POMADAS

Darfur increasingly came to dominate political discourse from 2003 onwards, yet the origins of the conflicts, and the dynamics which sustained them, are rooted in the history of Darfur and of Sudan itself. Darfur had remained an independent sultanate until 1916, when it was forcefully incorporated into Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. While initially a centre of power in colonial Sudan, Sudanese independence in 1956 initiated a spiral of marginalization, neglect and impoverishment for Darfur, with Khartoum focused increasingly on developing northern Sudan and waging war against renegade elements in the South (Iyob and Khadiagala, 2006: 134). The rise of the theocratic state in 1989, dominated by riverian elites from Northern Sudan and from Khartoum, brought further repression and an intensification of the North-South conflict, pursued more vigorously and violently by the new military regime in Khartoum. The period also witnessed an intensification of conflict between Khartoum and peripheral areas of Sudan. Indeed, the 1990s were a decade when Sudanese state was confronted with the emergence of armed movements in the West, East and Centre, while the armed movements of the South had fought Khartoum into a stalemate from which it was not likely to be able to extract itself through the use of traditional military means (Iyob and Khadiagala, 2006: 32). As Khartoum focussed its attention on finding a negotiated end to the North-South conflict, several opposition movements, some armed, others political in nature, rapidly sprung up in Darfur, the largest of which were the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) and the Sudanese Liberation Movement (SLM). Khartoum however from the

outset refused to engage with the JEM and the SLM on a political level, and the movements turned increasingly to the use of armed insurrection. From 2000 onwards, intermittent conflict commenced between the armed movements and the police and armed forces in Darfur. Yet the armed movements mostly focused their efforts on attacking police stations, small garrisons and administrative facilities, and the conflict did not draw the attention of Khartoum, which left the regional administrative authorities to deal with the ‘tribal’ conflict.

Khartoum had assumed by the end of 2002 that the small insurrection in Darfur had been nipped in the bud, and was at the time largely unprepared for the emergence of a military threat in the West, with most of its forces deployed in the South. Yet by early 2003 the armed movements had rapidly gained ground, threatening to take control of Darfur from Khartoum (Flint and de Waal, 2008: 121). In Khartoum’s calculation, the stakes were high, as the conflict had the potential of destabilizing the central government at a time when its attention was focused on regaining international legitimacy through the North-South peace process, where it was negotiating from a position of strength (Iyob and Khadiagala, 2006: 151). Khartoum was however not able to utilize the regular armed forces in quelling the uprising, due to the high number of Darfuri soldiers serving in the national army, and the need to maintain a robust military presence in the South. Thus, Khartoum resorted to the use of a counter-insurgency campaign in Darfur, modelled on similar campaigns which had been conducted in South Sudan and in the Nuba Mountains in previous years (Clough, 2005: 3). The government armed and deployed the Janjaweed, tribal groups supplied with weapons and promises of financial reward in return for engaging the armed movements on Khartoum’s behalf. The Janjaweed, working alongside the intelligence services, the regular armed forces and the national police, quickly unleashed a reign of terror in Darfur, fighting not only the SLM and the JEM directly, but focusing their destructive power on the communities from which the armed movements had emerged, and which provided shelter and supplies to them. Khartoum thus focused both on engaging the movements directly, and on destroying the communities which enabled them operate. A brutal conflict ensued, characterized by millions of displacements, hundreds of thousands of combatant and non-combatant deaths, a scorched earth policy on the part of the government, rape, mutilation, aerial bombing of villages and communities, forced starvation, mass killings, and the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity, perpetrated on all sides.

Yet when Darfur first erupted onto the international stage in mid-2003, the attention of the world’s foreign policy-makers was not focussed on Sudan. Indeed, international attention was squarely focussed on conflicts in Iraq and, to a lesser extent at the time, in Afghanistan. What little attention was directed towards Sudan was focused squarely on the Naivasha peace process in Kenya, which held the potential of finally bringing an end to the North-South conflict. Thus policy- makers in Western capitals tended to ignore the emerging Darfur conflict as a distraction from broader efforts aimed at bringing peace to Sudan. Khartoum exploited this opening, quickly escalating the conflict in Darfur both through regular but mostly through irregular military means, and attempted to isolate Darfur from international attention, imposing tight travel restrictions to the region, even for Sudanese citizens (Clough, 2005: 3). Both the UN and non-governmental organizations thus found themselves having to travel to Chad to assess the situation in Darfur. The American Embassy in Khartoum began to include reports of ethnic cleansing in its internal cables to Washington, but these had little impact, and policy-makers in Washington were not particularly interested in a further complication in their Sudan policy (Flint and de Waal, 2008: 169).

During the summer of 2003, an increasing number of representatives from Darfur arrived in Khartoum, pleading with the UN for protection from the Janjaweed and government forces. By September, the UN Resident Coordinator, Mukesh Kapila, sent a report detailing atrocities in Darfur to New York and requested guidance. Yet the Security Council and the troika of Norway, the United States and the United Kingdom, who were leading the North-South mediation efforts, feared that engaging Khartoum on Darfur would stall progress in the Naivasha negotiations, as the SPLM and Khartoum had already reached a ceasefire agreement in October 2002, and diplomats believed that a final settlement was only weeks or months away (Traub, 2010: 5-6). Darfur was therefore not prioritized. Kapila could also not elicit much interest among diplomats in Khartoum, and in October 2003 travelled to Washington and European capitals, briefing officials there on the deteriorating humanitarian situation and the string of atrocities taking place, and urging for Darfur to be placed on the agenda of the Security Council. No interest was forthcoming however (Traub, 2010: 6). On 30 November, the UN office in Khartoum issued a briefing to New York estimating that 600,000 Darfuris had been displaced, and that the humanitarian situation in Darfur could soon emerge as the worst humanitarian crisis in Africa. The report recommended strong international pressure be placed on Khartoum to control the militias. The report again fell on deaf ears however (Traub, 2010: 6-7). Yet by December Kapila’s reports had gained some traction, and Jan Egeland, the UN’s chief humanitarian coordinator, and Kofi Annan within days of one another convened press conferences stating that Darfur had already become the worst humanitarian crisis in the world (Traub, 2010: 7). The Security Council however refused to take up the matter.

Increasingly, the conflict was spiralling out of control, with the armed movements engaged in continued acts of defiance against government forces, and the government responding with increasingly brutal acts of retaliation against the movements and the civilian population. Despite efforts to keep Darfur off the international agenda, pressure from non-governmental organizations and humanitarian agencies, the obstruction of humanitarian efforts on the part of the Sudanese government, and the rapidly escalating numbers of displaced persons raised a crescendo of condemnation, which swiftly led to accusations that genocide was being committed in Darfur (Iyob and Khadiagala, 2006: 152). Making the most of these developments, JEM members began to portray the conflict in Darfur as genocide by early 2004, both within and outside of Sudan, calculating that a successful portrayal of the conflict as genocide would serve to delegitimise the government in Khartoum, would contribute to fostering regime change, and perhaps would even forestall independence in the South (Flint and de Waal, 2008: 101). Labelling the conflict as ‘genocide’ however did not gain much traction at the time, and Western policy-makers were keen to steer away from any such portrayals of what was keenly portrayed at the time to be nothing more than a humanitarian emergency.

By early 2004 Jan Egeland was urging the Security Council to place Darfur on its agenda. Egeland was convinced that ethnic cleansing was taking place, but the United States and the United Kingdom, together with Norway, blocked any moves to have Darfur placed on the agenda of the Council. Egeland’s efforts also received no support from the UN Department of Political Affairs (UN DPA), which was focused entirely on the North-South Naivasha process (MacKinnon, 2010: 83 and Traub, 2010: 7 - 8). Egeland would later complain that the three members of the troika were “obsessed with getting a North-South agreement” (in Williams, 2010; 206). Some UN officials did attempt to get member states to take a stance on Darfur, but even the Secretariat itself was divided on the matter. One UN political affairs officer stationed in Khartoum noted:

We kept sending these reports to headquarters, and then there was a terrible silence. We were under great pressure from Sudanese Government, and we received no political guidance (in Traub, 2010: 8).

The AU was at the time also not prepared to address the situation in Darfur. At the Second Extraordinary Assembly of the Union, meeting in Libya from 27 – 28 February 2004, no mention was made of Darfur, although a one-page Resolution was adopted on the humanitarian situation in Haiti (African Union, 2004[c]).

As international attention began to focus on the ever-increasing numbers of refugees and IDPs emerging from Darfur and on swelling evidence that widespread and systematic violations of human rights were occurring, it became evident that some form of policy response was required. By mid-2004, the US-British-Norwegian troika that was supporting the Naivasha process came to understand that some form of response needed to be formulated. Two options were considered by the troika. The first was to deal with Darfur as part of the North-South peace process, and to enlarge Naivasha to become a more inclusive inter-Sudanese peace process. Should this fail, the troika would consider at the very least stabilising Darfur before concluding the Naivasha process. The second option was to proceed with the Naivasha process until its completion, and then to focus attention on Darfur. The latter option was favoured, and the troika focused on pressing ahead with the negotiations along the North-South axis. As one observer notes, this decision was based on considerations of both timing and of feasibility. Neither the SPLM nor Naivasha partners were keen on having the North-South process held hostage by an unpredictable conflict in Darfur, and thus the conflicts were separated from one another, to be dealt with in sequence (De Waal, 2007: 1040 - 1041). As another observer further notes, there was also a real fear that a discussion on Darfur would cause the government in Khartoum to pull out of the Naivasha talks, and set back progress in one of Sudan’s many conflicts (Clough, 2005: 4).

Khartoum was therefore left to deal with the situation in Darfur as it saw fit, as long as it was cooperating in the Naivasha process. Yet as James Traub argues, both diplomats and activists quickly became convinced that Khartoum was using the Naivasha process to pursue its conflict in Darfur unhindered, and one deadline after another was missed in Naivasha, prolonging the negotiations. At the same time, the SPLM quickly came to view the SLM and the JEM as proxy forces of its own, weakening Khartoum at the bargaining table both politically and militarily and draining the government’s attention and resources from the North-South conflict (Traub, 2010: 8). The SPLM thus also began to support the armed movements in Darfur, in an effort to strengthen its own bargaining position. The pace of negotiations in Naivasha thus slowed down, with both parties focused on Darfur in the struggle for political power in Sudan. Yet the partners adhered to the decision that Darfur be dealt with purely as a humanitarian problem, and continued to pressure for the politics of the broader Sudan conflict to be negotiated in Naivasha, to the exclusion of the movements in Darfur (Seymour, 2010: 59 – 60).