40 lashes in public.

Earlier, she told the BBC she was not afraid, saying: “Flogging is not pain, flogging is an insult to humans, women and religions.”

Ms Hussein has resigned from a UN job that would have given her immunity to take on the case – indicating she wants it to become a test case for women’s rights in Sudan.

“If the court’s decision is that I be flogged, I want this flogging in public,” she told the BBC’s Today programme.

But Ms Hussein’s trial in the capital, Khartoum, was delayed for a month after the judge said he needed to verify if she was immune from prosecution because of her former position at the UN.

After her hearing was adjourned, Ms Hussein said the authorities wanted to delay her trial until the fuss around it went away.

Scores of women protested outside the court, some holding up banners saying “No return to the dark ages”.

Then the riot police drove them away, reports the BBC’s James Copnall in Sudan.

First they marched up the road, banging their batons against their plastic shields, and later they fired tear gas and charged the protesters.

SOURCED FROM BBC

DARFUR REBEL GROUP RELEASE 60 SOLDIERS, POLICE

A major Darfur rebel group released 60 captured government soldiers and police on Saturday, the International Committee of the Red Cross said, a move that could help clear a logjam in troubled peace talks. The insurgent Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) handed the captives to Red Cross officers who passed them on to government officials on Saturday afternoon, the humanitarian group said.

“JEM has released 55 Sudan Armed Forces soldiers and five policemen,” Red Cross spokesman Saleh Dabbakeh told Reuters. Talks between JEM and Sudan’s government, which started in Doha in February, have stalled over the timing of confidence building measures, including the release of each other’s prisoners and a ceasefire.

JEM has said it wants Khartoum to release captured rebel fighters before any ceasefire is agreed, while Khartoum says it needs an end to hostilities ahead of other moves. The rebel group told Reuters the release took place close to the north Darfur settlement of Kutum, adding it was ready to free more captives if the government reciprocated by releasing imprisoned JEM fighters.

“We are fulfilling the goodwill agreements we signed in Doha,” senior JEM official Ahmed Tugud said. “We still have many government captives and are willing to release them if similar steps are taken by the other side.” No one was immediately available from Sudan’s government to comment on the release.

SOURCED FROM REUTERS

KIDNAPPERS REQUEST FOR $2 MILLION

Kidnappers of two female aid workers in Sudan’s Darfur region have demanded $2 million for their release, but the government is determined not to pay, a minister said on Tuesday. The two workers for Irish aid group GOAL were seized by armed men on July 3 from their base in the north Darfur town of Kutum — the third abduction of foreign humanitarian staff in the region in four months.

“The kidnappers are asking for $2 million. But our policy is not to pay ransom. We feel that would encourage others to do the same,” said state minister for humanitarian affairs Abdel Baqi al-Jailani.

The minister said Darfur officials were using local leaders to negotiate with the kidnappers, adding he was still expecting a positive outcome. “Our main priority remains the safety of the two women”

Irish negotiators and government officials have sent teams to Khartoum and El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, to help free the women, named by GOAL as Hilda Kawuki, 42, from Uganda, and Sharon Commins, 32, from Dublin. Two groups of foreign aid workers kidnapped in Darfur earlier this year were released unharmed after a period of negotiation.

SOURCED FROM REUTERS

MBEKI: AU YET TO TAKE A STANCE ON ICC

An African Union (AU) panel led by South Africa’s former President Thabo Mbeki said it had not taken a stance on an international court’s indictment of Sudanese officials including President Omar Hassan al-Bashir.

Fighting between the government, its allies and a myriad of rebel groups in Sudan’s western region has claimed as many as 300,000 people, according to the United Nations, but Khartoum says only 10,000 have died since clashes broke out in 2003.

“The panel has not taken a position whether or not the intervention of the (International Criminal Court) in Sudan or the arrest warrants the court has issued are appropriate,” it said in a statement.

The ICC has indicted Bashir on seven counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including murder, rape and torture.

He has dismissed the allegations as part of a Western conspiracy, and the AU has sought a deferment of the indictment, saying it has complicated peace efforts in Darfur.

An AU summit in Libya last week voted to suspend cooperation with ICC in the matter.

Mbeki told reporters on Friday that his panel of eight eminent Africans had consulted widely inside and outside Sudan.

“The consensus reached is that those charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity should appear in court and defend themselves,” he said. “The warrant has been issued. There is nothing that can be done.”

SOURCED FROM REUTERS

AU HALTS COOPERATION WITH ICC OVER BASHIR

The African Union says it will halt co-operation with the International Criminal Court over its decision to charge Sudan’s leader with war crimes.

President Omar al-Bashir was indicted over alleged atrocities in the Darfur region in March.

But delegates to an AU meeting in Libya agreed a resolution saying they would not co-operate in his arrest.

Analysts say the move means the Sudanese leader can travel across the continent without fear of arrest.

The Sudanese government has been fighting rebels in Darfur since 2003.

The ICC has accused President Bashir of two counts of war crimes – intentionally directing attacks on civilians and pillage – as well as five counts of crimes against humanity, including murder, rape and torture, related to the conflict.

He denies the allegations, saying the state has a responsibility to fight rebels.

SOURCED FROM BBC

SUDAN AND DARFUR REBEL END TALK WITHOUT A DEAL

Talks between Sudan’s government and a Darfur rebel group have been adjourned without agreement, both sides said on Friday, blaming each other for the impasse. The move will be seen as a setback to the United States and mediators from the United Nations and African Union who have been stepping up pressure for a resolution to the festering six-year conflict in Sudan’s remote west.

Khartoum has been holding on-and-off discussions with the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) — Darfur’s most militarily active insurgent organisation — in Qatar since February. The discussions, also brokered by Qatari mediators, are supposed to pave the way to full peace talks, but have stalled on arguments over a series of confidence-building measures including the exchange of prisoners.

The spokesman for the Sudan government side, Al-Shartawi Ja’afar Abd-al-Hakam, told state radio the talks had reached stalemate following JEM’s refusal to let other organisations and rebel groups take part. JEM dismissed the accusation, saying Khartoum was refusing to honour an earlier deal to free JEM prisoners and improve access for humanitarian groups in Darfur.

“There is no point continuing when the government is adamant it will not go through with the goodwill agreement,” senior JEM official Al-Tahir al-Feki told Reuters by phone from his base in Britain. He said the talks would be adjourned for two months for the negotiating teams to consult with their leaders.

JEM has clashed with Sudan’s army a number of times since the beginning of the talks, most recently over control of settlements in North Darfur, on a strategic road leading to the border with neighbouring Chad.

SOURCED FROM REUTERS

SUDAN TRIBESMEN ATTACK UN BARGES CARRYING FOOD

Armed tribesmen attacked UN barges carrying food aid in southern Sudan, with unconfirmed reports of casualties, UN officials have said. Gunmen from the Jikany Nuer ethnic group attacked the 27 boats near the town of Nasir, near Sudan’s eastern border with Ethiopia, on Friday. The barges were travelling to the town of Akobo when they were attacked and 16 have returned to Nasir, the UN said.

Locals said several people had been killed, the AFP news agency reported. “We don’t have information on how many people were killed or injured. But everyone we have talked to has described it as an attack,” Michelle Iseminger of the UN’s World Food Programme said. The boats had been travelling on the Sobat tributary, part of the White Nile river system.

The boats had been carrying sorghum and other food aid to refugees who had fled tribal fighting in the south of Sudan. “There are many wounded in the hospital including soldiers, and many killed, there are dozens dead,” said an unnamed Nasir resident quoted by AFP. The boats had included an escort of soldiers from the southern Sudan People’s Liberation Army.

The river, which is the only way to deliver aid to the poorly-developed south of the country, was closed earlier this year because of tensions in the area. A 22-year war between the Islamic north and the Christian and animist South ended in 2005. But correspondents say tension remains and many fear renewed fighting ahead of a referendum on the south’s potential full independence due in 2011.

SOURCED FROM BBC

AID GROUPS RETURN TO DARFUR

Sudan has authorised four aid agencies expelled from the country in March to return to troubled Darfur, says the UN’s humanitarian chief John Holmes. The four groups – named as Care International, Save the Children, Mercy Corps, and Padco – were among 13 organisations expelled in March. Mr Holmes said all the groups had the opportunity to seek readmission.

About 300,000 people have died and two million been displaced in the six-year conflict in Darfur, the UN estimates. Mr Holmes said Sudan had agreed to allow NGOs to go back to Darfur provided they registered under slightly changed names and logos.

“That possibility is there for all the organisations which were expelled and some of them already have taken advantage of it. They now got very recently new registrations and will be restarting their operations,” he said. The Sudanese government expelled the aid groups in March, following the announcement that President Omar al-Bashir was being indicted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes.

SOURCED FROM BBC

SUDAN’S LEADER DENIES WAR CRIMES

The Sudanese president has given his first international interview since being indicted for war crimes in Darfur, denying all the charges against him.

Speaking on the BBC’s HARDTalk programme, President Omar Al-Bashir challenged the international community to “bring me evidence that proves Sudanese forces have attacked and killed citizens” in Darfur

“I challenge anybody to bring me evidence that proves the Sudanese armed forces attacked and killed citizens in Darfur,” he told the BBC’s HARDtalk.bashir denies

In his first TV interview since being indicted on war crimes charges, he dismissed talk of crimes as propaganda.

Mr Bashir was indicted by the war crimes court on 4 March.

He has poured scorn on the International Criminal Court charges, which were the first issued by The Hague-based court against a sitting president.

In the Sudanese capital Khartoum, Mr Bashir told HARDtalk: “What has been reported to have happened in Darfur did not actually happen at all.

“What happened in Darfur was an insurgency. The state has the responsibility to fight the rebels.”

He added: “We have never fought against our citizens, we have not killed our citizens.”

The ICC has accused President Bashir of two counts of war crimes – intentionally directing attacks on civilians and pillage – and five counts of crimes against humanity, including murder, rape and torture

SOURCED FROM BBC