Fears for Darfur as Khartoum Rejects Obligation to Arrest Bashir (video)
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Related subjects: Africa, Darfur crisis, Diplomacy & Politics, Embedded Video, Evelyn Winston Pérez, Global, Humanitarian Crisis, In the Loop, International Criminal Court Comments Off
The indictment of Sudanese president Omar Hassan al-Bashir by the International Criminal Court means the nation of Sudan itself is, under international treaties to which it is party, obliged to arrest and extradite its own president. But the regime of the authoritarian ruler has, unsurprisingly, rejected that obligation and says the indictment is a conspiracy against Sudan by western powers.
‘Voices from Darfur’ (documentary from 2007)
There are now fears that Bashir’s government may do as other embattled authoritarians with illegal military campaigns have done, and try to speed the process of ethnic cleansing it has engineered and still supports in the western region of Darfur. Government-backed militia, reportedly with Khartoum-linked air support, have been purging the region of black African tribes, murdering hundreds of thousands and forcing millions to flee their homes.
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The fallout from the bloodshed in Darfur has so affected neighboring Chad, which has taken in hundreds of thousands in refugee camps, that Chad accuses the Bashir government of using Darfur as a staging ground for a paramilitary border war against the Chadian government. Fears of a larger regional war have been growing for some time.
The joint African Union / UN force operating in Darfur is not large enough to stage a full ground and air campaign to keep Bashir’s forces out of the region altogether, and diplomats have expressed concern that the situation may now escalate as Bashir seeks to consolidate his hold on power and rule out the possibility that rebel groups from Darfur may gain political legitimacy, enter Sudanese government or secure autonomy for the region.
The indictment also places added pressure on Bashir to destroy evidence, including witnesses who could testify about the Darfur mass killing and the links between “janjaweed” militia and regular Sudanese military forces. Aid workers and journalists have long been in danger when operating in Darfur, and fighting has repeated forced the delay or suspension of aid to the region.
It is expected a motion may be put forth at the UN to give the peacekeeping forces there jurisdiction to arrest Bashir or officials operating under him, in order to carry out the ICC warrant. The ICC has no police force of its own, and is powerless to act on its arrest warrants without the aid of national governments. UN powers are now looking to secure cooperation from all members, to isolate Bashir and prevent his traveling without risk of arrest.
But the immediate concern needs to be the civilians “on the ground” in and around Darfur, and possibly in other regions of Sudan that were engaged in drawn-out civil war with Khartoum. There is growing consensus that the AU/UN force must be charged with acting to prevent any incidence of violence against civilians, in order to prevent Bashir from using the warrant as an excuse to wage all-out war on the civilian population of Darfur.
Already, Bashir has expelled 13 aid organizations from the region, a move UN sec. general Ban Ki-moon said will cause “irrevocable damage” to humanitarian aid operations in the region. An estimated 4.7 million people receive humanitarian aid in the devastated Darfur region; the expulsions could lead to the rapid spread of disease, hunger and preventable death among the hardest hit populations.
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