SUDAN: Peace in Darfur - one step forward, two steps back

Photo: Derk Segaar/IRIN

What flared up in 2003 as a conflict between the government and two main rebel groups - the JEM and SLM/A - over marginalisation and distribution of wealth and power, has resulted in fighting between splintered rebel groups - file photo

NAIROBI, 18 May 2009 (IRIN) - Rebels in Sudan's Darfur region are showing signs of unity, but it has not brought their region any closer to a comprehensive peace, analysts said, as the government wrapped up another round of unsuccessful discussions with the most active rebel group.

Since the indictment on 4 March http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=83299 of President Omar al-Bashir for war crimes, the Justice and Equality Movement claims to have made big strides towards uniting fractious rebels by bringing other groups under its umbrella.

"We are quite hopeful that by mid-June [at the latest], we will have one organisation," Gebreil Ibrahim, JEM's economic adviser and brother of the group's leader, Khalil, told IRIN. "Now we have started calling it the New JEM."

What flared up in 2003 as a conflict between the government and two main rebel groups - the JEM and the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army, or SLM/A - over marginalisation and distribution of wealth and power, has resulted in fighting between splintered rebel groups, increased banditry and ethnic clashes.

"Unity by attrition"

But Darfur's rebellion has come "full circle" and is once again re-emerging as two main groups - the JEM and the faction of the SLM/A led by Abdel Wahid Mohammed Nur, according to Theodore Murphy of the Geneva-based Humanitarian Dialogue Centre, which has helped facilitate negotiations between rebels and the government.

"To a degree, it's down to efforts within the movements to unite, but also because the smaller groups are falling apart and being absorbed into the larger," he told IRIN, calling it "unity by attrition".

Last month, Suleiman Jamous, an influential commander with the Unity faction of the SLM/A, announced that he, 30 commanders and 500 soldiers were joining the JEM, virtually decapitating the SLA-Unity faction.

New recruits

The JEM said hundreds more soldiers from various factions of the SLA and other rebel groups had also joined.

Following the government's expulsion of 13 major international aid agencies from Sudan http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=83311 - most of whom were serving the 2.7 million people living in camps in Darfur - hundreds of civilians have also joined JEM ranks, according to spokesman Ahmed Hussain Adam.

For the first time, Hussain said, members of Arab groups traditionally aligned with the government - the Beni Halba, the Rizeigat and the Misseriya - were joining the JEM in their hundreds.

Nur's faction of the SLM/A is similarly "dabbling" with bringing in former splinter groups, Murphy said.

But despite these strides, a comprehensive peace deal remains elusive in the semi-arid western region of Sudan, where as many as 300,000 people are estimated to have died and another 4.7 million depend on aid to survive.

Negotiations

The JEM was the only player in a February attempt at restarting peace talks with the government, at which it signed a "goodwill agreement" to exchange prisoners and facilitate the flow of aid to Darfur. Renewed discussions beginning 6 May on implementing that agreement came to a close in the Qatari capital Doha last week with no tangible results.

Photo: Derk Segaar/IRIN

Fighting between splintered rebel groups, increased banditry and ethnic clashes have devastated Darfur - file photo

While the return to two main rebel groups is a "step forward", Murphy said both groups refused to negotiate together, so "it may not get us that much closer to a comprehensive process".

Others fear the JEM can never be the only unifying force, as some groups will always oppose its Islamist nature. Many analysts say its recent popularity is due to the money it offers new recruits. It has also engaged in various battles over the last few months, in an effort, analysts said, to prove its military strength and thus increase its leverage in negotiations.

Focus on JEM

"Unless the structural approach that has been taken to the Doha talks is opened to include other movements .comprehensive peace agreements in Darfur will not be possible," said Paula Roque, a researcher at the Institute for Security Studies, a Pretoria-based think-tank.

On 15 March, the SLM's Unity and Juba factions, as well as the SLM faction led by Khamis Abdallah Abakar, the breakaway JEM faction led by Idris Azraq and the United Revolutionary Forces Front, signed an agreement in Libya "to create a unified front and participate in the peace negotiations", according to the latest Darfur report by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon.

This small alliance was not present during the recent discussions between the JEM and the government, which ended on 12 May and will resume on 27 May.

"The special relationship the US and the Sudan government are building up with the JEM, prioritising [leader] Khalil Ibrahim's movement in peace talks, risks backfiring unless balanced by other contacts, especially with Arabs," writes Julie Flint on the blog, Making sense of Darfur. http://www.ssrc.org/blogs/darfur/category/darfur/

The Darfur conflict pits mostly non-Arab rebels against the Arab-dominated government and has exacerbated tensions between nomadic Arabs and settled Africans in the region. While the Africans have suffered most in the conflict, Arabs have also been victims.

"The peace process has always been between the government on one side and the predominantly non-Arab rebel movements on the other," Flint writes. As the JEM becomes the main negotiating partner, and Arabs continue to be excluded from the process, "the parameters of the peace process are shrinking rather than expanding, as they must".

Representing the Fur

Who represents the region's native group, the Fur, has become another problem. Nur, the Fur's rebel leader and one of the founders of the rebellion, refuses to negotiate with the government until the violence in Darfur stops. Other rebel groups say he has been averse to any co-operation with them as well.

"Abdel Wahid [Nur] has essentially painted himself into a corner," said Colin Thomas-Jensen, a policy adviser at the Washington-based Enough Project. The JEM's political and military surge has led to increasing discontent with Nur's leadership, "but there's no one to fill that vacuum.

Photo: Derk Segaar/IRIN

Rebels in south Darfur: An analyst says Darfur's rebellion has come "full circle" and is once again re-emerging as two main groups, the JEM and a faction of the SLM/A - file photo

"The Fur, being the largest group in Darfur and being the largest group affected by this war, need strong representation in any peace process. The consensus view among negotiators and mediators has developed that Abdel Wahid will not provide that. Finding a Fur representation has become an obsession for many within the mediation."

Thus while some degree of rebel unity is a step forward for Darfur, increased politicisation of the conflict and the lack of representation of some groups continue to plague peace efforts. Meanwhile, analysts and civil society alike have grown "tired" of the constant making and breaking of alliances among the rebels.

For Ibrahim Mudawi, chairman of the Sudan Social Development Organization, Sudan's largest NGO, which is active in Darfur, these latest rebel mergers are insignificant.

"All of them [the rebel groups] are irrelevant. All are fragmented. They are sitting on smaller and smaller constituencies," he said. "There is no one having a vision or plan."