12-18-05, 9:37 am

The National Islamic Front is poised to renew its special place in history as a regime that has successfully deployed genocide as a tool of domestic political and security policy. It joins the Turkish government, which was responsible for the genocidal destruction of perhaps a million Armenians during World War I, and the Nigerian government, which during the late 1960s was responsible for the genocidal destruction of more than a million Ibo people in the Biafra region of southern Nigeria. But unlike the earlier Turkish and Nigerian regimes, the National Islamic Front has been successful in its genocidal efforts on multiple occasions, including its previous genocides in the Nuba Mountains (beginning in 1992) and in the southern oil regions (beginning in 1997). These are the ghastly precedents for current genocide in Darfur.

Moreover, unless there is a fundamental shift in the political, economic, and military circumstances presently obtaining in eastern Sudan---among the Beja and Rashaida peoples of Red Sea and Kassala Provinces---we may see 'national security' yet again take the form of genocide. The 'Eastern Front' insurgency movement is in many ways the most threatening to NIF economic power, this by virtue of its proximity to the vital oil pipeline that runs from Heglig in the south through Khartoum to Port Sudan on the Red Sea. The military response of the NIF will almost certainly be to create a cordon sanitaire along the pipeline in areas of the Beja and Rashaida, killing and displacing all civilians as well as destroying their livelihoods---this as a means of creating 'security' for surging oil production that may soon reach 500,000 barrels/day. All oil for export must presently pass through territory potentially threatened by these long-marginalized peoples of the East.

The National Islamic Front, which has disingenuously (if understandably) sought to rename itself the 'National Congress Party,' is a regime that took power under circumstances, and with ambitions, that make a genocidal domestic security policy entirely intelligible. The NIF seized power by military coup in June 1989, deposing the elected government of the Umma Party's Sadiq el-Mahdi. To be sure, Sadiq was hardly representative of Sudan as a whole, and had in many ways increased the brutal deployment of Arab muraheleen militia in southern Sudan, particularly in using slavery as a weapon of war (see Jok Madut Jok's authoritative 'War and Slavery in Sudan' [University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001]). But Sadiq had been elected, and political pressures, including from the rival Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), had brought a peace agreement in the north/south war to the brink of fruition.

It was precisely to stop this peace agreement that the NIF timed its military coup for June 30, 1989. The men responsible for this coup, and for deliberately aborting the nascent peace agreement, came to power with a ruthlessly determined Islamizing and Arabizing agenda. Very little has changed in the intervening 16 years, despite the wishful thinking of many who have tired of, or wish to avoid, the difficulties of confronting the NIF. To be sure, Hassan al-Turabi---mastermind of the coup, and certainly the most aggressive Islamicist---has been in many ways expediently sidelined by the NIF. But all other important coup participants remain in positions of supreme power, in particular President Omar el-Bashir and Vice President Ali Osman Taha.

Despite the formation of a 'Government of National Unity' per the terms of the January 9, 2005 peace accord between the NIF and the southern Sudan People's Liberation Movement, all signs are that the NIF has used the past year to re-consolidate its full grip on national power. Many of the politically most talented members of the SPLM chose to remain in the south to contribute to the embryonic Government of South Sudan; many of those who initially went to Khartoum to participate in national governance have returned to the south, disillusioned in the possession of what are merely the trappings of political power (some have been deliberately excluded from government discussions by virtue of linguistic limitations in Arabic). Shadow ministries, which enjoy real power, daily entrench themselves further: a particularly good example is the Foreign Ministry, where southerner Lam Akol is only a figure-head Foreign Minister (former foreign minister Mustafa Ismail continues to shape Khartoum's real foreign policy agenda).

Certainly the SPLM is incapable of halting genocide in Darfur, or even shaping in significant ways NIF military policies or negotiating strategy in Abuja (Nigeria). It is highly inconvenient for the international community---gazing powerlessly at ongoing violence and genocidal destruction in Darfur---to admit as much; but the inability of the SPLM to affect realities on the ground in the region is clear. The NIF controls the Presidency, the national army, the national security and intelligence services, national wealth, and enjoys an absolute 'parliamentary' majority. The lesson of the past year is that 'Government of National Unity' is no more 'unified' than the 'Comprehensive Peace Agreement' (CPA) was 'comprehensive.'

In short, the NIF dominates political, economic, and military power in Sudan, and the CPA has done nothing for most of Sudan's marginalized people---even the people of southern Sudan who were to have benefited most from this nominally historic agreement. Conspicuously, the NIF has failed to meet the essential benchmarks of the CPA (see my extended analysis of this failure, ). Whether the issue is Khartoum's military withdrawal from the south, disarming its proxy militia in the oil regions, accepting the findings of the Abyei Boundary Commission, equitably sharing oil wealth from oil production in southern Sudan, or creating a meaningful partnership in national governance, the NIF has failed to meet its obligations and promises.

This failure is nothing new for the NIF: it has never honored any agreement made with any Sudanese party---not one, not ever. That NIF bad faith should be so conspicuous and still draw no meaningful rebuke or criticism from the international community ensures that the CPA will continue to wither, and that a true, just peace for southern Sudan will recede further and further. Seeing that there is no real cost for reneging on the terms of the CPA, the NIF will further undermine, attenuate, and 'revise' the agreement.

For the international community, this is a terribly short-sighted betrayal of the enormous diplomatic investment in the Naivasha peace process---anchored by the historic Machakos Protocol of July 2002, which guarantees southern Sudanese the right to a self-determination referendum, including the right to secede. The right of southern self-determination looks increasingly like another expedient promise from the NIF---what some, indeed, have argued was the case from the beginning. With only a distracted and irresolute international community as guarantor of the Machakos cornerstone agreement, and with self-determination the sine qua non of true peace in southern Sudan, the renewal of war in southern Sudan seems only a matter of time.

CHRONICLING KHARTOUM'S SUCCESS IN DARFUR

The most recent report from Human Rights Watch ('Entrenching Impunity: Government Responsibility for International Crimes in Darfur,) offers an extraordinarily well-researched account of the mechanics of genocide---of just how the NIF has organized the destruction of non-Arab or African tribal populations in Darfur. It also presents substantial new evidence for what has long been clear, but in this report is established beyond reasonable doubt: that senior NIF leadership has directly overseen Darfur's genocidal destruction.

The chains of command for military operations---as well as recruitment, supply, and direction of the murderous Janjaweed Arab militias---lead directly to the most senior members of the NIF: President (and Commander-in-Chief) Omar el-Bashir; former First Vice-President and current Second Vice-President (and still arguably the most powerful political figure in Sudan) Ali Osman Taha; the head of Khartoum's viciously efficient security and intelligence services, Major General Saleh Abdallah 'Gosh'; former Minister of the Interior and current Minister of Defense Abdul Rahim Mohamed Hussein; Major General Bakri Hassan Salih, former Minister of Defense and now Minister for Presidential Affairs; Abbas Arabi, Chief of Staff of the Sudanese Armed Forces.

Others named in what amounts to an overwhelmingly authoritative indictment are current and former regional officials representing NIF authority in Darfur (military and civilian), as well as several Janjaweed leaders, including the most infamous, Musa Hilal.

These 22 names (a full list appears on pages 87-88 of the HRW report) are certainly among the 51 names referred to the International Criminal Court by the UN Security Council on the basis of a UN Commission of Inquiry (January 25, 2005).

HRW conclusions about NIF responsibility deserve extended citation. HRW asserts that Khartoum's policy of human destruction in Darfur 'was strategic and well-planned':

'Since early 2003, the leadership in Khartoum has relied on civilian administration, the Sudanese military and Janjaweed militias to implement a counterinsurgency policy that deliberately and systematically targeted civilians in violation of international law. Ultimate responsibility for the creation and coordination of the policy lies in Khartoum, with the highest levels of the Sudanese leadership, including President Omar El Bashir, Vice-President Ali Osman Taha, and key national ministers and security chiefs.'

'The Sudanese government is extremely hierarchical in many respects, and functions through a tight network of ruling party insiders. Although further investigation to establish the details of the involvement of key national officials is necessary, the role of top Sudanese officials in coordinating the 'ethnic cleansing' campaign is evident when the major offensives are analyzed. Even clearer is the pivotal role of President El Bashir himself, whose public statements were precursors to the call to arms and peaks in the violence, and no doubt echoed the private directives given to the civilian administration, military, and security services.'

'For instance, on December 30, 2003, [Bashir] announced that 'Our top priority will be the annihilation of the rebellion and any outlaw who carries arms.' [Bashir's] public words predated, by a matter of days, the January 2004 offensive that used systematic force in violation of international humanitarian law to drive hundreds of thousands of people from rural areas. The Sudanese government's military campaign dramatically escalated in the first days of 2004: hundreds of villages across Darfur suffered initial or repeat attacks, some of extraordinary brutality. [ ] The methodical use of aerial support to target civilians in the military campaign, despite protests from air force officers, also reflects the involvement of high-level officials in Khartoum.' (page 58)

'The widespread and systematic abuses by government and Janjaweed forces against [non-Arab or African] ethnic groups believed to be linked to the rebels amount to an attack on a civil population within the definition of crimes against humanity. The pattern of similar crimes against civilian populations in different areas of Darfur, as well as documentary and eyewitness evidence linking senior government officials with abusive military operations, point to a policy at the highest levels of the Sudanese government.' (page 74)

'Overwhelmingly targeted were communities sharing the ethnicity of or geographic proximity to the two main rebel movements. These ethnic groups initially included the Masalit, Fur, and Zaghawa, and later expanded to include communities of Dajo, Tunjur, Meidob, Jebel, Berti, and other non-Arab tribes. In many cases documented by HRW, there was little to no rebel or armed presence in the targeted villages at the time of the attacks, and the attacks were clearly aimed at the civilian population.' (page 7)

INIDCTMENT, BUT NO CONVICTION OR PUNISHMENT

Despite the thorough and authoritative nature of the indictment rendered by Human Rights Watch, the report fails on a number of counts. In these failures, we catch glimpses of the larger failure of the international community, and may discern something of the nature of Khartoum's ultimate genocidal victory.

[1] The HRW report offers no recommendations both adequate to the current acute security crisis and likely to be accepted by the parties exhorted. It is, of course, obligatory for such a human rights report to 'recommend' that the Government of Sudan 'suspend from official duty, investigate, and fully prosecute all civilian and military personnel [ ] implicated for individual or command responsibility for serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law in Darfur' (page 3). But as the very power of the HRW indictment of senior 'Government of Sudan' officials makes compellingly clear, short of self-prosecution, this recommendation is simply boilerplate exhortation.

But even when speaking of recommendations to the UN Security Council, the African Union, the International Criminal Court, and to the US, the EU and Canada, HRW offers little more than exhortation to strengthen an AU force in Darfur that is radically inadequate to the critical security requirements of civilians and humanitarians. The AU has neither the resources nor the capacity to absorb resources urgently required for civilian and humanitarian protection. And recommending that the UN Security Council pass hortatory resolutions and move more expeditiously on targeted sanctions against the NIF genocidaires (per UN Security Council Resolution 1591) has a distinct air of irrelevance given the crisis on the ground.

It is right that HRW urges the AU to cancel its January 2006 summit in Khartoum; but a subsequent recommendation that the UN 'work closely with the AU to intensify a review of long-term protection needs in Darfur' suggests again a lack of urgency that seems deeply at odds with current realities on the ground.

[2] A perverse and intellectually lazy skepticism about whether the crime of genocide has occurred in Darfur is, unsurprisingly, buried in the report (page 74). The entirety of the argument for such consequential skepticism consists of a bare three sentences:

'Whether [National Islamic Front] policy [in Darfur] amounted to genocide remains unclear. The International Commission of Inquiry into the crimes in Darfur concluded that there was no government policy of genocide, but that crimes may have been committed by individuals with genocidal intent and that this question should be resolved in a court of law. Determining whether there was genocidal intent requires access to government documents and to those in the leadership who planned and coordinated the campaign in Darfur.' (page 74)

Even in the space of three sentences, HRW deeply confuses the debate about genocide; this is a failure of reason and common sense that in many ways echoes the painfully politicized report of the UN Commission of Inquiry that HRW invokes (see my two-part analysis of this report, particularly its deep confusion over the issue of 'genocidal intent,' 'Idea: A Journal of Social Issues').

It should be noted first that a determination of 'genocidal intent' does not logically require 'documentary evidence'; for we may of course reliably infer intent from actions, when those actions are widespread, systematic, and well-reported. If the NIF, working in concert with the Janjaweed, has deliberately destroyed as many as 80-90% of the villages of African tribal groups (the overwhelming consensus within the Darfuri diaspora); if more than 95% of total casualties, likely in the range of 400,000, are from African tribal populations (strongly suggested by extant data); if the displaced persons who report widespread destruction, killing, rape, abductions, and torture are overwhelmingly from the African tribal populations of Darfur (as indicated by all human rights groups and humanitarian organization on the ground); if the livelihoods of the displaced African tribal populations have been deliberately, comprehensively destroyed (again, reported in scores of reports and documents); if these destructive attacks are very often accompanied by the use of characteristic racial epithets targeting African ethnicity ('Nuba,' 'zurga,' 'abid'); if all evidence suggests that these actions are systematic, well-planned, and coordinated; then collectively we have overwhelming evidence of the intent to commit acts that 'destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such,' including:

[a] Killing members of the group; [b] Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; [c] Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; [d] Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [e] Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. (1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article 2)

Skepticism in the face of such evidence as Darfur so abundantly presents betrays only a peculiar fixation on a particular form of documentary evidence, although even this abounds, despite HRW's tendentious sentences.

Indeed, HRW itself---in addition to the deeply damning passages already cited here---provides a great deal of precisely the documentary evidence required for a genocide determination. Two of many examples:

[i] The well-documented (on the basis of eyewitness reports) mass executions of hundreds of Fur men and boys in Wadi Saleh, South Darfur (HRW pages 26-33) are a terrible echo of Srebrenica. Here, evidence includes accounts such as that of a resident of Mukjar: 'Ahmed Haroun, the state minister of the interior from Khartoum, exhorted the Janjaweed and army in a speech to 'kill the Fur,' according to a resident of Mukjar who heard the speech.' (page 27);

[ii] HRW reports on the basis of interviews with former government soldiers:

'Army commanders directly commanded and coordinated attacks in full knowledge that they were attacking civilians. Sudanese government troops based in Kutum were reportedly led by a Sudanese army commander named Gaddal Fadlallah. According to men who served under him in several attacks on villages in the Kutum area, he gave clear instructions to attack civilians. For instance, before an attack on Enciro (where the SLA was based in 2002 and early 2003), he said, 'On your way, every house and village needs to be burned completely. I do not want to see any left after the battle.' He added, 'All men, even civilians that you see should be killed.''

Here we must recall HRW's own point that regular army and Janjaweed military attacks were consistently directed 'against ethnic groups believed to be linked to the rebels,' i.e., non-Arab or African tribal groups---and that command-and-control, as well as lines of reporting, are strongly hierarchical, leading directly to senior member of the NIF (and thus revealing of their 'intent').

Presumably HRW is also aware of other relevant documentation. For example, Julie Flint and Alex de Waal, in their superb 'Darfur: A Short History of a Long War' (Zed Books [London & New York], 2005), cite a particularly relevant document:

'a communiqué to the command of the 'Western military area' from [chief Janjaweed leader] Musa Hilal's headquarters in Misteriha [North Darfur], [which] said, citing orders from the president of the Republic [Omar el-Bashir]: 'You are informed that directives have been issued...to change the demography of Darfur and empty it of African tribes' through burning, looting, and killing 'of intellectuals and youths who may join the rebels in fighting.'' (page 106)

There are a number of such documents, precluding reasonable skepticism about genocidal intent.

[3] HRW recommends that the International Criminal Court 'investigate and prosecute senior civilian officials at all levels of government, including President Omar El Bashir' (page 5). Without acknowledging the extraordinarily difficult context in which the ICC has been forced to operate by obdurate 'senior [NIF] officials,' this recommendation risks distorting fundamental truths about the chances for justice via the ICC. So long as the NIF remains in power, there can and will be no prosecution---or even extradition---of those responsible for genocide. Indeed, the very existence of an ICC investigation creates incentives for the NIF to sustain prevailing levels of insecurity in Darfur as a means of hampering possible investigation, even as such insecurity is now the most powerful tool of human destruction.

This is of course an uncomfortable reality for HRW, which lobbied hard this past March for a UN Security Council referral of Darfur to the ICC. Indeed, HRW went so far as to argue that such referral would have a deterrent effect on the ground in Darfur, an argument thoroughly undermined by realities of the past several months. For of course those who have committed genocide are well aware of the fact, and are hardly to be deterred from future acts of ethnic violence, violations of international law, or obstructionism simply because of an ICC referral: having committed the ultimate crime---or at the very least what HRW euphemistically calls 'ethnic cleansing'---what possible incentive is there for NIF officials to alter behavior in ways consistent with the 'deterrent' effect HRW predicted?

The truth of the situation was recognized early on by ICC Prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo: investigation of the NIF would actually increase threats against both potential witnesses and humanitarian workers in Darfur. Speaking of the 'security risks that may face witnesses, other information providers, and ICC staff,' Moreno Ocampo emphasized that:

'The information currently available highlights the significant security risks facing civilians, local and international humanitarian personnel in Darfur. These issues will present persistent challenges for the investigation.' (ICC Report to UN Security Report, June 2005, page 8)

In this same report, half a year ago, Moreno Ocampo also declared that the 'initiation of the [ICC] investigation marks the start of a new phase in the proceedings that will require specific, full, and unfettered cooperation of the Government of Sudan and other parties in the conflict' (page 5). This 'initiation of the investigation' was greeted at the time not with 'unfettered cooperation' but with scorn by senior NIF officials such as Justice Minister Ali Mohammed Osman Yassin, a scorn that continues under the new Justice Minister:

'Sudan will not allow ICC investigators to enter its Darfur region to probe suspected war crimes committed during the conflict there, justice minister [Mohammed Ali al-Mardi] said on Tuesday. [ ] Mardi said the ICC investigation, requested by the Security Council, was not necessary because the Sudanese judicial system was capable of trying any crimes in Darfur. 'The ICC officials have no jurisdiction inside the Sudan or with regards to Sudanese citizens,' Mardi [said]. 'They cannot investigate anything on Darfur---they have no jurisdiction. This is quite clear and they know it.'' (Reuters, December 14, 2005)

And of course the NIF holds a trump card: 'Moreno Ocampo gave a list of actions he would not or could not take, including the almost impossible task of protecting witnesses' (Reuters, December 14, 2005). The NIF holds yet another trump card, one it is not re-playing at present, but soon may. In June 2005 the NIF made clear the stakes it was playing for:

'Khartoum warned last week that the launching of the [ICC] investigation was counter-productive and could hamper the peace talks it is holding in Abuja with the rebel organisations.' (Agence France-Presse, June 14, 2005)

Given the NIF's sense of impunity, despite overwhelming evidence of its culpability, it is disingenuous for HRW to call baldly for the ICC to 'investigate and prosecute senior civilian officials at all levels of government'; indeed, this recommendation comports with the peculiarly disingenuous claim made twice by Juan Mendez, UN special advisor on the prevention of genocide, in his otherwise excellent October 2005 report to the Security Council: 'it is in the self-interest of the Government of Sudan to cooperate with the ICC prosecution as a way of creating an atmosphere conducive to reconciliation' (Report of October 4, 2005, Paragraph 36).

It is not in the self-interest of genocidaires to cooperate in their own prosecution, and to suggest otherwise creates the impression of either dangerous naiveté or fear of speaking the truth. Khartoum's ruthless survivalists will never allow Sudanese witnesses to be brought to The Hague, or interviewed by the ICC in Sudan (Reuters, December 14, 2005)---no more than they will permit Sudanese suspects, or themselves, to be extradited. The simple truth is that with control of the army and the security forces, members of the NIF will be extradited only when they have been removed from power ().

THE ONGOING DESTRUCTION OF DARFUR

All reports make clear that insecurity and violence continue to escalate throughout Darfur. A grim, wide-ranging overview was recently provided by the UN Integrated Regional Information Networks (December 12, 2005). All evidence indicates severe deprivation in the camps, a high prevalence of rape, overall continuing constriction of humanitarian access, and escalating violence in rural areas, including violence involving both the Janjaweed and Khartoum's regular military forces. In the recent words of UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres, 'People are dying in Darfur, and dying in large numbers.' Mortality will rapidly accelerate with the continuing evacuations of humanitarian workers (see my .

Nor is there any end in sight: Khartoum's genocidaires, the architects of this human destruction, have no incentive to halt the catastrophe, nor any significant fear of consequences. Those most powerful are those most culpable: what chance does justice have so long as power and guilt are simply obverses of one another in Sudan?

An inability to answer or even address this question haunts the brief (two-page) Darfur section of an important new general report on Africa sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations (

The report helpfully declares:

'The AU should request that the UN authorize a coalition of willing countries to provide a protective force, including from Africa, for the internally displaced persons within Sudan.' (page 22)

And further that:

'This coalition could serve as a bridging force to UN 'blue helmets' (i.e., UN soldiers). The need is urgent and only a non-UN coalition could deploy rapidly enough to meet the current need. The force should have a mandate to defend the populations against further attacks and to take military action as necessary to counter the threat.'

The report also helpfully recognizes that, 'the UN Security Council remains blocked by the Chinese and Russians from imposing strong sanctions against the government of Sudan,'

---and that,

'the US and its European partners should begin to impose further sanctions of their own on companies doing business in Sudan, and on arms shipments to Sudan, and should even consider ways to inhibit Sudanese oil exports. China should be put on notice that continued blocking of UN sanctions is a serious issue for the US and that US and European sanctions are in the works and that this issue could provoke a serious confrontation between. China and the US.'

With these recommendations the report offers strong conceptual support for the burgeoning divestment campaign against those European and Asian 'companies doing business in Sudan' (see http://www.sudanreeves.org/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=14).

But the report falters badly in arguing that:

'The US should press southern Sudanese leaders, now members of the central government, to take a much more active role in stopping government attacks in Darfur. [ ] Both northern and southern members of the government of Sudan should be put on notice that without broadening representation in the government and sharing resources with marginalized areas of the country like Darfur and eastern Sudan, the US will not provide the full political and economic support promised under the Comprehensive Peace Act.' (page 23)

This recommendation fails fundamentally in its implied understanding of the dynamics of power in Khartoum, and how completely marginalized the southern SPLM is in the merely notional 'Government of National Unity.' The SPLM is unable to secure even the legitimate southern portion of national wealth and power; it is in no position to use its putative 'leverage' within the government to shape Khartoum's policies in Darfur or eastern Sudan. To pretend otherwise is to mistake wholly the meaning of the past year in Sudan's history. The SPLM and the south have seen virtually nothing of the 'full political or economic support promised under the CPA.'

Indeed, the CPA is unraveling precisely because of the absence of US and international political support to ensure full implementation of the agreement. Moreover, the south has seen nothing of the critical transitional aid it requires to build civil society, and an economy in a land ravaged by almost half a century of war. Even humanitarian aid is acutely deficient, especially in areas of Bahr el-Ghazal and Upper Nile Provinces that are experiencing severe food shortages. And again, oil wealth that has been promised the south under the wealth-sharing protocol of the CPA has yet to materialize, even as it is desperately needed by southerners at this, their moment of greatest need.

Genocide in Darfur is fully the responsibility of the National Islamic Front. There are no domestic political forces that can presently wrest Darfur policy from the NIF. To equivocate on this point, to suggest that the NIF and the SPLM somehow share political responsibility going forward, represents a deep failure, or refusal, to understand why the genocide began and what has sustained it for more than two and a half years. Genocide began in Darfur as the instinctive response to threat by Khartoum's entrenched security cabal; it can be ended only by an international willingness to oppose, with all necessary resources, this most vicious of instincts.

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