Washington, DC — The night before the arrival of the head of the United States aid agency in Sudan, a Sudanese government aircraft bombed a village he was to visit in the rebel-controlled southern area of the country. Nevertheless, USAID Administrator Andrew Natsios says the cease fire in the contested Nuba Mountains appears to be holding.
"The most hopeful sign we saw on the trip that could be built on in the future," he says, "is the Nuba Mountain ceasefire."
Natsios, who is also U.S. Special Humanitarian Coordinator for Sudan, told reporters Friday that at levels beneath the top leadership of both Sudan's National Islamic Front (NIF) government and the rebel Sudan Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA), "favorable" signs of NIF and SPLA cooperation were evident. "There has been -- appears to be -- an exchange on both sides of military and political offices at the local level, which I don't think has...happened before, operationally in the field. People from one side of the conflict are visiting the other side, and the other side is visiting."
Elaborating on that point later, Natsios said that while he see two sides militarily, there aren't two sides in a social sense. There is a strong desire for peace at the grassroots, he says, but political leaders seem unready to respond. Although there are factions within the NIF government that favor peace, others do not. The unanswered question, he says, is "which faction will carry the day."
Natsios acknowledges that attacks on civilians are continuing. Commenting on government bombing that occurred immediately after his meeting with Nuer chiefs last Wednesday, Natsios said, "It was odd, from our perspective, that the bombing took place right where the chiefs that we had met were from. And it is not near the conflict area."
Humanitarian and development assistance in the embattled south is moving forward, according to USAID Assistant Administrator for Humanitarian Assistance, Roger Winter, after a slow start. Winter attributed the dely to "difficulties" with the NIF government over the decision-making process that will determine access for humanitarian purposes.
Asked about the NIF's assertion Thursday, that key "necessary principles" for humanitarian assistance requires that Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS), the umbrella operation for UN and nongovernmental agencies working in Sudan, operate out of the capital Khartoum, and that all relief be distributed from internal facilities -- presumably government or government-controlled, Natsios emphatically called those demands "not acceptable!"
The USAID Administrator, pointing out that 50 percent of relief efforts are in SPLA-held areas in the south, said the governments requirements, "would` destroy the relief program itself. The principle of Operation Lifeline Sudan since it was created in 1988, was to allow the northern-held areas to be served from the North and the southern-held areas to be served through Lokichokio in Northern Kenya. Any change will disrupt the relief effort and endanger people's lives, and we would not accept it."
Constance Newman, USAID Administrator for Africa, announced two major initiatives. One is a US$22m agricultural initiative to increase both agricultural skills and access to capital in the south. "Southern Sudan has major natural resources and has the potential of being a major producer of agricultural products," said Newman.
The second initiative is a five-year $20m education project for southern Sudan that will train over 2,000 women teachers in four regional training institutes. The initiative also proposes to build 240 primary schools and 10 secondary schools as well as to promote non-formal distance learning for over 20,000 out-of-school youth.
The tricky issue of oil operations in Sudan has barely been addressed by the diplomatic initiative although many analysts and observers consider the question of the use of oil revenues central to facilitating any durable peace. But with the NIF dependent on oil monies for the more than US$1m a day cost of the war, and the SPLA adamant about the legitimacy of oil facilities as military targets, the two sides are nowhere near agreement. The NIF has rejected suggestions of an independent trust fund for oil revenues, pending a peace settlement, as an infringement on its sovereignty.
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Natsios says he recognizes that oil pipelines and rigs run through the traditional lands of the Nuer in the south. "A settlement that simply keeps everything in place and has peace would be inadequate," he acknowledges, because [southerners] have lost their home and their land, their traditional land."
But oil is only one of a number of difficult issues, Natsios says. Other challenges include the emotional as well as political questions of governance, religion and cultural autonomy. Slavery and abduction also remain "controversial" issues, says Winter. "The government asserts that it doesn't have slavery as such. But there is obviously a practice that is problematic that occurs in parts of the country."
In March, the U.S. Special Sudan peace envoy, former Senator John Danforth, secured agreement from the parties for 15 foreign peace monitors. They are still not in place. "We are not going to impose anything on them," said Natsios, "because then it ultimately will not hold."
