Amnesty urges probe on security situation in Darfur

The United Kingdom-based human rights organisation Amnesty International (AI) has expressed concern over the deteriorating security situation in the Darfur region of western Sudan, where armed bandits have in the past few months intensified attacks on civilians. AI has urged the Sudanese government to set up an independent commission of inquiry into the situation in the region, with a view to preventing its possible escalation into another civil war similar to that fought between the government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) in the south of the country. According to AI, hundreds of civilians, mostly from sedentary agricultural groups like the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawah, have been killed or wounded, their homes destroyed and herds looted by nomadic groups over the past few years. Sometimes dozens of civilians had been killed in a single raid, AI noted. Recently, bandits attacked government forces and the manager of the Jabal Marrah Development Project based in the region. "The situation must not be allowed to deteriorate further into another Sudanese war. Those who commit crimes, must be brought to justice, but international human rights standards of fair trial must be respected," AI. According to the rights body, which in January sent a team of experts to Sudan to investigate human rights abuses in Darfur, the sedentary groups have complained that government forces have failed to protect them, and suggested that the attacks were an attempt to drive them from their lands. "Government responses to armed clashes have been ineffective and have resulted in human rights abuses," the AI statement said. "We met leaders of the Fur who had been arbitrarily thrown into prison without charge or trial, and denied communication with the outside world for up to seven months. Leaders of nomad groups have been similarly treated. Special courts set up in 2001 have sentenced people to death without even the presence of a lawyer. Such abuses of human rights will only cause more bitterness," it added. However, according to a Sudanese senior diplomat in Uganda, the government already set up a special commission to investigate insecurity in Darfur two years ago and is currently working on strategies to address the problems of insecurity in the region, which were found to be largely associated with poverty and underdevelopment. Siraj al-Din Hamid, the Sudanese ambassador to Uganda, told IRIN that the government in Khartoum had allocated a budget to address the basic needs of the population in the region. "This is a remote area. There is underdevelopment. All development in Sudan has been centred in the middle of Sudan and Khartoum," Hamid said. "But the country is so vast and resources are scarce. The suspension of external aid to the country for the last 13 years has aggravated the [problem]."