Washington, DC — An international task force put together by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) has released policy recommendations that it says will end the Sudan's 18-year civil war. The report highlights what it calls the Sudanese government's policy of bombarding humanitarian relief sites, "egregious" human rights abuses and its failure to combat slavery.
More than two million people have been killed in the conflict. Over four million people have been displaced.
Says CSIS president and CEO John Hamre, citing broad bi-partisan support in Congress and from among diverse U.S. groups to put Sudan high on the Bush administration's agenda, "the report provides U.S. policymakers with a pragmatic and focused strategy." Specifically, the report argues that "the new administration is well-positioned to take a fresh look and move beyond a policy of containment and isolation that has made little headway in ending Sudan's war."
Among the report's key recommendations are the establishing of "an international nucleus" to press for "serious and sustained" talks between the government and its southern opposition, multi-lateral "inducements" and "pressures" that move government and rebels to the negotiating table, creation of an interim "One Sudan, Two Systems" formula that will allow democratic self-governing regions in the north and south while preserving a single Sudan, and resumption of the full operations of the U.S. embassy in Khartoum.
Over the past two years, the report claims, Sudan's growing oil production has shifted the balance of military power in the government's favor and other peace plans have no chance now. Only the United States, the report's authors believe, has the leverage to impose peace. And while the Sudanese government recognizes U.S. muscle, southern rebels appreciate U.S. recognition of their moral cause and feel that the U.S. "will not countenance the military subjugation of the south."
The response to the CSIS report has been low key. However, an ad hoc group of Capitol Hill supporters of the rebel Sudanese Peoples Liberation Movement (SPLM) has issued a critique. In a written response, the group describes the findings of the CSIS document as "largely based on questionable assumptions and a problematic analysis of the situation in Sudan."
Why should the government negotiate seriously if it is getting stronger and the south weaker? the group asks. Oil development will produce more suffering, the group claims. Slavery is not addressed nor is the "continuing, unabated liquidation of the peoples of the Nuba." Normalized relations with Sudan and consultation with allies "will not change the behavior of the extremist government in Khartoum," they say.
Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters
Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox
They call for the appointment of a special envoy with "exclusive control over management of the peace process" to lead contact with the government and SPLM. The want sanctions maintained and international pressure kept up until aerial bombardments of civilians, participation in slavery is ended and militias disarmed. Any peace process "must halt the brutally destructive military actions in the oil fields, and reach an agreement with the SPLM on an interim arrangement."
The already muddy waters of Sudanese politics have been further clouded in recent weeks by the imprisonment of Islamic leader Hassan Al Turabi, who many presumed to be the real power behind government decision-making, after he signed a "memorandum of understanding" with the Garang faction of the SPLA. Authorities went to Turabi's home on lastWednesday night (February 21) and arrested him.
Relations between Al Turabi and Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir began unraveling in December 1999 when Bashir dissolved parliament while Al Turabi was serving as its speaker. It was two days before pro-Turabi lawmakers were set to vote on curbing Bashir's presidential powers. Eight months later, Turabi set up his own political party, the Popular National Congress, after stepping down as secretary-general of the ruling National Congress Party, which had previously been led by Bashir.
But Turabi's accord with the SPLM came as a surprise to many because Al Turabi, a conservative Islamist, had previously advocated a more hardline stance against the Christian-Animist SPLM. Al Turabi's critics are now likely to accuse him of being an insincere proponent of peace and multipartyism as a means to gain power since falling out with Bashir.
