Day: August 24, 2022

South Sudan says it is investigating allegations that one of its diplomats at the United Nations sexually assaulted a neighbour, prompting police to briefly detain him in New York.

The undersecretary in the Foreign Affairs ministry, Mayen Dut Wol told Sudan Tribune he learned of the diplomat’s arrest through the media and contacted the mission head and his deputy for more details.

“There was no report that has come from our mission to the United Nations suggesting incident. My attraction was drawn to the media report for which we have started to conduct internal verification about the allegation”, explained Dut.

He said the mission head was out of office, making it difficult to obtain information on what transpired.

Dut said the media report did not cite any source and quoted anonymous sources, including the victim.

“Nobody came out to lodge the complaint against one of diplomats at our permission to the United Nations. If such incident has occurred, it would have been brought to our attention through appropriate and official channels. This has not happened as far as I’m concerned,” he stressed.

Multiple sources told Sudan Tribune that the suspect is a known miscreant diplomat, citing undiplomatic behaviours during private functions and going to off-limits places in the areas of his assigned locations.

“I am not surprised of such reports. I knew one day incidents of such nature would be brought to the attention of the government South Sudan because of the behaviours of our diplomats. They do not have ethics because they are professional diplomats. These are nominees of either political parties or leaders who have decided to staff our foreign services with their relatives or friends”, a senior diplomat at the Foreign Affairs ministry on Tuesday.

The diplomat claimed that the foreign service has turned into a “dumping site” for relatives of senior government officials as well as relatives and family members of top security and military officers.

Today if one of the senior government officials or a top general, police, security and defence feel ashamed of the behaviours of his relatives or family members in the country, they resort to sending them to the ministry of foreign affairs and international cooperation for assignment outside the country.

It remains unclear what the foreign ministry and the office of the president would do if the incident is established to be a true story.

Observers are keen to suggestion measures which the authorities would take to address the matter.

Some claim the first measure would be to relocate the diplomat from the area where the incident occurred or else he would be recalled to the headquarters for proper investigations to be conducted.

Another way as part of the measures would involve reaching out to the victim with an apology and finally a disciplinary measure would be taken. Such a measure would a summary dismissal of the diplomat from not only in the foreign service but also in the civil servant category of the country.

Source: Sudan Tribune

The Ugandan government has reportedly turned down a request by Sudanese rebels to reside in the country, citing their lack of commitment to pursue genuine causes.

Sudanese rebel Abdel Wahid Mohamed Al-Nur, multiple sources disclosed, had his request for a residential permit rejected on directives from President Yoweri Museveni.

A top South Sudanese security officer told Sudan Tribune on Saturday that Museveni faulted Al-Nur for refusing to accept peaceful negotiation with the government of Sudan, yet pursuing military means.

“Abdel Wahid Mohamed Al-Nur is using the conflict in Darfur, especially in the Jebel Mara area for business purpose. He is fighting for a genuine cause. He is becoming a conflict entrepreneur. He is using community members and the fighting as the cover for his illicit business activities in the Jebel area. He is now openly involved in illicit mining. He has actually forgotten the cause of Darfur”, he said.

A highly placed source revealed that he was recently involved in efforts to allow President Museveni meet with Al-Nur, but they could not succeed because the Ugandan leader declined the request.

“In the diplomat and security services, a request stays for more than two weeks; it means the recipient is not interested in the visit. Al-nur has made several attempts through our contacts, diplomatic channels and the good offices but the Ugandan leadership has not responded”, he explained.

A diplomat at the Ugandan embassy in Juba told Sudan Tribune that Uganda and the president was not ready to engage in an indefinite diplomat support for rebel groups without significant presence on the ground or those with no clear ideologies and visions aimed at changing the system in their countries.

“This Sudanese guy called Al-Nur is a business man. He is a political leader because his approach is dogmatic. There is nothing like that in politics. Political leaders are flexible. They explore ways to finding a solution to the problem. There is now a window of peace being mediated by the president of the Republic of South Sudan General Salva Kiir Mayardit with the support of the region but this man is not utilizing this opportunity. He is not making proposals”, said the diplomat who preferred anonymity.

Last week, Al-Nur and his aides told Sudan Tribune the group was looking for an opportunity to speak with the Ugandan leader about peace in Sudan and the region.

Sources claimed in multiple interviews with Sudan Tribune that Al-Nur had been in contact with the Ugandan leader who indicated in July he would permit him to relocate to Uganda from South Sudan where he lives as the guest of the President Salva Kiir to give him the opportunity to persuade him to join peace talk after he opted to remain out of the Juba peace agreement which Sudan and coalition of several rebel leaders and political groups signed in 2020 to end the conflict in Sudan.

It remains unclear how Al-Nur intend to pursue a way to end the conflict in the war ravaged region of Darfur and more specifically in his Jebel Mara area where the war has forced local people to relocate into mountainous area or fled to Chad, Central Africa Republic or crossed into Libyan as refugees.

Several attempts by the state of Qatar and the African union to broker an accord have never yielded meaningful peaceful efforts. Al-nur advocates a total regime change and removal of Arabs tribes which the government in Khartoum has settled in areas historically owned or associated with his ethnic group.

Source: Sudan Tribune

The United Nations on Wednesday said Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) forces stole 12 fuel trucks from a World Food Program (WFP) warehouse in Mekelle, Ethiopia.

Stéphane Dujarric, Spokesperson for the United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres, told journalists in New York that the Tigrean forces , in the morning of August 24, “forcefully entered” World Food Programme Warehouse in Mekelle and “stole” 12 track tankers of oil ( 570,000 liters).

“These stocks of fuel would be used solely for humanitarian purposes with the distribution of food, fertilizers and other emergency relief items,” he said in a statement.

The U.N spokesperson added that the “loss of fuel will impact humanitarian operations. ”

The U.N has condemned “looting or confiscation of humanitarian goods on humanitarian premises.”

David Beasley, the WFP Director, called the incident “outrageous and disgraceful”.

“Hours ago, Tigrayan authorities stole 570,000 liters of fuel for @WFP operations in #Tigray! Millions will starve if we do not have fuel to deliver food. This is outrageous and disgraceful. We demand the return of this fuel now,” he tweeted on Thursday.

In December last year, the world body reported that large amounts of food supplies had been looted from their warehouses in northern Ethiopia, leading to the suspension of food distributions in two towns.

The United Nations has been a target of anger by both the federal government and now the Tigray forces. On September 30, the government declared several senior U.N. humanitarian officials persona non grata and expelled them, saying they were interfering in the country’s internal affairs.

The federal government’s military has been fighting the TPLF since November 2020. The conflict has displaced nearly 1.2 million people internally, while thousands have sought safety in neighboring Sudan.

Source: Sudan Tribune

The African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies (ACJPS) called on Tuesday for urgent investigations into “suspicious circumstances’” surrounding the deaths of Pastor Azrag Barnabas and his three children in Central Darfur. Armed shepherds shot a sheikh of a Koran School in North Darfur on Monday.

According to a postmortem report uncovered by the ACJPS, Pastor Azrag from the church of Garsila in Central Darfur, may have been poisoned before falling ill and dying in November 2021. The research group said medical staff in Garsila tried their best to save his life but were unable to due to a lack of medical supplies.

Despite his death being reported to the police, no suspects have so far been arrested and a previous investigation into the cause of death was halted sometime after the October’s coup, the ACJPS said. The church of Garsila has since closed after other members became concerned about their safety.

Eight months later, on July 13, Azrag’s three children aged 6, 10 and 11 all died in a house fire. People from the community have pointed to foul play and the involvement of extremist groups, although the official cause of the fire remains unknown.

Pastor Azrag was born in Abyei near the South Sudan border area. He, along with other Christians from Abyei, founded a church in Garsila in Central Darfur where he has worked alongside his wife and children since the 1990s before eventually becoming church pastor sometime in 2015.

Targeted

After Omar Al Bashir took power through a military coup in 1989, Sudan witnessed a significant clampdown on religious freedoms in which Sudanese Christians were greatly persecuted. During the transitional government that followed, Christians began to receive better protection from the Sudanese authorities and the crime of apostasy was decriminalised. However, since October’s coup, there has been a resurgence in the persecution of Sudan’s Christian community.

On June 22, the ACJPS reported that police forces raided a church in Zalingei and detained four Christian men whom they found praying. The men were charged with apostasy, as the police insisted that they had converted from Islam to Christianity even though they maintained that they are Christians.

The ACJPS has again reiterated its demand for Sudanese authorities to respect religious expression and freedom across the country as ratified in the 2019 Constitutional Declaration.

Sheikh shot dead

A group of shepherds riding camels shot and killed a 55-year-old Muslim sheikh on a road near Naivasha camp for the displaced in Dar El Salam locality in North Darfur on Monday evening.

A witness named El Hadi Kosti told Radio Dabanga that Sheikh Mohamed Yousef, head of a Koran School in Naivasha camp, was shot three times by four armed shepherds who surrounded him just outside the camp as he returned home from his farm with a number of other farmers workers. He died instantly from his injuries.

Kosti said that the a report was filed at the Sudan Joint Forces near the camp, and that the body was buried in Naivasha camp Tuesday afternoon.

Source: Radio Dabanga

Sudan’s National Civil Defence Council announced that the number of deaths resulting from torrential rains and flooding over the past month has risen to 89 and that 50,000 homes across the country have either been completely or partially destroyed.

Heavy rainfall resumed again in El Gezira, but also across northern Sudan, with more than 85 millimetres of rain falling in Dongola on Tuesday.

Some of those affected in El Gezira told Radio Dabanga that the flooding of roads connecting the state capital Wad Madani and El Managil is hampering the delivery of aid to the region.

More than 10,000 farmers owning agricultural land containing cotton, beans and sorghum have been impacted by rainwater, particularly those from El Managil and the surrounding villages, they said.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Sudan reported on Sunday that around 25,000 to 30,000 people in El Managil have been affected by floods. Both the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), as well as Qatar, have since sent humanitarian aid and deployed forces to El Gezira.

As of Tuesday, OCHA reported that more than 156,000 people across the whole of Sudan have been affected by the past month of flooding and more than 12,500 homes have been completely destroyed. Another 21,400 houses are damaged.

In an updated report today, OCHA confirms that the flood waters in restrict the movement of commercial and humanitarian supplies. The authorities of El Gezira and communities are doing maintenance work on the road to facilitate the movement of people.

The UN agency also states that some of its humanitarian partners “reported delays for travel permits, with additional requirements to provide details, including exact location and date of assessments and the delivery of assistance. This new travel requirement delayed the planned movement of partners from Khartoum to the states and hampers response”.

Saudi-American aid

According to Sudan’s official news agency (SUNA), the Saudi King, Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, directed his Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre on Monday to implement an ‘‘air bridge’’ enabling food, shelter and aid to enter areas affected by the flooding and torrential rainfall.

On Tuesday, the first two Saudi planes loaded with 100 tons of food and shelter equipment landed in Sudan. The US Embassy in Khartoum also affirmed its readiness to help those affected by the floods.

In a Facebook post on Tuesday, the embassy expressed its sorrow for the loss of life, damage to property, and to the more than 146,000 Sudanese people affected by flooding since May. It added that it is working with both the international community and the United Nations to provide direct assistance to the Sudanese people through the US Agency for International Development (USAID).

Resistance Committees

The Khartoum Resistance Committees Coordination also announced its intention to support those affected by torrential rains and floods in a statement today.

They had previously called for a general strike to be held today, to protest against Sudan’s ruling junta, but postponed the civil disobedience action to be able to organise help for those affected by the floods. The strike previously announced also needed more organisation, alignment and coordination, the committees said.

Source: Radio Dabanga

The Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Karim Khan, has warned of the dire consequences of impunity for those Sudanese wanted by the court, and said it could lead to more crimes against humanity. “The nightmare for thousands of Darfuris has not ended.”

In his briefing to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) by videoconference on Tuesday, the first ever Security Council briefing from within a country where the ICC is pursuing justice, Khan urged the Council to do more to deliver justice for the people of Darfur.

Following his two-day visit to South Darfur, where he visited Kalma camp, with 300,000 residents one of the largest displacement camps in the region, and the Hasaheisa and Hamidiya camps in and Central Darfur, Khan stressed the need for “actual action, not promises”.

The trial of former janjaweed leader Ali Muhammad Ali Abdelrahman (known as ‘Ali Kushayb’) “represents a glimmer of hope for justice in Darfur. We must collectively ensure it is the beginning of true accountability and not a false dawn,” he said.

He stressed that the situation in Sudan needs to be properly prioritised. “The nightmare for thousands of Darfuris has not ended,” he said, and warned of the dire consequences of impunity for those Sudanese wanted by the court, and said it could lead to more crimes against humanity.

Khan further spoke about the importance of implementing the agreements signed with the Sudanese authorities. As part of a “way forward”, he suggested to hold a UNSC session in Sudan to hear from the Darfuris themselves how much they are in need of security and justice.

The ICC prosecutor also emphasised the responsibility of Sudan to cooperate with the court, and said he would meet with Gen Abdelfattah El Burhan, head of the sovereignty Council and Commander-in-Chief of the Sudan Armed Forces, and other officials on Wednesday to discuss the cooperation with the court.

He welcomed the government’s commitment to open an office for the court during the coming period and to grant visas.

Khan and his deputy, Nazhat Shameem Khan, who stayed in Khartoum where she met with human rights defenders, are scheduled to leave the country tomorrow.

‘Widely welcomed’

Khan reported that he was warmly welcomed by the displaced he visited in Darfur on Sunday and Monday, and that he was sincerely impressed by their resilience and patience.

A number of displaced community leaders in the Hamidiya and Hasaheisa camps near Zalingei, capital of Central Darfur, expressed their satisfaction with the visit to Radio Dabanga.

El Shafee Abdallah said that the visit of the ICC prosecutor “achieved its purposes as we conveyed the demands of the families of the victims and survivors for justice, which will not be achieved unless the wanted persons are transferred from Kober Prison [in Khartoum] to the ICC in the Hague.

“We all know that achieving justice requires long procedures that must be completed in order for the country to emerge from the circle of conflicts and disputes,” he added.

Fathiya Adam, representative of the displaced women in Central Darfur, told Radio Dabanga that they demanded the ICC prosecutor to bring all 51 defendants to trial.

She also demanded protection “to the families of the victims, the witnesses, and all the displaced people who lost their lands and farms, and are living in exceptional conditions for twenty years”.

Delay

In Khartoum, lawyers, human rights defenders and representatives of human rights organisations expressed their dissatisfaction with the delay in the procedures for handing over the persons indicted by the ICC.

According to a statement issued by the Darfur Bar Association on Tuesday, they expressed their fear that the current rulers of Sudan, following the coup d’état of October 25 last year, will restore the impunity of the defendants.

In a meeting with ICC Deputy Prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan on Monday, they referred to the repeated visits of representatives of the ICC Prosecution Office to Sudan, and expressed their dissatisfaction about “the modest outcome of the results and the failure to extradite the wanted persons to The Hague”.

Source: Radio Dabanga