| Submit your comments on this article | |||
| Africa Horn | |||
| UN report warns of ‘ethnic cleansing’ in Sudan | |||
| 2011-06-04 | |||
| JUBA, Sudan — A confidential United Nations report warns that the invasion by Sudan’s military of the contested north-south region of Abyei could lead to “ethnic cleansing” if the tens of thousands of residents who fled are not able to return. The UN human rights report — dated May 29 and marked “Not For Public Citation or Distribution” — said the north’s Khartoum government may have carried out a premeditated military plan to invade Abyei when Sudanese Armed Forces, or SAF, troops moved in May 21.
The Ngok Dinka is a black tribe that associates itself with Sudan’s south. The Ngok Dinka fled Abyei when northern troops and ethnic Misseriya — Arab cattle herders aligned with the north — moved in and looted homes. The UN report estimated that between 15 percent and 20 percent of the homes in Abyei were burned in what it called “deliberate destruction” and a violation of international humanitarian law. “By destroying their homes, looting their properties and inspiring fear and terror, over 30,000 Ngok Dinkas have been forcefully displaced from their ancestral homes, leaving the Abyei area now more or less homogeneously occupied by the Misseriya,” it said. The report said that the likelihood that all the Ngok Dinka residents can return to Abyei “is limited,” given the massive destruction of civilian property and the occupation of Abyei by northern forces. President Barack Obama’s Homeland Security and Counterterrorism adviser, John Brennan, held meetings in Sudan’s capital of Khartoum this week to discuss deteriorating security conditions around Abyei. Princeton Lyman, the US Special Envoy to Sudan, was in the southern capital of Juba on Friday and told AP it was not realistic to have the Ngok Dinka move back into Abyei while it is occupied. “People who fled out of fear will not be comfortable coming back,” Lyman said. “The key is for the SAF to withdraw with appropriate security arrangements from the UN. Then we know people will be able to safely go back.”
The north’s invasion of Abyei was precipitated by a May 19 attack on northern and UN troops by southern soldiers. The UN report said two northern soldiers were killed in that attack, which it called a trigger for the invasion but one that appeared to be a “deliberate plan” by the north “as evidenced by the SAF troop build up in the area before the attack,” the report said.
| |||
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #3 |
| Posted by: Bill Clinton 2011-06-04 13:55 |
| #2 |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2011-06-04 08:42 |
| #1 |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2011-06-04 06:23 |