Khartoum, February 24: Exiled Darfur rebel leader Abdelwahid Nur on Wednesday blasted a ceasefire pact between Sudan and his main rivals in the troubled region as “ceremonial” and said it ignores the security of civilians.
“What peace is it? A ceremonial peace… a struggle to get government posts, but one not interested in fundamentals: guaranteeing the security of the population,” said Nur, who heads the Sudanese Liberation Army.
The ceasefire accord “totally ignores the security of the Darfur population,” Nur, who lives in exile in France, said in a telephonic interview.
The most heavily armed Darfur rebel group, the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), on Tuesday signed with the government a ceasefire agreement and a framework accord for a final peace to be finalised by March 15.
The deal signed during a high-profile ceremony in the Qatari capital, Doha, came days only after the two sides inked in Chad a provisional 12-point accord offering JEM a power-sharing role in Sudan.
JEM leader Khalil Ibrahim and Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir were at the ceremony along with Qatari emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani and Chadian President Idriss Deby Itno — whose countries have facilitated talks between the two parties– as well as Eritrean President Issaias Afeworki.
The provisional deal offers the JEM a power-sharing role in Sudan where presidential and legislative polls are to be held in April for the first time in 24 years.
Nur has refused to enter peace talks with Khartoum, and other smaller rebel groups in the troubled western region of Darfur have also rejected negotiations with Beshir’s government.
“We are fighting for the people, for the right to live, it is something on which our movement can never compromise,” Nur said.
“We must first guarantee the security of the population, disarm the (pro-government) Janjaweed rebels, end the genocide, and then we can speak of a conflict resolution.”
A copy of the framework accord inked in Chad on Saturday says that “the government of Sudan will fairly compensate refugees, the displaced and all victims of the Darfur conflict.”
The conflict has claimed about 300,000 lives and displaced 2.7 million people, according to UN figures. Sudan puts the death toll at 10,000.
Fighting erupted in Darfur in February 2003, when ethnic minority rebels took up arms against Khartoum and state-backed Arab militias called Janjaweed, demanding greater access to resources and power.
Khartoum responded by unleashing the Janjaweed, a militia of mounted gunmen dubbed “devils on horseback” which has been blamed for atrocities including murder, rape, looting and burning villages.
Darfur, a vast arid region of Sudan the size of France, contains considerable mineral wealth, including oil, uranium and copper, with cattle-rearing one of the main sources of income.
Nur is very influential within the Fur — the main ethnic African tribe which gave Darfur its name, with Dar meaning home in Arabic — and has supporters among the tens of thousands of people displaced by the conflict.
But several diplomats have described him as intransigent and say his views are unrealistic.
According to reports, Nur’s faction has been struck by internal dissensions in recent weeks with several of his commanders questioning his refusal to enter into talks with Khartoum.
Nur meanwhile accused the Khartoum government of unleashing its might against the SLM stronghold in the Jebel Marra mountains of Darfur, which has been rocked by intermittent fighting over the past weeks.
“It (Sudan government) attacked us in order to put the pressure on us to join the Doha negotiations,” Nur said of talks hosted by Qatar between Darfur rebels, Sudanese officials as well as UN and African Union mediators.
Tuesday’s ceasefire agreement has been welcomed around the world as a first step towards a full peace deal in Darfur and world powers have urged all rebel factions to join the peace drive.
—Agencies