01 Aug 2007: ISS Today: Preparing to Use the Darfur Road-Map

1 August 2007: Preparing to Use the Darfur Road-Map

 

The joint African Union-United Nations ‘roadmap’ agreed on 8 June this year is supposed to guide the Darfur political process and the joint operations of these two international bodies in the region. If the current status of the peace process is anything to go by, however, they will find themselves navigating in a sandstorm.

 

This week is important for the Darfur process for two reasons. Firstly, Tuesday saw the adoption of a new Security Council resolution on a joint UN-AU peacekeeping force for Darfur. In contrast with previous discussions on the draft resolution, the members of the Security Council were unanimous in their vote for the joint force.

 

The initial draft submitted by the UK and Ghana on 27 June had called for the completion of the light-to-heavy support package agreed upon in Addis Ababa in November 2006, which would entail the deployment of a total of some 26,000 military and civilian personnel. The draft also set out a Chapter VII mandate for the force (to be called UNAMIS), which would authorise deployed troops to use all necessary means within their capabilities in the areas of deployment to protect personnel, humanitarian workers, and civilians under threat of physical violence.  It also condemned the continued violations of the Darfur Peace Agreement and of the relevant resolutions, and demanded that all parties meet their existing obligations.

 

Importantly, South Africa, which together with the Congo and Ghana currently represents Africa on the 15-member UN Security Council, was also reluctant to sponsor the original text, signalling a difference in approach from that of its counterpart and co-sponsor of the resolution, Ghana.

 

Predictably, the resolution was also criticised by the Sudanese envoy to the UN, Abdalmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohammad, who described the document as ‘ugly’. This draft has since been revised in response to calls from Qatar, Indonesia and China to moderate the language: it has dropped the threat of sanctions against Sudan should the country not comply with the resolution.

 

Secondly, there are talks due to begin on 3 August in Arusha, Tanzania, between the non-signatory Darfurian rebel groups, the Sudanese government and representatives of the international community. These form part of the second, or ‘pre-negotiation’, phase of the roadmap meant to ‘set the basic parameters of parties’ positions vis-à-vis existing agreements, and ascertain the parties’ core grievances and positions on key issues, including power-sharing, wealth-sharing and security arrangements’.

 

Although the question of the mandate and scope of a peacekeeping force is central to addressing the immediate security situation in Darfur, the Arusha talks should define whether such a force will indeed play its essentially secondary role to meeting the real challenge -- of achieving political negotiations between the parties to the conflict.

 

Much has been said about the proliferation of Darfur’s rebel groups over recent months, in what has been a welcome move away from the rather unhelpful binary representation of the war as Arab on African violence. Nevertheless, there has still been little focus on the rebel movements themselves and how they relate not only to Khartoum but also to each other.

 

In the continuing evolution of the crisis it has become increasingly clear that the conflict is a manifestation of five levels of tension. The first relates to the growing antagonism on a communal level between nomadic herders and the largely sedentary Fur community, which intensified during the 1984-1985 drought. The second is the militarisation of camel herding communities in Western Darfur, many of which fled the conflict in Chad. Thirdly, the emasculation of traditional authority and local conflict–management initiatives as a consequence of the centralisation of Sudanese politics in Khartoum has made communities vulnerable to armed violence, particularly in the context of the easily accessible weaponry throughout the Sahel region.

 

The fourth level, and perhaps most relevant to the interim period in Sudan, is the way in which the North-South Peace Agreement is affected by, and consequently influences, the possibilities of power sharing in Darfur. The Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) under the leadership of John Garang was instrumental in the development of the SLA from a small, localised, opposition group in the form of the Darfur Liberation Front to one subscribing to the nationalist vision of the SLM. It is not without cause that Garang saw the future of the SPLM as having the potential to transform the political landscape of the Sudan and creating his vision for a ‘New Sudan’. Indeed, the violence in Darfur assisted the SPLM in speeding up the conclusion of the Naivasha and Machakos talks. At the same time, however, those same talks were seen to be delivering very little to other marginalised areas, and had the opposite effect of entrenching Khartoum as the representatives of the ‘North’ – a significant misrepresentation of the legitimacy of the National Congress Party. Darfur, which falls within the ambit of the North thus felt betrayed by the outcome of the Naivasha negotiations, and resorted to arms to claims to the consideration of the political centre.

 

Since 2005 the extension of the conflict in Darfur has had numerous repercussions on the North-South agreement, not least in ways relating to the diversion of resources and attention from the post-conflict reconstruction of the South. More urgently, it has also added to the delays in preparing the ground for the vaunted 2009 national elections. With the war continuing in Darfur there is little chance of conducting the credible census meant to precede an election, or indeed to demarcate borders crucial to the definition of constituencies, or the the power sharing and security arrangements. The deterioration in relations between the SPLM and NCP over Darfur (these were hardly congenial from the outset) sounds alarm bells over the sustainability of the CPA.

 

Finally, the neighbourhood of which Darfur forms part is far from stable. The historical fragility of states such as Chad, CAR, Libya and DRC has contributed significantly to the lack of security in the entire region and has made ‘governing’ an issue of regime security. This is perhaps best exemplified by the Déby regime in Chad, which came to power with the explicit military support of the Sudanese authorities. Contemporary relations between Sudan and Chad have soured because of Déby’s miscalculation of the strength of Zaghawa sentiment within Chad in support of the Darfur rebels. Déby’s reliance on France for security and much-needed reinforcement of his legitimacy has added to his strained relations with the Sudan’s National Congress Party.

 

It is common knowledge that the only movement to sign the stillborn Darfur Peace Agreement was the faction of the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) led by Minni Minnawi. This faction has since also seen the fragmentation of its forces, particularly following the perceived dilution of the rebel leader’s relevance since he assumed a post in Khartoum.  We should also bear in mind, however, that historically there has been a tense relationship between the Zaghawa and Fur communities, both of which have fallen victim to Khartoum’s military ‘solution’ to uprising in Darfur. Wahid Nur, veteran community leader and leader of the original SLM, maintains a following in Darfur and has opposed the DPA process, claiming that it fails to deal substantively with key issues around power-sharing and security. Yet the relations between Wahid and Minni are increasingly strained, reaching a point at which their individual forces have refused to assist each other in battles with the Khartoum’s forces on the ground. Their relationship has thus so far been dictated by short-term opportunism, and this will need to be addressed if there is to be any cohesion at the negotiation table.
 
The other outstanding, yet crucial, element in the rebel camp is the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) under Khalil Ibrahim. Though JEM is typically depicted as being a small fighting force without much presence on the ground in Darfur, its members’ relationship with, and experience in, the Islamist movement gives them particular political insight essential to dialogue with the National Congress Party. Now more than ever, the lesson from the failed Abuja negotiating process must be learned: that political astuteness rather than hegemony over fighting forces defines the power balance in the negotiations. The JEM’s national orientation is also important in that it has the ability to speak to questions of broader marginalisation, which are the key to its close relationship with rebel movements in Eastern Sudan.

 

All of the above is playing out in the context of the interest of international actors in the Darfur process. Though it is encouraging to note the recent convergence at the June meeting of key actors in Tripoli of various parallel initiatives on Darfur and Sudan/Chad, questions remain about the role of French and US interests in their government’s pursuit of individual foreign policy objectives and how these relate to their governments’ activities on Sudanese issues. Not only has Libya re-emerged as an international player in the Sudan peace process, playing host to the enlarged contact group meetings, but has also positioned itself as the recipient of new investment as a result of the freeing of six foreign medical personnel convicted of deliberately infecting Libyan children with HIV. French President Nicholas Sarkozy visited Libya a day after their release and signed a series of agreements that would see French business interests securing a share of investment in Libya’s nuclear energy programme.

 

At the same time, the European Union has agreed to the deployment of French forces along the border of Sudan and Eastern Chad as a ‘protection’ force for civilians fleeing the Darfur conflict. This follows months of refusal by Chad for any NATO or EU deployment along its border; it would now seem that the use of French forces represents a reaffirmation of security for the Deby regime.

 

The continuing attempts by Eritrea to play a bigger role in the Sudan, and its success in being given the position of mediator to the Eastern Peace Agreement (despite its involvement in supporting elements of the Eastern opposition) in October last year, also adds to the internationalisation of the Sudan’s domestic political puzzle.  For now, it will be important for the international contact group and the Sudanese authorities to realise that solving the Darfur crisis will mean adopting an inclusive approach, no matter how protracted this might prove. The continued detention of SLM humanitarian commander Suleiman Jamous at the UN hospital in Kadugli for over 13 months after the UN assisted in flying him out of Darfur for medical attention, highlights one of the opportunities lost in building confidence between the parties.

 

The Arusha round represents a rare chance to rectify the numerous shortcomings of the Abuja process. It should not be missed.

 

Mariam Bibi Jooma, African Security Analysis Programme, ISS Tshwane (Pretoria)