New Guerrilla Factions Arise in Sudan Ahead of Peace Talks
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
The New York Times
October 25, 2004

ABUJA, Nigeria Oct. 24 - As many as two new guerrilla factions have emerged in western Sudan, potentially complicating peace talks that are scheduled to start here on Monday between the Sudanese government and its two established rebel foes, the United Nations top envoy to Sudan said in an interview on Sunday.

Little is known about the power and political objectives of the new insurgents. But with their recent attacks, they have posed a new source of insecurity in an already traumatized region and have imperiled the safety of African Union monitors and aid workers. The new guerrillas are not among the signers of the cease-fire agreements between the government of Sudan and the two established Darfur rebel groups, the Justice and Equality Movement and the Sudan Liberation Army.

" At the beginning, I thought they were an artificial creation, but now I think it's more serious," said Jan Pronk, the United Nations special representative on Sudan. "It's a force with which you have to reckon."

Mr. Pronk, who is from the Netherlands, said that one group was based near the northwestern border with Chad and that the other was in southern Darfur.

According to Maj. Gen. Festus Okonkwo, a Nigerian who commands the African Union Cease-Fire Commission, the new northern group, the National Movement for Reform and Development, attacked a government convoy on Oct. 6. General Okonkwo said it was unclear whether the same faction was responsible for planting mines that killed two aid workers recently.

General Okonkwo described the group as a breakaway faction of the Justice and Equality Movement. That faction's chief negotiator, Ahmed Tugod Lissan, said the new group had been created by an ousted field commander of the Justice and Equality Movement who now is collaborating with Khartoum and its allies in Chad. "They have been created by the government," Mr. Lissan declared. The government said it knew nothing about the group.

News of the latest factions came on the eve of peace talks. The talks are to be mediated by the African Union and are aimed at ending a nearly 20-month conflict that has left more than 1.5 million people homeless and, according to the World Food Program, claimed 70,000 lives from hunger and disease. United Nations officials have said that the insecurity in the region has threatened the delivery of emergency food aid.

As rebel and government delegates arrived here in recent days - rebels in suits and coats, the government officials in white robes and turbans - they took turns accusing one another of bad faith.

The Sudanese agriculture minister and chief negotiator here, Magzoub el-Khalifa Ahmed, blamed rebels for fomenting trouble across Darfur to sustain international attention. "They need to stimulate all these governments and all these organizations on their side by making the situation worse on the ground," he said.

Rebels said the government could not be trusted. "My honest feeling is they're interested in delaying," said the Sudan Liberation Army's chief negotiator, Sharif Harir.

No one expects that the talks, which are scheduled to last up to three weeks, will yield a comprehensive peace deal. The previous session broke off in September after disagreements over whether the government would disarm the allied Arab militias that have killed and brutalized villagers in Darfur.

The United Nations Security Council, threatening sanctions, has pressed Sudan to disarm the gunmen and has urged both sides to allow access for aid. Kofi Annan, the United Nations secretary general, has commissioned independent observers to assess whether the violence in Darfur constitutes genocide.

The Security Council is scheduled to hold a special session on Sudan next month in Nairobi, the Kenyan capital. The Security Council has only met outside its headquarters in New York twice; once in 1952 in Paris, and again 20 years later in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

On Sunday afternoon, after speaking to delegates in a closed-door session, Mr. Pronk said he had urged both sides to take on the political grievances that led to conflict. "We are trying to make clear to them, and I am, 'You are here to fight for your people; you have to do that today,' " Mr. Pronk added. "I'm telling them, 'Don't lay mines.' "

The rebels' political goals have never been clear, beyond vague demands for the sharing of wealth and power in Sudan. That could also be a potential stumbling block in the talks.

Meanwhile, preparations were under way for the deployment of additional African Union troops in Darfur. By the end of the year, General Okonkwo said, troop strength would grow to 3,320, from the current 463.

A delicately worded mandate authorizes the African Union to monitor cease-fire violations and protect civilians who are "under imminent threat." That language is purposefully open to interpretation. The commander said his soldiers could not enforce the law, but added, "We cannot sit down and watch civilians being killed while we are around."