Sudanese Police Attack On Aid Workers Tests U.N. Chief's Diplomacy - He Calls It 'Unacceptable' in Letter to Bashir

Colum Lynch
Washington Post, May 20

UNITED NATIONS -- On Jan. 19, a group of 20 international aid workers and peacekeepers celebrated their day off with an afternoon of dining, drinking and dancing at the guesthouse of the private relief agency, the American Refugee Committee, in the town of Nyala, Darfur.

The outing ended in the early evening when Sudanese police and security agents broke into the house, videotaped the attendees -- which included five U.N. workers, representatives of six U.S. and British aid agencies, and African Union peacekeepers -- and then beat them with batons and rifle butts and sexually assaulted at least one female U.N. worker. Locals cheered from the street, and some joined in the assault.

The diners were jailed, subjected to further beatings and accused of illegally consuming alcohol and engaging in immoral behavior, citing the discovery of a Sudanese woman found alone in a room with a man. Those charges were reduced or dropped, but the hosts and a handful of other aid workers were each fined about $100 and charged with failing to obtain a permit to hold a gathering.

The episode -- drawn from interviews and confidential written accounts from U.N. officials and aid workers -- has become a test of U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon's efforts to use quiet diplomacy with Sudan. Ban, who has never spoken publicly about the case, called the attack "unacceptable" in a private letter to Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir and urged him to ensure that police were held accountable. But Ban's attempt to parlay his new relationship with Bashir -- cultivated during a series of talks over U.N.-brokered peacekeeping -- has yielded little progress in this case.

Bashir last month dismissed Ban's appeal, warning in a confidential letter that U.N. staff members would be held accountable for violating Sudanese laws and suggesting that they receive special training in "conduct and discipline" to ensure they obey those laws. "Accordingly, persons working in Sudan, regardless of their status or assignments, are expected to observe and respect the customary laws of the communities in which they serve."

Bashir and other Sudanese officials have said the episode underscores how foreign aid workers trample on Sudan's Islamic traditions, and Sudanese religious leaders have organized demonstrations to protest the outsiders' behavior.

For the United Nations, the incident marked the most flagrant act of violence by government forces against international personnel in Darfur. A U.N. board of inquiry into the incident -- which involved relief workers from Oxfam International, World Vision International and the International Rescue Committee -- recently concluded that Sudan violated provisions of the status of forces agreement governing the U.N. presence in Sudan.

"The humanitarian community feels, rightly, doubly victimized in this incident. Those concerned were not only assaulted, but then themselves charged with a crime," John Holmes, the U.N. undersecretary general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, told the U.N. Security Council last month. "Those who have come to help the population are now themselves targets."

The conflict in Darfur began in February 2003, when Darfurian rebels took up arms against the Islamic government, claiming that they represented the region's disadvantaged black villagers. In response, Khartoum armed and organized Arab militia, known as the Janjaweed, and supported a bloody counterinsurgency that led to the destruction of hundreds of villages, the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians and the flight of more than 2.5 million from their homes.

Conditions improved in 2004 after relief workers flooded into Darfur, establishing a massive aid operation that currently costs $800 million a year. Today, more than 13,000 relief workers, including nearly 900 foreigners, deliver food, medicine and other life-saving services to more than 3 million people.

But security has deteriorated sharply since May 2006, when Khartoum and one of Darfur's chief rebel factions, the Sudan Liberation Army, signed the Darfur Peace Accord -- a pact that was rejected by several rebel factions and most of Darfur's population, and which led to the splintering of Darfurian rebel groups.

The Nyala incident occurred at a time when attacks against foreigner aid workers are soaring in Darfur. Relief workers have suffered nearly daily attacks, including carjackings and assaults that have left more than 13 dead over the past year and made huge swaths of Darfur off limits for aid workers. Last month, armed groups hijacked 16 humanitarian vehicles, attacked eight humanitarian compounds, ambushed and looted seven relief convoys, and shot four aid workers.

The British relief agency Oxfam International, France's Action Against Hunger and the U.N. World Food Program withdrew in December from Darfur's largest camp for displaced persons, in Gereida, after armed groups attacked six humanitarian compounds on Dec. 18, stealing vehicles, cash and communications equipment, subjecting aid workers to beatings and mock executions, and raping one woman. The International Committee of the Red Cross is the only international aid organization remaining in the camp, where 130,000 people are settled.

"It is getting to the point now where the humanitarian aid response is at risk of breaking down," said Alun McDonald, a Khartoum-based spokesman for the British aid agency Oxfam International. "We used to know who to do deal with; we used to know who to phone up we were coming through their areas. Now we don't know."

Some aid workers have expressed concern that the U.N. leadership has not confronted the Sudanese government more forcefully. Ban's predecessor, Kofi Annan, made little fuss about Sudan's expulsion in December of former U.N. Special Representative Jan Pronk. A replacement has not been named.

The United Nations has not acknowledged Sudan's expulsion of the three other U.N. officials over the past six months, including the top-ranking security official who was given 48 hours to leave the country after Sudanese officials protested his circulation of a memo warning aid workers of possible al-Qaeda attacks.

U.N. officials say that while Ban has not gone public, he has been uncommonly tough with Bashir in private. In his confidential Feb. 23 letter to Bashir, Ban expressed "deep concern" over the January attack. "I view this incident as serious and unacceptable and I trust that your government will ensure that the perpetrators are held accountable."

Ban urged Bashir to pledge "his own personal support" to ensure cooperation with a U.N. board of inquiry looking into the incident. He also pressed Bashir to order a judicial review of the case in Khartoum to "send the message that your government will not tolerate attacks against relief workers by its own officials or anyone else."

In his reply, Bashir made no mention of the police abuses and told Ban to drop the matter. "I suggest that episodes of similar nature be tackled at the appropriate administrative level so that you and I devote our time and energies to reinvigorate the peace process."