What ever and where ever the wind blows us to

Deepening the climate of mistrust
Chad: caught in the Darfur crossfire

Chad ranks near the bottom of almost every world league table, poor, corrupt and lawless – and now under direct attack by rebels operating out of a base in Darfur in an invasion co-ordinated by Sudan

By Gérard Prunier

The sudden offensive by Chadian rebels on 31 January came as no surprise to observers of the region. For well over a year Chad’s president, Idriss Deby, has been involved in a proxy war conducted by guerrillas with Sudan’s president, Omar al-Bashir. But with January’s rebel attacks, the war came into the open.

On Monday 28 January a column of 250 pick-ups carrying 2,000 fighters set off from their base in Hajil in western Darfur (Sudan). According to witnesses, the invasion was directly coordinated by the Sudanese defence minister, General Abd-er-Rahim Mohamed Hussein (1). On 1 February at the battle of al-Massaqit, 80km northeast of Chad’s capital, N’Djamena, they fought off a counter-offensive from the Chadian National Army (ANT). The next morning the rebels reached the capital and besieged the main public buildings, including the presidential palace, where Deby was trapped. On February 3 the ANT regained control of the city after two days of fighting.

The reasons for the rebel failure were military: they were over-confident that Deby’s regime was crumbling and launched their attack with inadequate forces (too few men, no artillery, few anti-tank weapons and no surface-to-air missiles), so the ANT was able to take full advantage of its modest military superiority. They had three Mil Mi-24 helicopters piloted by Ukrainian mercenaries and around 20 old Russian T-55 tanks. The rebels, who lost two-thirds of their vehicles and between 200 and 300 men, withdrew from the capital and regrouped 80km away to wait for reinforcements and fresh supplies of fuel and ammunition. A further force of around 2,500 men set off from Sudan. To stop them, Deby made an appeal to the Sudanese rebel force, the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) (2). A large JEM force crossed the border into Chad to try to prevent rebel reinforcements reaching N’Djamena. In the battle near Adré on 4 February the Sudanese air force entered Chad’s airspace to attack the JEM forces. Despite this, Deby’s supporters managed to secure a narrow victory.

This second rebel failure sparked violent reprisals from Khartoum against the JEM based on its territory. The Sudanese army and its Janjaweed (3) militia massacred more than 200 civilians suspected of being JEM supporters in the villages of Abou Surouj, Salia and Sirba near the Chadian border on 8 February. By mid-February the two rebel contingents that had tried to overthrow Deby had joined forces 300km east of the capital. Nonetheless, President Deby and his JEM supporters still retain strategic superiority.

The war in Darfur

The key to understanding this conflict is in the war in Darfur. When it broke out in February 2003, the leader of the rebellion in Sudan was a Chadian by the name of Abbaka who was killed in 2004. He was from the Zaghawa, a semi-nomadic people who live on the border between the two countries (4), and sympathetic to his oppressed fellow Zaghawa in Sudan. Deby was aware that the conflict in Darfur had the potential to destabilise his country. The rebellion he led in 1989 against Chad’s president, Hissène Habré, had been launched from Darfur, so in 2003 he was quick to back Khartoum in putting down the uprising. But this meant fighting his own ethnic group. In May 2005 the Zaghawa contingent in the Chadian National Army revolted and insisted that Deby replace the chief of staff and the head of the security force with Zaghawas sympathetic to the rebellion in Darfur.

These changes led to Chad switching allegiance and supporting the rebels in Darfur, which provoked a reaction from Khartoum in late 2005. Deby’s regime looked increasingly unstable: it was highly dependent on the Zaghawa (2% of the population), who were themselves split over their support for the Darfur rebels. There was a complete absence of democracy in the country: elections were rigged, freedom of speech was suppressed and corruption rife. In 2006 Chad unilaterally reneged on an agreement with the World Bank, which obliged it to reserve some of its petroleum revenues for long-term projects. Instead, Deby used the money to buy arms.

By late 2005 the rebels found willing supporters among some of Chad’s population. Even if they do seize power, there is little hope their regime will be much of an improvement on Deby’s: the rebels often have former links to the current regime, and have shown proof of corruption and brutality besides ties with Sudan.

The unarmed civil opposition in Chad is in danger. Deby, fearful that the rebels might make use of it to lend their cause moral authority, rounded up its leaders on 3 February. Their fate remains unknown, and the government continues to deny the evidence that it is detaining them. Since the rebels were driven from the capital on 6 February, rumours of disappearances and summary executions have begun circulating.

Chad’s crisis is being played out in a tense international climate. When the rebels launched their attack from Sudan, two international peacekeeping forces, Eufor-Chad and Unamid (United Nations-African Union Mission in Darfur), were about to be deployed. Eufor, a French-dominated 3,700-strong force, was establishing itself in N’Djamena, whereas the UN force, which has suffered from the double handicap of weak international support and constant sabotage by the Sudanese, was still being set up (5). The date of the rebel offensive was unlikely to have been chosen at random: the rebels and their Sudanese backers feared that Eufor, whose official mission is to protect refugees and displaced people in eastern Chad, would prop up Deby’s regime. As soon as Eufor-Chad was established and the border secured, it would be easier for Unamid to become operational.

Sarkozy’s moves

Faced with this difficult diplomatic and military situation, President Nicolas Sarkozy at first hesitated. Keen to avoid France being isolated for its unilateral support of Chad’s dubious regime, he initially provided only minimal support, information and logistics, to the Chadian army.

Then, seeing that the African Union (6) and the United Nations (7) indirectly backed his strategy, he went further. French defence minister Hervé Morin said that France would do what was necessary in the event of a renewed attack. The rebels denounced French military aid and called on the former colonial power to remain neutral in the conflict. The latitude which international organisations have allowed France is in part a response to the suddenness and brutality of the rebel attack, which at one point seemed likely to succeed. The prospect of seeing a notionally legitimate regime (however dubious in reality) forcibly replaced by an equally dubious regime was seen as a threat to the stability of the whole region.

The United States has been absent, preoccupied with the conflict in Kenya and happy to leave the French to sort out the situation in Chad. This attitude reflects the contradictions in US policy on Sudan: the State Department remains suspicious of the regime in Khartoum, believing it a threat (8), while the Pentagon views the Sudanese leaders as reformed terrorists, worthy of trust and capable of being useful in the war on terror. Whether or not Paris goes further in its support of President Deby, the problem is unlikely to change: Chad’s government is a phantom regime; the situation in Darfur is a catastrophe (200,000 dead and 2,000,000 displaced); and the peace-keeping forces, if they are deployed, will find there is little peace to keep.

The attitude of the Chadian and Sudanese governments, “who accuse each other of supporting rebels across their border, is deepening the climate of mistrust,” according to Jean-Marie Guéhenno, the UN Under Secretary General for peacekeeping operations. “It’s feeding tensions between the two countries and demonstrates that the potential exists for an international conflict” (9). The Chadian-Sudanese border was a disaster area even when Darfur was just a launch pad for regime change in N’Djamena. It has now become a major flash point. And this is likely to persist as long as Khartoum continues to show contempt for human rights in the region.

Africa, continent of organised pillage
The factions

The rebellion

The Darfur peace agreement signed on 5 May 2006 in Abuja, Nigeria, led to a series of splits in the rebel movements.

Sudan Liberation Movement-Abdel Wahid Muhammad Nur Faction (SLM-AWN: headed by Nur, founder of the original SLM, which split into three factions of which this is the largest. Mostly indigenous Fur people, based in the mountainous region of Jebel Marra in the centre of Darfur. Also known as the Sudanese Liberation Army (SLA).

Sudan Liberation Movement – Minni Minnawi Faction (SLM-MM): headed by Minni; broke away from the original SLM at the Haskanita conference in November 2005. The SLM-MM is almost entirely from the Zaghawa ethnic group, to which Minni belongs, and is the only faction to have signed the Abuja peace accord in May 2006. Following the peace agreement Minni became a presidential adviser on Darfur and allied his faction to the Sudanese government in Khartoum. Many combatants deserted after this. Also known as the Sudanese Liberation Army (SLA-MM).

Sudan Liberation Movement — al-Ikhtyar al-Hur (SLM-Free choice): made up of representatives of the smaller African tribes of Darfur, such as the Tunjur and the Dajju, and led by Abderrahman Moussa, former spokesman for the SLM-AWN at the Abuja peace negotiations. This tiny faction accepted the June 2006 peace agreement not because it believed in the deal, but because the smaller ethnic groups, who have been greatly affected by the war, did not have access to camps for displaced persons. Tunjur leaders hoped to be able to use the protected humanitarian supply routes stipulated in the agreement. Although Moussa was appointed minister, the tribes have not benefited from aid as they hoped.

Group of 19 (G19): formed by 19 commanders and their men who chose to stay out of joining all the other factions, although the G19 has decided to give support to the NRF.

Popular Combat Forces: the first all-Arab movement emerged in November 2006 —members of the Rizaygat Arab tribe who operate in southern Darfur, between Kutum and Nyala.

Justice for Equality Movement: an ambiguous movement of Zaghawa, with close ties with Hassan al-Turabi’s branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. It is lead by Khalil Ibrahim and is playing a complex game with Idriss Deby’s government in Chad, having fought for and against him, depending on the circumstances. It receives generous funding from the Muslim Brotherhood, and its influence on the guerrilla movement is disproportionate to its military strength. It now funds the NRF.

National Redemption Front (NRF): led by former governor Ahmed Ibrahim Diraig, a Fur, and an intellectual leader, Sharif Harir, a Zaghawa. The NRF is an umbrella organisation for combatants from various factions that reject the Abuja peace accord, including many SLM-AWN combatants impatient with their leader’s procrastinations. In July 2006 the NRF attacked government positions in northern Kurdufan (bordering Darfur), giving the Sudanese government a pretext to send several thousand reinforcements.

The Janjaweed

Arab militias, whose name means “devil’s horsemen with Kalashnikovs”; they have no movement or structured units in themselves. They are bands of men or auxiliaries attached to regular Sudanese army units.

Chad President Idriss Deby Itno

Chad borders Sudan to the west of Darfur and more than 200,000 refugees have fled there since the beginning of the conflict. Chad accuses Sudan of supporting the armed rebellion within its borders over the past year; Sudan counter-accuses Chad of supporting the opposition in Sudan. This is a new twist because in 2003 Chad’s president, Idriss Deby, a Zaghawa, served as a mediator to Sudan’s President Bashir and attempted to obtain a short-lived ceasefire agreement with the SLM. In 1990 the military chief of the SLM, Abdallah Abakkar, had helped bring Idriss Deby to power.

This is the only Slovene music I like

After really interesting 20 minutes of yoga I had to break up my part of the session to write the first blog about well me and my country.

So as an assignment at blogging class I am ordered to write about the blogging atmosphere in Slovenia. Regardless the mountains, sea and the Panonian plain which made many of my peers during “educational” sport trips to sports haters I find it easy to live and gather information in Slovenia. That is the main reason why my post today is going to talk about blogs. Blogs as a form of education are taking a very important role.

Since I am a “fan” of forcible school related gathering of information much of the blogs I read in my life were just googled. But even though some were googled there are some blog that I read on an accurate basis because of the political interest. So here a 3 of them:

http://rspruk.blogspot.com/; the blog of a young economist concerning new events in economy

http://libertarec.blogspot.com/; the political ideas that are supported from me

and a non Slovene made, but from me a lot used blog:

http://euobserver.com/ ; about the EU and other important things in the world

And since it is now 8.22 and I am still in my sport things from yoga, I should start to prepare for the last day of blogging class.