Sudan

[Petronas]

Coup plotters jailed in Sudan
15/04/2005 10:24 - (SA)

Khartoum - Twenty Sudanese, most of them army officers, were sentenced on Thursday to prison terms ranging from five to 15 years over an alleged coup plot last year, a defence lawyer said. The detainees were arrested last year on charges of involvement in a coup attempt by Darfur rebel sympathisers, allegedly masterminded by the Popular Congress party of Islamist leader Hassan al-Turabi.

Defence lawyer Barud Sandal said however that Al-Hajj Adam Yusuf, initially suspected of being the plotters' leader and currently on the run, was acquitted for lack of evidence. "The sentences are harsh and we will appeal," said the lawyer. Twenty of the accused were sentenced to prison terms ranging between five and 15 years, while another five were also acquitted, three of them in absentia. The only civilian among those sentenced on Thursday is a lawyer, Suleiman Tumbul Haggar, said Sandal, who was himself detained in last year's government sweep before being released.

http://www.news24.com/News24/Africa/News/0,,2-11-1447_1690368,00.html

Following a little background on Hassan al Turabi. An unholy alliance between the Darfur "rebels" (who interestingly call themselves "mujahedeen") and Turabi's pro Al Qaeda extremist Islamists. Lends some credence to the reports of Al Qaeda plans to set up training camps in the the lawless Darfur region.

Hassan al Turabi

Dr. Hassan ‘Abd Allah al-Turabi (الدكتور حسن عبد الله الترابي in Arabic), commonly called Hassan al-Turabi (sometimes transliterated Hassan al-Tourabi) (حسن الترابي), is a political and religious leader in Sudan, who may have been instrumental in institutionalizing Islamic Sharia law in the northern part of the country.

He was influential as a government figure under several heads of state in the country, but is currently in a Khartoum prison, put there on the orders of his one-time ally, current president Omar al-Bashir.

Recent reports have suggested that (as of 2004), Turabi is associated with the JEM (Justice and Equality Movement), an Islamist armed rebel group which is involved in the Darfur conflict. Turabi himself has denied these claims.

The Appendix of the 9/11 Commission Report calls Turabi "Sudan's longtime hard-line ideological leader and Speaker of the country's National Assembly during the 1990s." Turabi was leader of the National Islamic Front, a powerful political faction in Sudan. The Front attempts to impose sharia law upon the country, even though radical Islamists form a small minority of the population.

Early life and Family
Turabi was born in Kassala, eastern Sudan (near the border with Eritrea), around 1932. His father was a Sufi Muslim sheikh.

Education
As a youth Turabi received an Islamic education, and went on to earn graduate-level degrees at universities in Sudan and abroad:

B.A. in Law, Khartoum University 1951-1955
M.A. in Law, University of London 1955-1957
Ph.D. in Law, Sorbonne, Paris, 1959-1964

Political Career
After graduating, he returned to Sudan and became a member of the Islamic Charter Front, an offshoot of the Sudanese branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. He became Secretary general of that party in 1964, and remained until Gaafar Nimeiry assumed power in a 1969 coup. The members of Islamic Charter Front were arrested, and Turabi spent six years in custody and three in exile in Libya.

But in the first change of many in what would be a convoluted political career, Turabi would become reconciled to Nimeiry in 1979, when he became attorney general.

Sharia Law
The Nimeiry administration declared the imposition of a harsh brand of Sharia Law in 1983. Popular dissent with legal measures such as the dissolution of the Sudanese parliament, and with punishments such as amputations and hangings, resulted in a coup against Nimeiry in 1985.

Terrorism
Turabi protected Osama bin Laden when the al Qaeda leader based his operations in Sudan from around 1990-1996, at Turabi's invitation. Bin Laden himself moved from Saudi Arabia to Sudan in 1991, in part because of conflict between Bin Laden and the Saudi government over the government's refusing his lobbies to allow him to organize a jihad to banish Saddam Hussein from Kuwait and choosing instead to permit the United States to station troops in Saudi Arabi as part of its effort to drive Iraq out of Kuwait. Turabi granted Bin Laden a safe and friendly haven from which to conduct jihadist activities; in return, Bin Laden agreed to help the Sudanese government in roadbuilding and to fight African Christian separatists in Southern Sudan.

Turabi founded the annual Popular Arab and Islamic Conference (also sometimes called the Congress) around 1991. Meeting here were several radical Islamic groups from around the world, including representatives from the Palestine Liberation Organization, Hamas, Egyptian Jihad, Algerian Islamic Jihad, and Hezbollah.

"Turabi sought to persuade Shiites and Sunnis to put aside their divisions and join against the common enemy. In late 1991 or 1992, discussions in Sudan between al Qaeda and Iranian operatives led to an informal agreement to cooperate in providing support-even if only training-for actions carried out primarily against Israel and the United States. Not long afterward, senior al Qaeda operatives and trainers traveled to Iran to receive training in explosives." -- 9/11 Commission Report, Chapter 2

Turabi's Conferences continued until around 1999, when his power in Sudan slipped due to political turbulence.

External links
Sudan Update's entry on the National Islamic Front (http://www.sudanupdate.org/WHOSWHO/NIF.HTM)
Biography of Hassan al Turabi from Human Rights Watch (http://www.hrw.org/press/2002/03/turabi-bio.htm)
Guardian article at the time of his March 2004 arrest (http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1182857,00.html)
Text of a speech given by Turabi before the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Africa Subcommittee (http://www.islamonline.net/iol-english/qadaya/qpolitic-14/qpolitic1.asp)
Chapter 2 of 9/11 Commission Report (http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/911Report_Ch2.htm) Turabi is described in Section 2.3
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hassan_al_Turabi"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hassan_al-Turabi

[Petronas]

Sudan (Country threat level - 4): The Eastern Front rebel movement stated on 21 June 2005 that fighting near the eastern city of Tokar, located approximately 75 mi/120 km south of Port Sudan, constituted a "real war" against the government that would continue unless the government concedes to the group's demands. The rebel group has destroyed three military garrisons in the fighting and is currently holding approximately 20 government troops hostage. The group is reportedly demanding justice for the killing of 20 people during a Beja demonstration in Port Sudan in January 2005. Tensions have been increasing in eastern Sudan, prompting concerns of a new conflict. On 13 June, rebels belonging to the Beja Congress Army captured six Sudanese officials in Hamesh Koreb. The rebels accuse the government of marginalizing the group and failing to develop the rebel land.

AIR SECURITY International - HOT SPOTS 6/22/2005

[Petronas]

Envoy to Sudan Reports Threats
U.N.'s Jan Pronk says Al Qaeda has warned him and non-African troops who might go to Darfur.
March 1, 2006

UNITED NATIONS — The world body's top envoy to Sudan said Tuesday that Al Qaeda has threatened him and any peacekeeping troops deployed there from outside Africa, following the Sudanese government's rejection of a proposed U.N. force meant to protect civilians in the nation's Darfur region. U.N. special envoy Jan Pronk said the government in Khartoum deeply distrusts foreign intervention in its nation and fears that the presence of a United Nations or NATO force would be the beginning of a foreign occupation such as those that took place in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The U.N. is drawing up plans to transform a 7,000-strong African Union force into a U.N.-led operation as the regional troops run out of funding and logistical support. But Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir on Saturday denounced the U.N.'s plan to field a force of as many as 20,000 troops, some from outside Africa, to quell continuing violence in Darfur.

On Feb. 17, President Bush said the number of peacekeepers on the ground in Darfur should be doubled, perhaps with the support of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Bashir responded Saturday that such international troops would be at risk. "We are strongly opposed to any foreign intervention in Sudan, and Darfur will be a graveyard for any foreign troops venturing to enter," he said in Khartoum. Bashir summoned Pronk on Monday to underline his government's insistence on African troops.

Pronk returned to the U.N. on Tuesday and told reporters that there is an "atmosphere of fear and conspiracy" in Khartoum. "They speak about re-colonization, invasion and they speak about Iraq and Afghanistan … and they speak about a conspiracy against the Arab and Islamic world," he said. The heated political climate in Khartoum has made negotiations over the next step difficult, Pronk said, describing intelligence that suggested that Al Qaeda terrorists were present in the Sudanese capital and had made death threats against him and any U.N. troops that might be deployed to the country. ...

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-sudan1mar01,0,545322.story?track=tottext

[NYer]

NBA fans might remember Manute Bol. Frank DeFord on HBO RealSports profiles Manute Bol's Tragic Life After Basketball. (http://dailyscorecard.blogspot.com/2006/03/manute-bols-people-slaughtered-in.html)

Bol tells Deford that during his career he wanted to go back to Sudan and fight alongside his Dinka tribesman in Southern Sudan. Considered the tallest people in the world, Christian and black, according to the show lived peacefully in Southern Sudan - until Arab Muslims from the North invaded with an intention to take over and Islamize them.

Bol and his best friend went to over 39 Congressmen personally and met with the Pentagon in the 90's telling them that their people were being decimated by the Arab Muslims from the North and would disappear if the US did not help. He said they got nothing.

His friend said he told the US the greatest threat they would face in the future would be from Islamist Fundamentalism, at which most laughed.

So Manute reached into his own pockets in the millions to help support the starving refugees who had witnessed their homes and families destroyed.

Read the whole thing ...

[keith]

Sudan denies violation of Darfur truce
By Opheera McDoom
Mon May 22, 8:17 AM ET



Sudan on Monday denied Darfur rebel reports that its troops had attacked their camps, breaking a ceasefire and a peace deal signed this month to end the conflict which has killed tens of thousands.

The peace deal was signed under intense global pressure on May 5 between the government and one main rebel faction. But two other rebel factions refused to sign, saying the deal was unfair. Thousands of Darfuris have demonstrated against the deal.

On Sunday the faction which signed the deal belonging to Minni Arcua Minnawi, said the government and its allied militia had attacked its bases in Dar es Salaam in North Darfur.

"We the armed forces did not attack any areas, not Dar es Salaam or anywhere," said the armed forces spokesman's office in Khartoum. "There are many empty accusations flying around but none of them are true."

The African Union said Arab militias, known as Janjaweed, had been massing in both North and South Darfur states and had exchanged fire with its soldiers. But they could not confirm any government attacks on rebels.

Clashes have continued unabated despite the peace deal between militias and rebels. Smaller clashes between rebel factions also continue. But the government, which the United Nations says armed the Janjaweed to fight the rebels, denies it is using the militias.

"The armed forces do not need to use militias. If we are attacked we have the right to defend ourselves and will do so," said the army official, who declined to be named.

The Janjaweed stand accused of a widespread campaign of rape, looting and killing which drove two million Darfuris from their homes to miserable camps across the vast desert region.

The government admits arming some tribes to fight the rebels in early 2003 but denies any links to the Janjaweed, calling them outlaws.

On Monday Minnawi's faction said the government was using Antonov planes as air cover for large troop movements in North Darfur state in preparation for an attack. The areas of control are not clearly marked so both the government and the rebels claim some areas as theirs.

"They flew Antonov planes for two hours this morning," said al-Tayyib Khamis, a spokesman for Minnawi's Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) faction. "They are trying to get as much territory as possible before the U.N. troops come in," he added.

The cash-strapped African Union force has asked for a U.N. transition in Darfur. The force has been unable to stop attacks on civilians even when present and those in the refugee camps have attacked them out of frustration.

Sudan prior to the peace deal had refused a U.N. force and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is sending top diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi for high-level talks in Khartoum on Tuesday hoping to secure a breakthrough.




Copyright © 2006 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable for any errors or delays in the content, or for any actions taken in reliance thereon.


Copyright © 2006 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.

[keith]

Sudan : No agreement on UN force in Darfur

June 7, 2006,
By Motshidisi Baloyi

Talks between a UN Security Council delegation and Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir centred on the role of the United Nations in resolving the Darfur conflict, but failed to reach a consensus on the deployment of a UN peacekeeping force.

"We had a busy programme. We had a very good and long session with President Bashir, as a well as a long session with the minister of foreign affairs [Lam Akol]," Emyr Jones Parry of the United Kingdom told reporters in Khartoum.

It was the first time the Council had come to the Sudanese capital for face-to-face meetings with Sudanese authorities. Although the talks were constructive, a decision on the deployment of a UN force in the volatile western Sudanese Darfur region was not reached.

Sudanese foreign ministry spokesperson, Jamal Ibrahim, told reporters his government would review the issue after a joint UN and African Union military assessment mission this week.

During the discussions, the delegation stressed the importance of a full and rapid implementation of the Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA), signed between the Sudanese government and the main rebel faction on 5 May.

Representatives from all 15 member countries are on the Security Council mission, most of them at the ambassadorial level. They are due to visit the AU headquarters in the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa, Darfur and Chad, where hundreds of thousands of Sudanese refugees are living in camps.

"I think we have explained why the last [Security Council] resolution was adopted under Chapter Seven [of the UN Charter, which authorises the use of force], and we have reinforced that we have come in spirit of partnership, of respecting fully the sovereignty – the territorial integrity - of Sudan," Parry added.

Meanwhile, international donors are expected to meet in Brussels next month to raise additional financing to extend the 7 000-strong AU peacekeeping mission in Darfur until September. The conference, to be hosted by the European Union, would also establish a plan for the reconstruction of Darfur and the gradual return of more than 2 million displaced people.




IRIN

http://politics.andnetwork.com/index;jsessionid=2CE20393EC7C4872177EC46F99D43289? service=direct/1/Home/older.titleStory&sp=l37979

[keith]

Bloody battle in northern Darfur
By Jonah Fisher
BBC News, Sudan



Sudan's Darfur region has seen its bloodiest few days since the signing of a peace agreement over two months ago.
More than 80 people have been killed as rebels fight each other for territory, according to sources within the African Union peacekeeping mission.

In early May, under pressure from the international community, the Sudanese government signed an agreement with one of the region's rebel movements.

But the deal has not been implemented and security has worsened.

Darfur's Sudan Liberation Army says it took up arms three years ago to fight for greater power and wealth for their people.

Offensive

Now the rebels have split and the SLA are fighting amongst themselves with a brutality that has driven thousands more people from their homes.

The town of Korma in North Darfur has changed hands three times since March.


In the latest clash, which began a week ago, forces from the SLA faction led by Minni Minnawi, conducted an offensive to empty villages around the town.
Those who escaped allege systematic rape and executions - violence which has until now been associated with pro-government forces.

The African Union has been told that 32 people died in the initial operation and that over 50 were killed as Mr Minnawi's faction consolidated its hold on the town.

The peacekeepers have so far been denied access to Korma to see for themselves.

Two months ago, in their haste to get a deal, the international community pushed through a peace agreement involving just one of Darfur's rebel factions - that of Mr Minnawi.

The size of that mistake is now becoming clear.

The conflict's victims who still live in overcrowded camps have rejected the deal.

Western donors now find themselves promoting the agreement alongside the Sudanese government and Mr Minnawi's SLA - a rebel force that seems more determined to settle scores than implement the deal.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/5165856.stm

Published: 2006/07/10 14:11:59 GMT

© BBC MMVI
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/5165856.stm

[Petronas]

Sudan (Country threat level - 4): On 25 August 2006, Islamist leaders threatened to take up arms against U.N. peacekeepers deployed to the Darfur region of Sudan. The leaders also warned the Khartoum government against allowing U.N. forces into the country. Al-Qaeda leaders have called on all Muslims to fight any U.N. force in Sudan. The United States and Great Britain have introduced a resolution to the Security Council that would deploy 17,000 troops and 3,000 police officers in Darfur to assist the overstretched African Union and to assist with the peace process.

http://www.airsecurity.com/hotspots/HotSpots.asp

[Petronas]

Sudan (Country threat level - 4): Human rights groups reported on 8 September 2006 that the Sudanese government is indiscriminately bombing villages occupied by civilians. The Sudanese government launched a major offensive on 28 August, including bomber aircraft and helicopter gunships, in the Darfur region in order to flush out rebel forces in the area. Sudan has repeatedly refused U.N. support; however, France has suggested sending in troops without Sudanese permission.

http://www.airsecurity.com/hotspots/HotSpots.asp

[Petronas]

Sudanese mourn death of editor
Thu Sep 7, 2006 1:00 PM BST

A sea of white-clothed mourners laid Sudanese editor Mohamed Taha to rest on Thursday after he was kidnapped and killed by unknown armed men, raising fears of a new brand of extreme violence in Sudan.

Taha's decapitated body was found dumped on a dirt road on Wednesday. He had drawn protests from Islamic groups last year by reprinting a series of articles questioning the roots of the Prophet Mohammed.

Amid cries of "There is no God but God" and "God is Greatest", thousands attended his funeral, including government ministers who sat alongside journalists and Taha's family. "The authorities have to get these people -- it's their responsibility," said Taha's uncle, Nasrallah Ali Mustafa. Hundreds of riot police lined the streets of central Khartoum and near the cemetery in a show of force by the interior minister whose resignation was demanded by hundreds of mourners at the morgue on Wednesday after Taha's body was found.

Sudanese were shocked by the gruesome crime, the first of its kind, and commentators voiced widespread concern it may be the start of a worrying new and violent trend. "Something must be done before the abduction phenomenon develops into a practice," said state-owned Sudan Vision, which printed in black and white only.

The semi-independent al-Watan paper said: "When you open this evil door to hell and knives and bullets take the place of the pen, this means we are.... on the path to chaos."

Police said they had made some arrests but no one has claimed responsibility for his death and authorities admit they are at a loss as to who committed the crime. "The circumstances are very murky," said journalist Sabah Mohamed al-Hassan. "This is the first time we see something like this in the history of this country."

Analyst and expert on Islamic groups, Diaa Rashwan, said it was likely to be local jihadis imitating al Qaeda. He linked it to rising extremism in the Middle East.

The picture viewed by a Reuters witness of Taha's body, hands and legs tied with his head lying next to his corpse, evoked spectres of similar crimes in Iraq. "Sudan is in a very critical situation now with the U.N. Security Council resolution ... and I think this is very dangerous," Rashwan said, adding, "I'm very worried." A week ago the Security Council passed a resolution to begin deploying more than 20,000 troops and police by year-end. Khartoum has likened the plan to a Western invasion that would attract jihadi militants and create an Iraq-like quagmire.

Sudanese Islamists have vowed to fight "the invaders". Mainly Muslim Sudan is under Islamic sharia law in the north, but while it has suffered multiple regional civil wars, it has not yet seen the extremist violence that has surfaced elsewhere in the Middle East.

Taha himself was an Islamist, but his criticism of other Islamic groups angered people. In the 1990s, an attempt was made on his life after he wrote an article about Islamist leader Hassan al-Turabi which offended many. Last year Taha was tried and his paper closed for three months for blasphemy, but sources said he was under close protection by the government during his time in prison. Some of Khartoum's Islamic groups protested angrily at his trial shouting threatening slogans.

Khartoum is also facing growing internal dissent from opposition parties who have tried to stage protests twice in the last two weeks to challenge the government over rising prices. Riot police used tear gas on Wednesday to break up a demonstration. On Thursday 53 people, including senior opposition party members, appeared in court after spending a night in jail accused of disturbing the peace.

http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=worldNews&storyid=2006-09-07T120020Z_01_L07869467_RTRUKOC_0_UK-SUDAN.xml&src=rss

[Petronas]

Government attacks intensify in Darfur
Fri Sep 8, 5:00 AM ET

Three years after rebels from the farming tribes of Darfur rose up against the Arab-dominated government in Khartoum, Sudan, the region is staring into the abyss once again.

Government planes have embarked on a wave of indiscriminate bombings in Darfur, killing civilians in Sudan's war-torn western region, according to human rights campaigners.

Witness statements collected by Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International detail deaths and injuries to women and children as Russian-made Antonov planes deliver their deadly payload. "Government forces are bombing villages with blatant disregard for civilian lives," says Peter Takirambudde, HRW's Africa director. ...

... Sudan's president, Omar Al-Bashir, has vowed to fight off UN troops himself, and warned that Sudan would take on international soldiers "as Hizbullah beat Israeli forces." ...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20060908/wl_csm/osudan;_ylt=Ai2r0JyCGrb_YY5.QdPvSs6s0NUE;_ylu=X3oD MTA3b3JuZGZhBHNlYwM3MjE-

[Petronas]

About 200,000 killed in Sudan's Darfur region: U.S. professors
September 15, 2006 - 22:19

Between 170,000 and 255,000 people have died in Sudan's war-torn Darfur region since 2003, said a new study that insists the death toll is often underreported. But the actual number of people who have died could be as high as 400,000, said one of the study's author's John Hagan, a sociology and law professor at Northwestern University in Illinois.

There is much uncertainty in estimating the death toll in Darfur because of difficulties obtaining accurate body counts in the conflict-ridden region, said the study, which was published Friday in the journal Science. The study was co-authored by Alberto Palloni, who directs the Center for Demography and Ecology at the University of Wisconsin. "The core of the problem is that in natural disasters, you can count the bodies or relatives are relatively accessible" to talk to, Hagan said in a telephone interview Friday. "This just isn't happening in Africa. There are mass graves but NGOs (non-governmental organizations) don't have access to them."

The conflict in Darfur began in early 2003 when black tribes revolted against the Arab-dominated government. The Sudanese government has been accused of unleashing Arab militiamen known as janjaweed who have been blamed for widespread atrocities, including rapes and killings.

Hagan said some news agencies and other organizations have been underreporting the death toll. UN officials have given death toll estimates of 180,000 to 200,000, while the U.S. State Department issued a report in spring 2005 that estimated between 63,000 and 146,000 had died.

In their study, the authors used World Health Organization and Medicins Sans Frontieres, or Doctors Without Borders, surveys done in refugee camps in West Darfur to obtain monthly mortality rate estimates. They used a ratio of the mortality rates to number of displaced people in the camps to extrapolate the data to cover the entire Darfur region over 31 months. "We tried to sort out the problems of overestimation and underestimation," of the death toll, Hagan said, adding the study was the first time research on the death toll in Darfur had appeared in a peer-reviewed scientific publication.

"We can say safely and cautiously that the toll is over 200,000," he said. But, Hagan said, the study had limitations and the number is likely to be much higher, even reaching 400,000. The study covers 31 months beginning in the fall 2003 and ending in the spring of this year. The research does not include the months since then and the months when the conflict first began in early 2003, he said. The study also does not include missing people who are presumed dead, Hagan said.

http://www.macleans.ca/topstories/news/shownews.jsp?content=w091582A

[Petronas]

Sudan (Country threat level - 4): On 16 September 2006, volunteer members of Sudan’s Popular Defense Forces staged a protest in Khartoum, the capital, against the possibility of U.N. forces taking over peacekeeping operations in the Darfur region, stating that they would respond to any such force as an invading army. Reports indicate that more than 1,000 people participated in the march to the U.N. offices in the city, which passed peacefully. The rally coincided with an international “day of action,” which peace activists in the United Kingdom, United States, Africa and other parts of the world staged to draw attention to the humanitarian atrocities occurring in the Darfur region and to demand that the international community take action.

http://www.airsecurity.com/hotspots/HotSpots.asp

[keith]

Khartoum's Murdered Journalist: A Casualty in Islam's Theological Civil War

By Andrew McGregor

The brutal decapitation of Khartoum newspaper editor Muhammad Taha earlier this month was part of a much larger inter-Islamic struggle reaching from the mountains of northwest Pakistan through Darfur, Tunisia, Paris and London. The murder took place against a local backdrop of street clashes between demonstrators and riot police, growing press censorship and calls from Sudan's president Omar al-Bashir for national unity against the "threat" of UN intervention in Darfur.

On the evening of September 5, 50-year-old Muhammad Taha, editor of the Islamist daily al-Wifaq, was abducted from his home by three masked assailants. His body was found in the street the next day, bound and beheaded. Taha was a member of the Sudanese Ikhwan (Muslim Brotherhood), a former member of Hassan al-Turabi's National Islamic Front and traditionally regarded as a friend of the military/Islamist regime. Taha's relationship with the government was actually much rockier, tested by Taha's fondness for provocative viewpoints in both the political and religious spheres. In 2000, he survived an assassination attempt after criticizing the ruling National Congress Party, and six months ago arsonists struck al-Wifaq's offices.

Responsibility for the shocking murder was claimed in an internet statement by Abu Hafs al-Sudani, who purported to lead Al-Qaeda in Sudan and Africa (al-Arabiya, September 12). Both the individual and the organization were previously unknown. The name appears to be a variant of a name commonly used by other well-known Islamic militants, such as Abu Hafs al-Misri, Abu Hafs al-Mauritani and Abu Hafs al-Urdani. In the statement, Abu Hafs accused the editor of dishonoring the Prophet, but also referred to Taha as "a dog of dogs from the ruling party." Abu Hafs said that the killers were safely outside of Sudan, perhaps accounting for the delay in claiming responsibility. Khartoum senior prosecutor Babekir Abdelatif downplayed the possibility of al-Qaeda involvement on September 13 (Sudan Tribune, September 13).

Politicians such as Umma Party leader Mubarak al-Fadil have suggested the al-Qaeda claim was meant to deflect attention from local Sudanese Islamists. The murder would represent al-Qaeda's first activity in Sudan since Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri urged their followers to attack UN forces in Darfur in an April 23 statement broadcast by al-Jazeera television.

The charges of "dishonoring the Prophet" stem from an obscure anti-Islamic tract serialized in Taha's newspaper accompanied by commentary by Taha. As the excerpts appeared, al-Wifaq's offices were targeted by demonstrations by the Islamist group Ansar al-Sunna. Taha was charged with the capital offense of blasphemy shortly after the articles appeared. Protestors gathered outside the courtroom daily demanding that prosecutors hand over Taha so that he could be killed immediately. In the end, Taha was fined US$3,200 and al-Wifaq was shut down for three months. After his trial, Taha continued to irritate the government through criticism of their Darfur policy and price hikes in staples designed to cover a budget shortfall.

Most media accounts of the publishing controversy and Taha's subsequent death incorrectly maintain that the offensive work in question was authored by the famous 15th century Egyptian historian al-Maqrizi. In fact, it is a recent pro-Christian, anti-Islamic tract entitled al-Majhool fi Hayat al-Rasool (The Unknown in the Life of the Prophet), a poorly researched work whose author uses the pseudonym "Dr. Maqrizi." The full text was made available at http://www.alkalema.us, a Christian Arabic website.

The first chapter serialized by al-Wifaq claims that the name of the Prophet's father was not Abdullah, but Abd al-Lat (Lat was an Arabian pagan god) and suggests that Muhammad was ineligible by his lineage to be a Prophet. During his trial, Taha maintained that his intent in serializing the work and his accompanying commentary was to refute the claims of "Dr. Maqrizi," describing the charges as "a joke" and politically motivated.

In the meantime, a Tunisian Islamist accused 72-year-old Paris-based Tunisian intellectual al-Afif al-Akhdar of being the anonymous "Dr. Maqrizi." Rached Gannouchi, leader of the Islamist Harakat al-Nahda group, used the organization's website (nahdha.net) to accuse al-Akhdar of writing the tract, reveling in his physical disabilities ("punishment from God for heresy") and issuing a fatwa calling for al-Akhdar's death for the offense of blasphemy. The book's claim that the Prophet was guided by Satan and assertions of the superiority of Christianity over Islam in no way resembled al-Akhdar's well-known intellectual and rationalist approach to Islam, a religion to which al-Akhdar remains deeply attached. Gannouchi issued his call for murder from the safety of British asylum, leaving al-Akhdar to appeal to the British justice system for Gannouchi's prosecution. The imam was eventually compelled to withdraw the baseless accusations from the website.

The cause for Gannouchi's scurrilous attack was evident. In October 2004, al-Akhdar joined two other Arab intellectuals in petitioning the UN Security Council to create an international court capable of trying Islamist terrorists for crimes against humanity, including those "scholars of terror" who issued fatwas calling for murder. Gannouchi was among those cited by name in the appeal.

In Sudan, eight months of relative press freedom was ended by the regime's desire to "prevent compromising the Taha investigation." Heavy censorship was re-imposed, especially on Arabic language newspapers like al-Wifaq, al-Sudani and al-Rai al-Shaab. The press interventions actually seem to have more to do with preventing media support for UN Security Council Resolution 1706, calling for the replacement of the African Union mission in Darfur with 20,000 UN peacekeepers and police, a measure resolutely rejected by the Sudanese government.

The war in northern Darfur has intensified since the May signing of the Darfur Peace Agreement by two resistance factions. Al-Qaeda's announced intention to intervene in Sudan has supported the government's assertion that a UN intervention would be self-defeating by actually attracting al-Qaeda militants to Sudan. Regime members from the powerful military and security branches as well as their Janjaweed allies have little desire to see UN forces arresting war crimes suspects for trial by the International Criminal Court.

Both al-Akhdar and Taha were convenient targets in a larger Salafi-Jihadi campaign against Islamic reform, applauded and encouraged by Osama bin Laden in his April message. Basing his argument on the work of 14th century scholar Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya (a disciple of Ibn Taymiyya), bin Laden claimed that "the crime committed by a freethinker is the worst of crimes, that the damage caused by his staying alive among the Muslims is of the worst kind of damage, that he is to be killed, and that his repentance is not to be accepted..." Bin Laden added that many of these freethinkers "are writers in newspapers" and should be killed immediately and "without consultation."

In a May 2004 address in Beirut on Arab modernity, al-Akhdar's words seemed to foretell Muhammad Taha's fate: "The Salafi school instills in the younger generations a religious fanaticism which entails a phobia of dissimilarity and a rejection of the other, to the upper end of approving his or her execution…Muslims other than Salafis are treated as (heretics) or deviators; thus enemies. A student therefore becomes ripe for the execution of all sorts of symbolic and bloody violence; he can burn others with fire...(or) behead those who disagree with him." Muhammad Taha's murder remains unsolved.

http://jamestown.org/terrorism/news/article.php?articleid=2370134

[Petronas]

'We burnt their homes and killed all the men, women and children'
October 18, 2006

OUTSIDE the back window Bakerloo Line trains rattle past. Downstairs someone makes tea. But in the upstairs living room of a nondescript house off Lambeth Road in South London a slight, softly spoken young man tells a story of atrocities in a far-off land that is anything but mundane.

Dily, a Sudanese Arab, recounts how for three years he and his fellow Janjawid charged the farming villages of Darfur on their camels and horses, raking the huts with gunfire and shouting: “Kill the slaves. Kill the slaves.” He reckons he attacked about 30 villages in all, and cannot count the people he shot. The villages were invariably destroyed, he says. The homes were burnt to the ground and the men, women and children killed — sometimes with the help of government airstrikes. If there were survivors “they would be left there . . . They couldn’t get help. Sometimes they made it to camps but mostly they died of thirst or starvation”.

Dily is a rarity in that wretched conflict. Filled with disgust, he finally escaped the Janjawid’s clutches and last month, with the help of “people smugglers”, reached Britain, where he is now seeking political asylum. He expresses remorse. He is willing to talk, and the story he tells flatly contradicts the Sudanese Government’s claims that it has no control over the Janjawid — the predominantly Arab “devils on horseback” who have driven two million of Darfur’s black Africans into camps and killed at least 200,000.

He says the Government deceived innocent Arab shepherds like himself into joining the Janjawid, saying they had to defend their communities against attack by Darfur’s black African rebel groups. He says they were trained and armed by Sudanese soldiers, ordered by the Government to attack Darfur’s villages and given military support when necessary. The Janjawid was formed for ethnic cleansing, he insists. “Why (else) would you attack villages, kill people, displace them and kill them in their thousands?”

Dily is not his real name, and he would be photographed only with a scarf around his face and a baseball cap pulled low over his eyes. His wife and young child remain in Sudan and he fears for their safety if he is identified. Nor can Dily’s story be independently verified, but he specifies names, places and events, speaks with the accent and idiom of the area he says he comes from, and has persuaded Darfuris living in Britain that he is genuine.

“He’s for real,” said Ishag Mekki, the deputy chairman of the Darfur Union, which represents Darfuris in Britain. James Smith, the chief executive of the Aegis Trust, a pressure group which campaigns against genocide, concurs: “We’ve checked his credibility as much as we can and we’re convinced he is who he says he is.”

Dily, who is in his early twenties, rarely smiled and fidgeted nervously with his hands as he spoke through an interpreter. He said he was tending his family’s camel herd in northern Darfur when rebel groups began attacking government targets in 2003: severe droughts had set black African farmers against nomadic Arabs and the rebels accused the Government of siding with the Arabs.

Dily said he was pressed to join the Janjawid by tribal elders, who were under pressure from government officials. “We were told we were Arab nomads and we had to protect our lands and our cattle,” he said. Dily and about 20 other youths from his area rode off on their camels to a training camp near the town of Kebkabiya where they joined hundreds of other Janjawid recruits. He says uniformed Sudanese soldiers spent about 20 days teaching them how to use guns — a Kalashnikov in his case — and attack villages.

Those with camels were separated from those with horses. They were organised into battalions of more than 500 men each. They were paid two million Sudanese pounds — roughly £500 — for the use of their camels and promised a monthly salary of 500,000 Sudanese pounds. Then they were unleashed. Apart from occasional visits home, Dily and his battalion — led by a former bandit — spent the next three years on the move, destroying one village after another. “The Government said attack all villages. The local commanders decided which,” he said.

The battalion would send scouts to check whether there were armed fighters in the targeted village. “If there were no fighters we just attacked straight away. If there were we had to be more cautious.” Sometimes they used satellite telephones to request airstrikes by the Sudanese military helicopters before attacking. “We would see smoke and fire and then we would go in.”

The attacks usually started early and lasted most of the day. The commanders said the villages had to be destroyed, and they did not spare women or children. “Mostly they said “Kill the blacks. Kill the blacks,” Dily said. “The majority of (the victims) were civilians, most of them women.”

Dily said he never raped a woman but other Janjawid did. “They took girls and women away, just out of sight, and started to rape them. Sometimes you heard gunshots if they refused.” They took away the cattle. Some were drunk.

Dily said he felt no elation during or after the attacks. He and his colleagues did not even know what they were fighting for, but faced execution if they disobeyed orders. “I hated the war and I hated the killings and decided to leave and to leave Sudan altogether,” he said.

One night he slipped away from the camp, risking death and knowing that he might never see his wife and child again. He hid in the mountains for three days, then made his way to the town of Kutum. A fellow Arab drove him to Mellit, and from there he was smuggled by car to the Libyan border for 500,000 Sudanese pounds. He was determined to reach Britain because, he was told, “it’s different from other European countries. They look after refugees”.

He borrowed money from friends of his father in Tripoli’s Sudanese community and paid $1,200 (£640) to reach Italy on a small boat packed with 25 other illegal immigrants. He paid another $200 to reach Paris by train and $300 to be smuggled into Britain in a lorry carrying boxes of bottled water. He arrived somewhere — he thinks Oxford — on September 20. He was arrested and sent to Croydon to apply for asylum. He is now living in a hostel, haunted by memories of burning villages. “Anybody who participates in war has to feel sorry for what happened,” he says.

The Aegis Trust plans to present Dily’s testimony to the International Criminal Court as evidence of genocide by Sudan’s leaders, who are still refusing to let United Nations troops into Darfur. “Everything this man says confirms that the Government of Sudan, contrary to its protestations, has been organising and supporting the Janjawid’s ethnic-cleansing operations from the beginning,” said Dr Smith, of the Trust. Told of Dily’s testimony on a BBC Newsnight programme, Hilary Benn, the International Development Secretary who has just returned from a visit to Sudan, said: “It’s clearly very serious evidence and I would urge that that information is passed to the International Criminal Court investigators.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2409336,00.html

[Petronas]

Fierce Fighting Breaks Out in Sudan's South
Friday, December 1, 2006; Page A20

Hundreds of people may have been killed in the heaviest fighting between Sudan's former north-south foes since they signed a peace deal last year, a former senior rebel officer said Thursday. Terrified civilians in the southern town of Malakal reported looting and bodies in the streets after three days of clashes, and U.N. officials in New York said 240 civilian workers had been temporarily evacuated.

"More than hundreds have been lost. The Sudan army sustained very heavy casualties, and civilians were caught in the crossfire," said Elias Waya Nyipuocs, a former senior officer in the Sudan People's Liberation Army, a rebel group that fought the government in a long civil war.

Nyipuocs said a militia allied with the Sudanese armed forces attacked the SPLA and the local commissioner of Malakal. The militiamen then took refuge in military barracks near the airport and full combat began. Nyipuocs said the armed forces fought "side by side" with the militia against the SPLA. Armed forces tanks shelled the town, inflicting many civilian casualties, he said.

A U.N. statement said fighting had subsided early Thursday. Tension between armed groups in the town remained high, and there was sporadic gunfire, looting of shops and violence against civilians.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan called the clashes "a serious violation" of the January 2005 deal, which ended what had been Africa's longest civil war. The conflict in southern Sudan took 2 million lives and displaced 4 million people. A separate conflict in the Darfur region of western Sudan has left as many as 450,000 people dead from disease and violence and forced 2.5 million from their homes since 2003.

About 10,000 U.N. peacekeepers are monitoring the 2005 agreement, which created separate north and south armies with joint units in major towns and an autonomous southern government. Malakal is the capital of the Upper Nile region, potentially one of the most oil-rich regions in Sudan.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/30/AR2006113001331.html

[NYer]

http://cagle.msnbc.com/working/061222/benson.gif

[Petronas]

Sudan arrests 20 extremists, seizes explosives
Friday, August 17, 2007

KHARTOUM: Sudanese police have arrested 20 young Islamist extremists over the past days and seized weapons and explosives, the justice minister said Wednesday. “It is still premature to speak of any ties with Al-Qaeda,” said the minister, Mohammed Ali Mardhi, but added it could not be excluded either. The men, in their 20s, were arrested between Sunday and Tuesday in various locations in the capital Khartoum and its sister city Omdurman. One policeman was wounded in an exchange of fire with the extremists. Stores of guns and explosives including nitroglycerin were found in the homes they had rented, he said.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\08\17\story_17-8-2007_pg4_12

[Casey]

Bin Laden host Hassan al-Turabi held after rebel raid on Khartoum

Middle East & Africa
May 13, 2008

Rob Crilly in Nairobi

Sudanese authorities arrested the country's leading Islamist ideologue as they sought to respond to the weekend attack on the capital by Darfuri rebels.

Hassan al-Turabi, the man who invited Osama bin Laden to live in Khartoum during the 1990s, was taken into custody but then released without charge after 15 hours of questioning.

Mr al-Turabi is closely linked to the leader of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), Khalil Ibrahim, who was once his pupil.

On Saturday the rebels launched an audacious attack on Khartoum's twin city of Omdurman, the seat of parliament and separated from the capital only by the Nile. They were beaten back before they could cross into Khartoum but today promised fresh attacks.

Security services have responded with a round-up of al-Turabi's supporters. Issam al-Turabi, his son, told The Times that armed soldiers and pickups mounted with anti-aircraft guns surrounded the family home at about 4am.

Mr al-Turabi, who was entrusted with Bin Laden's horse when the al-Qaeda leader was asked to leave Khartoum in 1996, confirmed his father had been released without charge.

He said: "They asked him about the rebellion, whether he knew they were heading to Khartoum and whether he stood side-by-side with them. He refused to answer so in the end they told him they were taking him home."

His father was once the ideological power behind the Government of President Omar al-Bashir. He wanted to turn Khartoum into a haven for Islamist movements from around the world.

Osama bin Laden arrived in the city in 1991 after falling out with the Saudi government, but Hassan al-Turabi was sidelined as President al-Bashir tried to improve relations with the West. Since then he has been imprisoned and subjected to house arrest. In recent years he has been left alone as his influence appeared to wane.

In an interview with The Times before his arrest he said that he supported the rebels' cause and had long advocated a federal structure for Sudan. “These are the people who have had a key role in our economy and the Army,” he said. “The people have contributed to Sudan and they deserve a degree of equality.

He said he had split with his former pupil — the doctor, as he calls him — over the use of force to achieve greater Darfuri autonomy. "The doctor thought there was no point in forming a party as it would be banned, so he took up arms instead,” he said. “But quite a number of our leadership went with his group.”

Many of the JEM leaders were members of al-Turabi's Popular Congress Party and share his Islamist outlook.

Last year the US imposed sanctions against Dr Ibrahim for his role in the violence. He claimed to still be in Omdurman today and promised his assault was far from over.

“This is just the start of a process and the end is the termination of this regime,” he told Reuters by telephone. “Don't expect just one more attack. This is just the beginning.”

The weekend attack, when a Jem convoy managed to drive from Darfur into Omdurman, is the first time the conflict has reached the capital, Kjartoum. Sudan immediately severed ties with Chad, which it said was behind the attack.

The two countries have been fighting a proxy war using opposing sets of rebels. Now the fear is that it could become a real war.

Analysts said that Jem had achieved its aim of undermining Khartoum's reputation as an impregnable fortress, exposing opposition and fear within the capital.

John Prendergast, of the Enough Project which campaigns against genocide, said: “There were more soldiers on the inside than there were soldiers who ventured all the way from Darfur, which should be very worrisome for the Government.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/africa/article3917030.ece

[keith]

Darfur’s JEM Rebels Bring the War to Khartoum

By Andrew Mc Gregor

Last weekend’s daring raid on greater Khartoum by Darfur’s rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) has shaken the regime and effectively disrupted the already morbid peace process in West Sudan. Though often referred to as a Darfur rebel group, JEM in fact has a national agenda, much like John Garang’s Sudanese Peoples’ Liberation Army (SPLA), which always maintained it was a movement of national liberation rather than a southern separatist group. Until 2006, JEM was also involved militarily in the revolt of the Beja and Rashaida Arabs of Eastern Sudan against Khartoum.

The Zaghawa tribe that straddles Darfur and Chad dominates the JEM leadership, marking a major challenge to traditional Arab superiority in Sudan (see Terrorism Monitor, March 7). While some of the leaders of Darfur’s badly-divided rebel groups have fought the rebellion from the cafés of Paris, JEM leader Khalil Ibrahim has remained at the front, forging a disparate group of refugees, farmers and ex-military men into the strongest military force in Darfur and the greatest threat to the Sudanese regime.

Greater Khartoum consists of the capital, Khartoum, the city of Omdurman on the western side of the White Nile, and the industrial suburb of Khartoum North on the north side of the Blue Nile. Khartoum itself is protected by broad rivers to the west and north, making assaults from these directions extremely difficult. Despite decades of warfare in Sudan’s provinces, Khartoum has not experienced any fighting in its streets since 1976, when Libyan-trained Umma Party rebels—also from West Sudan—fought running gun-battles in a failed attempt to overthrow the military government.

The once dusty and decaying Sudanese capital has undergone an astonishing transformation in recent years due to growing oil revenues and massive investment from the Gulf, Malaysia and China. Khartoum has increasingly become an island of prosperity surrounded by a vast and impoverished hinterland that now calls for an equitable distribution of the national wealth.

Across the Desert to Khartoum

On May 8, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) reported they had learned of “preparations made by rebel Khalil Ibrahim to conduct a sabotage attempt and a publicity stunt through infiltrating the capital and other towns” as well as noting that “groups riding vehicles” were headed east from the Chadian border (Sudan Tribune, May 8). A JEM commander reported that the column consisted of 400 vehicles and took three days to reach Khartoum (AFP, May 11). Notably absent from the attack were forces from the Sudan Liberation Army – Unity (SLA-Unity), another Darfur rebel group that has operated in a military alliance with JEM for the past two years.

A government spokesman claimed that the armed forces met the rebel column in Kordofan, at a point 75 mi west of the capital, where a portion of the rebel force made a run for Omdurman after most of the column had been stopped by a government attack.

JEM claims to have hit the Nile north of Omdurman, seizing and looting the Wadi Saidna Air Force base, 10 miles north of Khartoum. This claim has not been verified, but eyewitnesses reported seeing an attack on the base (Sudan Tribune, May 11).

On Friday night, May 9, Khartoum’s embassies received calls from the government warning them of a possible rebel attack on Khartoum (AFP, May 10). Despite the incoming reports of a JEM column heading east across the desert, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir continued performing the umrah (the minor pilgrimage) in the holy cities of Saudi Arabia. With Bashir in Saudi Arabia, the acting president was First Vice President Salva Kiir Mayadrit of the SPLA, who maintains he was in constant contact with al-Bashir until his return late on May 10.

Assault on the Suburbs

On May 10, some 150 armored pick-up trucks reached the outskirts of Omdurman. With helicopters in the air, security personnel poured into the streets, setting up checkpoints and securing potential targets. The bridges linking Omdurman to Khartoum across the White Nile were blocked.

Despite bold claims from JEM spokesmen that their forces were “everywhere in the capital,” it appears that few, if any, of the rebels managed to penetrate much farther than the suburbs of northern Omdurman, where their burning pick-up trucks could be seen after the battle. Claims by rebel commanders that their troops had seized the bridges and entered Khartoum appear to have been wishful thinking or an attempt to unnerve the regime.

Throughout the attack, media-savvy JEM field commanders were on the phone to major international media sources, giving progress reports with the sound of gunfire and explosions in the background. A commander called Abu Zumam claimed his forces had entered Omdurman and were preparing to seize the National State Radio building (Radio Omdurman). Another JEM commander named Sulayman Sandal was also in constant contact with media. As the government counter-attacks began to drive JEM fighters from the city, Commander Sulayman insisted: “This was just practice. We promise to hit Khartoum one more time unless the [Darfur] issue is resolved” (AP, May 11). The commander claimed JEM forces had initially seized all of Omdurman, but were beaten off due to the inexperience of JEM troops in urban warfare (AFP, May 11).

Sudan’s official news agency SUNA claimed that JEM’s “military commander” Jamal Hassan Jelaladdin was killed on the outskirts of Khartoum in the morning of May 11. SUNA also reported the deaths of Muhammad Saleh Garbo and Muhammad Nur al-Din, described as the leader of the attack and the JEM intelligence chief, respectively (SUNA, May 11). JEM reported that no one by these names were in the rebel ranks, but claimed Jamal Hassan had been captured and summarily executed after his vehicle broke down (Sudan Tribune, May 12).

What Were the Targets?

JEM spokesman Ahmad Hussein Adam declared that Wadi Saidna air force base was targeted because it was “the base from where all Sudanese military planes go to Darfur” (AFP, May 10). Heavy civilian losses were reported in Northern Darfur in the weeks preceding the raid on the capital. JEM recently accused Khartoum of recruiting 250 Iraqi pilots to carry out bombing missions in Darfur following combat losses and a reluctance by Sudanese pilots to continue bombing civilian targets (Sudanjem.com, May 4).

State radio facilities head the list of desirable targets on any coup-leader’s target list—in this case Radio Omdurman was no exception. JEM may have anticipated that the residents of Khartoum were only awaiting a sign to rise up against the government, but there appeared to be no verifiable instances of tri-city residents offering material support to the rebels. With residents confined indoors by a curfew, parts of the city were remarkably quiet.

When the bridges across the Nile were secured by Sudanese security forces it became impossible to complete JEM’s objectives. There does not appear to have been any backup plan for this fairly predictable circumstance. When asked by the BBC how he plans to deal with this problem in his promised return to the capital, Khalil Ibrahim responded; “I am not empty handed. I took a lot of things from Khartoum—a lot of vehicles, ammunition and money” (BBC, May 12). There are reports that a large quantity of weapons and ammunition were seized at the Wadi Saidna air base.

According to VP Salva Kiir, the rebel targets in the capital included Radio Omdurman, the military headquarters and the presidential palace beside the Blue Nile (Sudan Tribune, May 13).

Mopping Up

When the JEM attack crested in the suburbs of Omdurman many fighters found themselves without any means of escaping the city. Some surrendered while others were reported to have doffed their camouflage gear in favor of civilian clothing. Gunfire continued throughout the weekend as security forces tried to flush out hidden JEM fighters. Reports of gunfire in the center of Khartoum were apparently the result of edgy security men firing on a group of civilians hiding in a building (BBC, May 12). When the fighting had stopped, government forces stated 400 rebels and 100 security men had been killed.

Security forces reported seizing 50 rebel pick-up trucks while battered prisoners were repeatedly displayed on state television. With continuing reports that Khalil Ibrahim had gone into hiding in Omdurman after being injured when his truck was hit by gunfire, Sudanese state television broadcast his photo for the first time, encouraging viewers to report any sightings. A reward of $125,000 for information leading to the JEM leader’s capture was later doubled to $250,000.

Despite the lack of any public support in Khartoum for the rebels, security forces quickly decided that the attack must have relied on a fifth column within the city. This prompted mass arrests of Darfuris in the capital, especially those of the Zaghawa tribe (Sudan Human Rights Organization statement, Cairo, May 13). Some Darfur groups reported the arrest and beatings of thousands of Darfuri laborers working in the capital (al-Jazeera, May 13). Other reports claim dozens of Zaghawa in the city have been executed (Sudan Tribune, May 13). A JEM spokesman described the arrests as “ethnic cleansing” (Sudan Tribune, May 10).

Sudan’s leading Islamist, Hassan al-Turabi, was detained for questioning by security forces due to his former association with JEM (see Terrorism Monitor, June 17, 2005; July 1, 2005). Khalil Ibrahim was once described as a follower of the controversial al-Turabi, but there appear to be few, if any, ties remaining between the two. Turabi and several other members of his Popular Congress Party were quickly released after questioning.

The Role of the Army and Security Forces

The majority of the rank-and-file in Sudan’s army comes from the African tribes of Darfur and Kordofan. They are typically led by Arab officers from the Northern Province of Sudan. Most of the fighting in the capital appears to have been done by government security services and police rather than the military. VP Salva Kiir notes that the army did not intervene until it became clear the rebels had been repulsed (Sudan Tribune, May 13). Some mid-level army commanders are reported to have been arrested after the attack.

Reacting to public criticism of the military’s failure to stop the assault long before it reached Khartoum, a presidential adviser claimed that the military had intentionally drawn the rebels “into a trap” (Sudan Tribune, May 13). Sudanese Defense Minister Abdel-Rahim Muhammad Hussein was roundly condemned by members of parliament who called for an inquiry as to how JEM forces could reach the capital. (Al-Sharq al-Awsat, May 14; Sudan Tribune, May 14). While some MPs called for his resignation, the Defense Minister blamed the U.S. embargo for the lack of surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft.

After returning to Darfur, Khalil Ibrahim thanked the neutrality of the Sudanese army, which “welcomed him” (Sudan Tribune, May 13). This statement alone will create chaos in the security structure as the government seeks out real, potential and imagined collaborators.

Reaction of the SPLA

JEM frequently states its commitment to the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) signed by the southern Sudanese Peoples’ Liberation Army (SPLA) and the ruling National Congress Party (NCP). At the same time, it is vehemently opposed to the idea of southern separation—the CPA calls for a referendum on southern separation in 2011, a position that has interfered with JEM efforts to forge stronger ties with the SPLA. Regarding any attempt to overthrow the government as interference in implementing the CPA, the SPLA’s military commanders offered Khartoum the use of SPLA troops still under Salva Kiir’s command.

Proxy War with Chad?

Last March, N’Djamena and Khartoum signed yet another in a series of worthless peace agreements after an attack by Sudanese-supported rebels nearly deposed the Zaghawa-based government of President Idriss Déby. Khartoum has accused Chadian forces of mounting a diversionary attack on the SAF garrison at Kashkash along the Chad/Sudan border “meant to support the attempt of sabotage of the rebel Khalil Ibrahim” (Sudan Tribune, May 10). The SAF claimed to have successfully repulsed the Chadian troops, forcing them to pull back across the border.

On his return from pilgrimage, Bashir severed relations with Chad and laid the blame for the raid on the “outlaw regime” in N’Djamena: “These forces come from Chad who trained them ... we hold the Chadian regime fully responsible for what happened.” Perhaps unwilling to admit the military potential of the Darfur rebels, Bashir claimed: “These forces are Chadian forces originally, they moved from there led by Khalil Ibrahim who is an agent of the Chadian regime. It is a Chadian attack” (AP, May 11). The SAF claimed that most of the prisoners were Chadian nationals. A Chadian government spokesman quickly denied any official involvement in the attack (AFP, May 10).

Chadian officials reported that uniformed Sudanese security forces broke into all the offices of the Chadian embassy in Khartoum, seizing documents and computers (Sudan Tribune, May 11). The Sudanese Foreign Ministry claimed: “We have evidence there was communication between [the rebels and] the government of Chad and the embassy of Chad in Khartoum" (AFP, May 11).

China Stays Aloof

Though China has natural concerns over the effect of a regime change in a country that is now one of its largest foreign oil suppliers, the reaction from Beijing was supportive but muted. JEM has made clear its opposition to China’s oil operations in Sudan, attacking Chinese oil facilities in Kordofan (see Terrorism Focus, September 11, 2007). JEM is also angered by the Chinese supply of arms and warplanes to the Khartoum regime. China was one of the few non-African countries approved by Khartoum for participation in UNAMID, contributing a group of military engineers to the Darfur peacekeeping efforts. In a Foreign Ministry statement, China condemned the attacks but hoped “the Darfur armed rebel group could join in the political process as soon as possible and resume negotiation with the Sudanese government, for the early signing of a comprehensive peace agreement, to realize peace, stability and development in Darfur” (Xinhua, May 11).

What Next for the Regime? For JEM?

Khartoum declared negotiations with JEM to be at an end on May 14, but this will make little difference since JEM was already not part of the ongoing negotiations with other Darfur rebel groups. Presidential adviser Mustafa Osman Ismail promised government retaliation instead: “From this day we will never deal with this movement again other than in the way they have just dealt with us” (Xinhua, May 11). President Bashir has also claimed that Israel funded the assault, calling Khalil Ibrahim “an agent… who sold himself to the devil and to Zionism” (AP, May 14). The government is demanding that JEM be declared an international terrorist organization by the United States and the UN (Radio Omdurman, May 13).

The raid on Khartoum was a reminder to the Northern Arab regime that it might all come crashing down one day and that their continued wealth and power is by no means guaranteed. After the raid, Khalil Ibrahim provided this justification for the attack: “The Sudanese government killed 600,000 people in Darfur and they are living at peace in Khartoum" (al-Jazeera, May 13). Whether the raid results in greater conciliation efforts and distribution of wealth to the provinces is yet to be seen. Past experience suggests that the government’s response will be increased violence and repression. Large-scale retaliation against Chad is virtually inevitable. In the meantime Khartoum may have to deal with a sudden reluctance on the part of international investors to put their money into an uncertain situation.

Khartoum will undoubtedly implement measures to prevent a repeat of the attack, but JEM has also learned several important lessons in this operation. It is difficult to believe that JEM intended to hold and seize the city at this time, but the operation may lay the groundwork for a larger effort in the future. More plausible is Khalil Ibrahim’s claim that he intends to exhaust and divide the Sudanese military by spreading the war far beyond Darfur (AP, May 13). According to the JEM leader, “This is just the start of a process and the end is the termination of this regime” (BBC, May 12).

http://www.jamestown.org/terrorism/news/article.php?articleid=2374172

[NYer]

Strange Doings in Sudan (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/sudan/5057043/Mystery-of-Israel-and-an-attack-in-Sudan.html)

The government of Sudan confirmed reports that the attack in January destroyed a convoy of vehicles carrying weapons through the country.

"A convoy of vehicles carrying illegal weapons was bombed near the Sudanese-Egyptian border," said the Sudanese transport minister, Mabruk Mubarak Saleem. He said several people had been killed the attack.

He added that smuggling was rampant in the region and claimed that the arms were destined for the Gaza Strip.

Any Halliburton operatives in that area?

[NYer]

Update: (http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2009/03/exclusive-three.html) Three Israeli Airstrikes in Sudan Since January.

HT: Rantburg -

ABC News' Luis Martinez reports: Israel has conducted three military strikes against targets in Sudan since January in an effort to prevent what were believed to be Iranian weapons shipments from reaching Hamas in the Gaza Strip, ABC News has learned.

Earlier this week, CBSNews.com was the first to report that Israel had conducted an airstrike in January against a convoy carrying weapons north into Egypt to be smuggled into the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.

But actually, since January, Israel has conducted a total of three military strikes against smugglers transporting what were believed to be Iranian weapons shipments destined for Gaza, a U.S. official told ABC News.

The information matches recent reports from Sudanese officials of two airstrikes in the desert of eastern Sudan and the sinking of a ship in the Red Sea carrying weapons.

[keith]

Good news for Khartoum, for now.

Court rules on Sudan Abyei dispute

An international court has redrawn the borders of Sudan's Abyei region to give the Khartoum government control of the Heglig oilfields and the Nile oil pipeline.

Both the Sudanese government and former rebels in the south pledged on Wednesday to abide by the ruling of the Abyei Arbitration Tribunal in The Hague.


"We have made a very important gain in this award," Dirdeiry Mohamed Ahmed, the Sudanese government representative at the tribunal, said.

"This territory includes the disputed oil fields."

Under a peace deal agreed between the north and south in 2005, Abyei will hold a referendum in 2011 on whether to retain special status within north Sudan, or join the south, where a simultaneous vote will be held on independence.


'Step forward'

Mutrif Siddig, the Sudanese foreign ministry under-secretary, said that Wednesday's decision was a "step forward".

"We respect this decision. And this decision is final and binding because all the parties agreed from the beginning that the decision of the court was binding and final," he said.


Riek Machar, a representative of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), which heads an autonomous regional government in the south, said that he hoped that the ruling would increase the chances for peace.

"We want peace. We think this decision is going to consolidate the peace," he said. "We came to see justice and it's a decision we will respect."

The SPLM fought a two-decade civil war with the Khartoum government.

At least 100 people were killed as Abyei town was razed in clashes in May 2008.

Tens of thousands of people were left homeless, most of them ethnic Ngok Dinka loyal to the south, who have long had tense relations with the district's Misseriya Arab nomads, regarded as loyal to the north.
Deng Alor, a senior southern leader who serves as foreign minister in Sudan's coalition government, said that the Ngok Dinka tribe had lost some small areas of land "but would accept the ruling".
"All in all the decision of the court is acceptable and we will implement it," he said.

Siddig said that Wednesday's decision also "guarantees the rights of Misseriya pastoralists".

Sudanese unity

Hassan Meki, a political analyst and the chancellor of the International African University, said that the ruling was a boost to the hopes of unity in Sudan in the run-up to the referendum.


"Now the people of Abyei will realise that their interests lie in their being unified with their partners in the north - to share the value of their wealth and their resources," he told Al Jazeera from Khartoum. "People want to co-existence ... and to share the wealth of the area."

Ashraf Qazi, the UN special representative for Sudan, said the ruling had been a "win-win decision".


"This will pave the way for the peaceful implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement as a whole. The rights of both communities have been guaranteed as a matter of international law."

Extra UN pacekeeping troops were sent to Abyei before the ruling amid reports that unauthorised southern military units were being sent to district.

Under the 2005 peace deal, the only forces allowed in Abyei are special joint north-south police and military units.



http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2009/07/20097229239873474.html