SUDAN Conflict

Historical Background

A rebellion started in 2003 against the Arab-dominated Sudanese government, with two local rebel groups - the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) and the Sudanese Liberation Army (SLA) - accusing the government of oppressing non-Arabs in favor of Arabs. The government was also accused of neglecting the Darfur region of Sudan. In response, the government mounted a campaign of aerial bombardment supporting ground attacks by an Arab militia, the Janjaweed. Literally translated, Janjaweed means 'devils on horseback'. The government-supported Janjaweed were accused of committing major human rights violations, including mass killing, looting, and systematic rape of the non-Arab population of Darfur. They have frequently burned down whole villages, driving the surviving inhabitants to flee to refugee camps, mainly in Darfur and Chad; many of the camps in Darfur are surrounded by Janjaweed forces. By the summer of 2004, 50,000 to 80,000 people had been killed and at least a million had been driven from their homes, causing a major humanitarian crisis in the region.

United Nations : First Intervention

On September 18, 2004, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 1564, which called for a Commission of Inquiry on Darfur to assess the Sudanese conflict. On January 31, 2005, the UN released a 176-Page report saying that while there were mass murders and rapes, they could not label it as genocide because "genocidal intent appears to be missing".[30] [31] Many activists, however, refer to the crisis in Darfur as a genocide, including the Save Darfur Coalition and the Genocide Intervention Network. These organizations point to statements by former U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, referring to the conflict as a genocide. Other activists organizations, such as Amnesty International, while calling for international intervention, avoid the use of the term genocide.

International Responses

International attention to the Darfur conflict largely began with reports by the advocacy organizations Amnesty International in July 2003 and the International Crisis Group in December 2003. However, widespread media coverage did not start until the outgoing United Nations Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Sudan, Mukesh Kapila, called Darfur the "world's greatest humanitarian crisis" in March 2004. A movement advocating for humanitarian intervention has emerged in several countries since then.

UN’s failure to prove existence of GENOCIDE

Genocide - murder of entire ethnic group: the systematic killing of all the people from a national, ethnic, or religious group, or an attempt to do this.

In January 2005, an International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur, authorized by UN Security Council Resolution 1564 of 2004, issued a report to the Secretary-General stating that "the Government of the Sudan has not pursued a policy of genocide." Nevertheless, the Commission cautioned that "The conclusion that no genocidal policy has been pursued and implemented in Darfur by the Government authorities, directly or through the militias under their control, should not be taken in any way as detracting from the gravity of the crimes perpetrated in that region. International offences such as the crimes against humanity and war crimes that have been committed in Darfur may be no less serious and heinous than genocide."

To address the dire human rights and humanitarian emergency in Darfur, the United Nations has taken several steps, but all of these have been frustrated by the Government of Sudan with the support of a number of other governments, including Egypt and Algeria.

In January 2005, the UN Secretary-General's International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur issued a well documented report that indicated that there was by then already some 1.6 million internally displaced persons as a result of the ongoing violence, more than 200,000 refugees from Darfur into neighbouring Chad, and that Government forces and allied militia had committed widespread and consistent war crimes and crimes against humanity including murder, torture, mass rape, summary executions and arbitrary detention. The Commission found that technically there was not a genocide in the legal sense of the term but that massive violations of human rights and humanitarian law were continuing. The Commission also found that the Janjaweed militia operated alongside or with ground or air logistical support from the Government's armed forces.

UN : Paralyzed

The United Nations Human Rights Council appointed seven UN human rights special rapporteurs to form a group of experts on Darfur.

On 11 December 2007, the group of experts issued its final 106-page report to the Human Rights Council which details the status of the Government's implementation of the recommendations the group had brought together and which concluded that the Government's implementation of human rights recommendations has been largely inadequate.
Attacks in January 2008 and February 2008 by Sudanese forces on Darfur villagers are described in a U.N. report, from March 20, 2008, as "violations of international humanitarian and human rights law."

As Sudan has not ratified the Rome Statute the International Criminal Court can not investigate crimes that may have taken place in Darfur unless the United Nations Security council asks them to under Article 13.b of the Rome Statute ("A situation in which one or more of such crimes appears to have been committed is referred to the Prosecutor by the Security Council acting under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations").

In March 2005, the Security Council formally referred the situation in Darfur to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, taking into account the report of the International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur, authorized by UN Security Council Resolution 1564 of 2004, but without mentioning any specific crimes. Two permanent members of the Security Council, the United States and China, abstained from the vote on the referral resolution. As of his fourth report to the Security Council, the Prosecutor has found "reasonable grounds to believe that the individuals identified [in the UN Security Council Resolution 1593] have committed crimes against humanity and war crimes," but did not find sufficient evidence to prosecute for genocide.
In April 2007, the Judges of the ICC issued arrest warrants against the former Minister of State for the Interior, Ahmad Harun, and a Militia Janjaweed leader, Ali Kushayb, for crimes against humanity and war crimes. The Sudan Government says that the ICC had no jurisdiction to try Sudanese citizens and that it will not hand the two men over to its custody.

Criticisms of International Response

On October 16, 2006, Minority Rights Group (MRG) published a critical report, challenging that the UN and the great powers could have prevented the deepening crisis in Darfur and that few lessons appear to have been drawn from their ineptitude during the Rwandan Genocide. MRG's executive director, Mark Lattimer, stated that: "this level of crisis, the killings, rape and displacement could have been foreseen and avoided ... Darfur would just not be in this situation had the UN systems got its act together after Rwanda: their action was too little too late." On October 20, 120 genocide survivors of the Holocaust, the Cambodian and Rwandan Genocides, backed by six aid agencies, submitted an open letter to the European Union, calling on them to do more to end the atrocities in Darfur, with a UN peacekeeping force as "the only viable option."

China : Criticized of supporting Sudan

As based on Security Council’s YALTA formula, substantive issues which requires the Security Council under it’s responsibility of maintaining or restoring world peace to invoke measures of enfrocement – the approval of which needs 9 votes including the Big Five (China as one of the Big 5). With the veto power vested to the so-called Big 5 , one vote from any of them will totally reject a draft of resolution or proposal of possible preventive measures. Under this Rule of Great-Power Unanimity, the Security Council is unable to function once any of the Big 5 exercises it’s veto power.

"Human Rights First" claimed that over 90% of the light weapons currently being imported by Sudan and used in the conflict are from China; however, according to Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI)'s "Arms Transfers Data for 2007", between 2003-2007, Sudan received 87 per cent of its major conventional weapons from Russia and 8 per cent from China.[ Human rights advocates and opponents of the Sudanese government portray China's role in providing weapons and aircraft as a cynical attempt to obtain oil and gas just as colonial powers once supplied African chieftains with the military means to maintain control as they extracted natural resources. According to China's critics, China has offered Sudan support threatening to use its veto on the U.N. Security Council to protect Khartoum from sanctions and has been able to water down every resolution on Darfur in order to protect its interests in Sudan. In response to these allegations, Chinese Ambassador to Sudan Li Chengwen said that "China played an important role in promoting the agreement of the Sudanese government, the African Union and the UN for the deployment of the Hybrid Force in Darfur. China's view is that intensive economic development of the region is a more effective means than harsh economic sanctions, in the effort to stabilize the crisis and alleviate the suffering of the people".[60] Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao reiterated these views on February 20, 2008, and "pointed out that China was the first non-African nation to send peacekeepers to Darfur and the biggest development aid provider to the region". However accusations of the supply of weapons from China in breach of a UN embargo continue to arise.

Prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC) has put countries providing arms to Sudan on notice that they are arming a potentially indicted war criminal, as well as likely violating the Genocide Convention, said Human Rights First.

China's trade and oil interests in Sudan have induced the permanent U.N. Security Council member to provide diplomatic cover for the government accused by many of war crimes against its own people, analysts say.

Sudan has had its back against the wall of the U.N. headquarters in New York during the past 18 months over the conflict in Darfur, where tens of thousands of people have died as a result of violence the United States called genocide. But the spectre of a Chinese veto has shielded Sudan from possible sanctions over the conflict and in turn protected a growing source of much-needed oil for Beijing. "This is RealPolitik," said Adwoa Kufuor, a human rights analyst on Sudan. "Yes China has economic interests ... and yes China will not risk offending the government of Sudan."
China's heavy but understated presence in Sudan is symbolised by the vast, walled compound housing its embassy on prime real estate in Khartoum. It dominates Sudan's crude oil sector, which produces around 330,000 barrels per day, and is building roads, bridges and dams. China has become Sudan's biggest foreign investor with $4 billion in projects.

China has in the past "sold" its UN veto power to protect Sudan from sanctions over the killing of people in Darfur in exchange for access to Sudanese oil. China is now Sudan's biggest customer.

Just Recently

On July 14, 2008, prosecutors at the International Criminal Court (ICC), filed ten charges of war crimes against Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir, three counts of genocide, five of crimes against humanity and two of murder. The ICC's prosecutors have claimed that al-Bashir "masterminded and implemented a plan to destroy in substantial part" three tribal groups in Darfur because of their ethnicity. The ICC's prosecutor for Darfur, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, is expected within months to ask a panel of ICC judges to issue an arrest warrant for al-Bashir.[19]
ICC Prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo referred President Bashir to the Court's Pre-Trial Chamber I, and requested that the chamber issue a warrant for his arrest for his role in perpetrating genocide in Darfur from 2003-2008, resulting in deaths of more than 300,000 people. The prosecutor’s request for a warrant marks the end of the initial phase of what is thus far a three-year investigation into crimes committed in all of Darfur, as well as the first time a sitting president has been charged with genocide.