ICG: Chaos in Darfur

OVERVIEW

Violence in the Darfur region of Sudan’s far west continues unabated. Some 450,000 persons were displaced in 2014 and another 100,000 in January 2015 alone, adding to some two million long-term internally displaced persons (IDPs) since fighting erupted in 2003. The government remains wedded to a military approach and reluctant to pursue a negotiated national solution that would address all Sudan’s conflicts at once and put the country on the path of a democratic transition. Khartoum’s reliance on a militia-centred counter-insurgency strategy is increasingly counter-productive – not least because it stokes and spreads communal violence. Ending Darfur’s violence will require – beyond countrywide negotiations between Khartoum, the rebel Sudanese Revolutionary Front (SRF) coalition and unarmed players – addressing its local dimensions, within both national talks and parallel local processes.

Darfur’s complex and multiplying local conflicts are increasingly ill-understood, due to lack of information and the limitations of reporting from the hybrid UN/African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID). Intensification of combat with rebel factions prompted the government in 2014 to fall back again upon notorious military auxiliaries, this time its new Rapid Support Forces (RSF), thus worsening violence and displacements. Arab militias and paramilitary forces like the RSF attacked non-Arab communities accused of being pro-rebel, fought each other, took part in communal conflicts and even hit at regular government troops.

Increasingly divided over Sudan, the UN Security Council has been unable to develop consensus around a new peace strategy and largely supports the untenable status quo. Discussions are now underway with the government about a possible UNAMID drawdown. Without strong support from New York and the African Union (AU) when the government obstructs it, the mission has been too deferential to Khartoum and systematically presented a narrative of an improving situation divorced from reality. It has also frequently failed to intervene and protect civilians, leading the UN to acknowledge “record levels of civilian displacement not seen since 2004”.

Peace in Darfur is unlikely separate from a solution to Sudan’s wider national problems, for which a number of processes need to be revived, modified or initiated, including an effort, especially in the UN Security Council, to review and rethink policy on Darfur and toward Khartoum generally. This briefing has a more limited purpose. It concentrates on Darfur dynamics, in particular a mapping of the complex conflict lines between and among communities and armed groups and militias, some sponsored by the government.

Suffering from a weak economy and without a military breakthrough, Khartoum appeared more open in 2014 to the inclusion of armed opposition in an AU-facilitated national dialogue. The AU mediation hoped to obtain separate ceasefires for Darfur and the “Two Areas” (South Kordofan and Blue Nile) in a “synchronised” way, paving the way for SRF inclusion in the dialogue. However, the process stalled, largely over Khartoum’s reluctance to negotiate with Darfur rebels on a basis other than the 2011 Doha Document for Peace in Darfur (DDPD). While this may suit the government in the short term, the region’s continued fragmentation into competing armed communities will become increasingly difficult to arrest and reverse.

Darfur’s different conflicts cannot be addressed all at once or in the same way. Crisis Group analysed the limits of the existing peace process in January 2014, and many of its recommendations are still relevant, in particular to review the DDPD, some of whose provisions require establishing a national consensus around the relationship between central government and peripheries, while others – chief of them the increasing communal violence – are too local to solve by national dialogue only. While Sudan’s government has remained reluctant to compromise on the DDPD and invokes as justification the document’s importance for Qatar – which indeed considers it a major diplomatic achievement despite the lack of implementation – it would be in Khartoum’s own interest to address swiftly both the national and local dimensions of the violence in Darfur. For the latter, the government should in particular:

• progressively control and disarm paramilitary forces and militias, via a mix of incentives, such as participation in local peace processes and the national dialogue, as well as development and services, but also coercion, including arrest and prosecution of those responsible for crimes; and
• initiate and support communal dialogue and durable local peace and reconciliation mechanisms involving traditional and militia leaders, while leaving mediation to respected, neutral Sudanese, including from outside Darfur, and limiting the government’s role to facilitating, supporting and guaranteeing agreements.

To advance resolution of Darfur’s conflicts, the government and armed opposition should:

• reach a ceasefire in Darfur, synchronised with a similar one in the Two Areas, including provisions for unfettered humanitarian access in both; and
• develop proposals to address concerns of all Darfur communities on issues such as security, land ownership, services and development.

International players, particularly the AU, arguably have a more important role to play in national than local processes. However, the UN Security Council and the AU Peace and Security Council should:

• agree on a Sudan strategy and then properly support it with political backing and appropriate resources.

Nairobi/Brussels, 22 April 2015

4th Sunday of Easter (B)

Short Reflection for the 4^th Sunday of Easter (B)

Readings: Acts 4: 8-12; 1 John 3: 1-2; John 10: 11-18

Selected Passage: “I am the good shepherd, and I know mine and mine know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I will lay down my life for the sheep." (John 10: 14 - 15)

Short Reflection: We are, indeed, called to become THAT GOOD SHEPHERDS with people entrusted to our care and service.  The Good Shepherd will lay down his life for the sheep. 

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Mother Teresa's Faith

MOTHER TERESA’S FAITH

What Mother Teresa underwent is called "a dark night of the soul." This is what Jesus suffered on the cross when he cried out: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" When he uttered those words, he meant them. At that moment, he felt exactly what Mother Teresa felt so acutely for more than fifty years, namely, the sense that God is absent, that God is dead, that there isn’t any God. But this isn’t the absence of faith or the absence of God, it is rather a deeper presence of God, a presence which, precisely because it goes beyond feeling and imagination, can only be felt as an emptiness, nothingness, absence, non-existence.

But how can this make sense? How can faith feel like doubt? How can God’s deeper presence feel like God’s non-existence?  Why would faith work like this?

The literature around the "dark night of the soul" makes this point: Sometimes when we are unable to induce any kind of feeling that God exists, when we are unable to imagine God’s existence, the reason is because God is now coming into our lives in such a way that we cannot manipulate the experience through ego, narcissism, self-advantage, self-glorification, and self-mirroring.

This purifies our experience of God because only when all of our own lights are off can we grasp divine light in its purity. Only when we are completely empty of ourselves inside an experience, when our heads and hearts are pumping dry, can God touch us in a way that makes it impossible for us to inject ourselves into the experience, so that we are worshiping God, not ourselves.

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3rd Sunday of Easter (B)

Short Reflection for the 3^rd Sunday of Easter (B)

Readings: Acts 3: 13-15. 17-19; 1 john 2: 1-5; Luke 24: 35-48

Selected Text: “And he said to them, thus it is written that the Messiah would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in his name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things." (Luke 24: 45-48)

Meditation: We are, indeed, witnesses of repentance and forgiveness of sins in the name of the Risen Lord.  There are two words that should characterize our life and ministry: MERCY and COMPASSION!

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2nd Sunday of Easter (B)

Short Reflection for the 2^nd Sunday of Easter (B)

Readings: Acts 4: 32-35; 1 John 5: 1-6; John 20: 19-31

Selected Text: “Jesus said to him, "Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed." (John 20:29)

Meditation: Believing is not a question of seeing and touching… It is a question of TRUST! We believe in Risen Lord on the basis of trusting the testimony and deeds of his disciples who were the witnesses of  Jesus’ Resurrection!

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The Newness of Christ Message

The Newness in Christ’s Message…

We are invited to go to our own Galilee and there we shall meet the Risen Lord. Galilee is all where it all started. There he began his ministry - proclaiming the good news to the poor; in the Mount, he gave us the new Commands; there he performed his miracles of healing and restoring life; there he called his co-workers whom he called disciples and apostles. And his message is:

"You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.' But I say to you, offer no resistance to one who is evil. When someone strikes you on (your) right cheek, turn the other one to him as well. If anyone wants to go to law with you over your tunic, hand him your cloak as well. Should anyone press you into service for one mile, go with him for two miles. Give to the one who asks of you, and do not turn your back on one who wants to borrow. (Matthew 5: 38-42)

·       No resistance to one who is evil…

·       Turning the other cheek…

·       Handing over your cloak, as well…

·       Going the extra mile…

·       Not turning of one’s back from the needy…

Are these the values we live by…?

In these deeds, we shall meet and recognize the Risen Lord!

Fr. Jun Mercado, OMI

The Lord is, truly, Risen! Alleluia!

He is RISEN from the tomb, Alleluia!

A Drama of the Heart - Jesus' Sacrifice

A DRAMA OF THE HEART – JESUS’ SACRIFICE

What made Jesus’ sacrifice, his handing himself over, so special?

We have, I think, focused too much on the physical aspects of the crucifixion to the detriment of what was happening more deeply, underneath. Why do I say that? Because none of the gospels emphasize the physical sufferings, nor indeed, in the fears he expresses in conversations before his death, does Jesus. What the gospels and Jesus emphasize is his moral loneliness, the fact that he was alone, betrayed, humiliated, misunderstood, the object of jealousy and crowd hysteria, that he was a stone’s throw away from everyone, that those who loved him were asleep to what was really happening, that he was unanimity-minus-one.

And this moral loneliness, mocked by those outside of it, tempted him against everything he had preached and stood for during his life and ministry.

What made his sacrifice so special was not that he died a victim of violence (millions die as victims of violence and their deaths aren’t necessarily special) nor that he refused to use divine power to stop his death (as he himself taught, that would have proved nothing).

What made his death so special is that, inside of all the aloneness, darkness, jealousy, misunderstanding, sick crowd hysteria, coldness, and murder, he held out, he gave himself over, without bitterness, without self-pity, holding his ideals intact, gracious, respectful, forgiving, without losing his balance, his meaning, or his message.

That’s the ultimate test and we face it daily in many areas of our lives.

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Choose Good and Choose Life!

Choose GOOD and Choose LIFE!

Bapa Jun Mercado, OMI

Whom Shall I Fear?

The Lord is my light and my salvation – whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life – of whom shall I be afraid? (Psalm 27:1)

It is incredible how much we are obsessed with death. We create instruments of war and spend millions of dollars to keep people obsessed with the possibility of death. This project of death has great power over this world.

But throughout the Gospels we repeatedly hear, “Don’t be afraid.” This is what the angels say to the women at the tomb. This is the Lord’s message to the disciples, “Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Fear does not come from God. God is a God of love. You need to resist this project of death because my project is a project of life.”

One thing I ask of the Lord…that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life…For in the day of trouble he will keep me safe in his dwelling. (Psalm 27:4-5)

Jesus said, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.” Peace is a central theme in the message of Jesus’ gospel. Sometimes we think that we can have peace with God and dwell in God’s household even if we are at war with our fellow human beings. Yet according to the gospel, non-violence should be the distinctive feature marking the children of the God of peace.

Peace is the first Message of Easter!

I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. (Psalm 27:13)

non-violence should be the distinctive feature marking the children of the God of peace.

I am still confident of this: I will see the goo

Easter Sunday (B)

Short Reflection for Easter Sunday (B)

Readings:  Acts 10: 37-43; Corinthians 5: 6-8; John 20: 1-9

Selected Passage: "Then the other disciple also went in, the one who had arrived first at th tomb, and he saw and believed.  For they did not yet understand the Scripture that he had to rise from the dead.” (Jonh 20: 8-9)

Short Reflection: Jesus is, truly, Risen! Alleluia! With Jesus' resurrection we have the guarantee that, in the end, good shall prevail over evil; life over death; and grace over sin!  We do not , yet understand… but we do NOT  look at the Risen Lord in an empty tomb.  He is risen and he now lives in us through our remembrance of his words and deeds, especially at the breaking of the break…

Easter Blessings to one and all!

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South Sudan - Possibility of National Dialogue?

Sudan: The Prospects for “National Dialogue”

Africa Briefing N°10811 Mar 2015

AFP PHOTO/ABDULLAH DOMA

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OVERVIEW

Prospects for an inclusive national dialogue President Omar al-Bashir promised in January 2014 are fading, making a soft-landing end to Sudan’s crises more doubtful. Sceptics who warned that the ruling party was unwilling and unable to make needed concessions have been vindicated. Peacemaking in Darfur and the Two Areas (Blue Nile and South Kordofan) and potential merging of these negotiations with the national dialogue were dealt a blow with suspension of African Union High-Level Implementation Panel (AUHIP)-mediated “parallel” talks in Addis Ababa in December. A separate German-backed initiative has elicited a more unified and constructive approach from the armed and unarmed opposition, but no breakthrough yet. The government still holds many cards – including formidable means of coercion – and has little sympathy for the increasingly unified demand of the armed and political opposition for a really inclusive process and true power sharing. Unless both sides give ground, a continuation of intense war and humanitarian crises is inevitable.

The offer of national dialogue was prompted by a series of events – partly due to unaddressed consequences of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) and South Sudan’s 2011 independence – including large, violently repressed nationwide September 2013 protests in Khartoum and other cities, followed by a costly, unsuccessful and unpopular military campaign in South Kordofan. But almost as soon as the government’s offer of dialogue was announced, there was a crackdown on opposition activists and the media. The recently-formed paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) reportedly were deployed in Khartoum to quell protests. The Sudan Armed Forces (SAF), alongside the RSF, have since renewed their “hot dry season” campaign against the Sudan Revolutionary Front (SRF) rebel coalition in the southern peripheries and Darfur.

Opportunism and divisions within the civilian and armed opposition have given the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) a respite. While other parties refused to participate in or withdrew from the preparatory National Dialogue Committee (NDC), some Islamist, traditional and smaller parties remained, looking to maximise their share of government posts in return for lending credibility to planned April elections that other major parties will boycott, further polarising the country. The December 2014 “Sudan Call”, which reflected a growing unity of demands from the political opposition, civil society and armed groups, came too late to influence the NDC’s discussion in August of the parameters for the dialogue and was immediately rejected by the government. However, the opposition’s more sophisticated approach at subsequent meetings in Berlin has improved prospects for an inclusive preparatory meeting before the election.

The NCP has reason to believe Sudan’s vulnerable regional and wider international position has improved. The International Criminal Court (ICC) decision to “suspend” its Darfur work gives the president more confidence he will not be prosecuted. Pressure from anti-Muslim Brotherhood Arab and Gulf states has eased somewhat. Meanwhile, the civil war in South Sudan has distracted the SRF, an increase in gold exports has relieved economic pressure, and the steep drop in oil prices has been weathered, because Sudan now imports much of its fuel, and its substantial income from oil transport fees is fixed. But this betterment of the government’s political and military position is fragile and reversible; fundamental, dangerous weaknesses remain.

As Crisis Group has argued in previous reports, a peaceful, political solution through an inclusive national dialogue would be a vital step toward ending the violent protests at the centre and wars in the periphery that could otherwise lead to Sudan’s further fragmentation. The NCP, and the military-security apparatus in particular, are unlikely to submit to another “CPA” process requiring them to share power in Khartoum with a still-armed opposition, but might accommodate greater regional administrative autonomy if they can continue to dominate the centre.

Western donors’ influence is much reduced, and the responsibilities for mediating the fighting, encouraging recommitment to inclusive dialogue and bearing the burden and cost of instability now mostly fall to the AU (especially the AUHIP, which is mandated to mediate the proposed national dialogue); immediate African neighbours; Arab friends (collectively the Gulf Cooperation Council); and China, given its huge investments. These actors could exert greater and coordinated influence for remedial actions that would improve the chances for more talk and less war by:

• pressing the opposition and government to participate in an inclusive preparatory meeting for the national dialogue, hosted and mediated by the AUHIP prior to the national elections, to forge clear terms of reference and common positions to which all parties are fully committed;
• urging the AU Technical Assessment Mission to consider the impact an AU observation mission to a controversial election might have on the AUHIP’s mandate in the national dialogue process;
• encouraging opposition parties and civil society to develop further a common position on the national dialogue through trusted third-country facilitation (eg, the German-sponsored initiative);
• pushing the government and opposition to re-engage with the AUHIP’s strategy for a parallel and loosely synchronised process of talks on the Two Areas and Darfur; and
• consideration by China of how its economic investments can better address regional inequalities that are fuelling continued wars.

Nairobi/Brussels, 11 March 2015 ICG

Restart South Sudan Peace Talks

Another round of South Sudan peace talks mediated by the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) (The members of IGAD are Djibouti, Ethiopia, Somalia, Eritrea, Sudan, South Sudan, Kenya and Uganda) in Addis Ababa has failed. The regional organisation was unable to alter the domestic and neighbouring nations’ military, political and economic calculus favouring further war, because its own divisions prevented it from applying concerted pressure for compromise. Its limitations laid bare, IGAD now calls, sensibly, for mediation to be led by an expanded “IGAD Plus” group that may include the African Union (AU), China, the U.S., UK, Norway and European Union (EU). But talks are dangerously suspended until April. Meanwhile, fracturing within both the government and the opposition coalitions threatens to substantially expand and complicate the war. The government has offered Sudan Peoples Liberation Army – In Opposition (SPLA-IO) members an amnesty until 31 March, after which a major offensive is likely. It is thus critical to restart preparatory talks and intense diplomacy before the end of this month.

The government’s army, the SPLA, has been gaining ground since May 2014 thanks to major arms purchases, improved tactics and the influence and presence of the Ugandan army. Many in the SPLA increasingly see little reason for concessions to the SPLA-IO. The amnesty is unacceptable to most in the SPLA-IO, who would be expected to return to the SPLA without political guarantees and with their former ranks, while many officers who remained with the government have been promoted. The government feels urgency to push for victory, as a looming fiscal crisis threatens its fragile coalition, much of which is built upon patronage networks running short of cash. Disgruntlement in important parts of the country – the Equatorias and Bahr el Ghazal – is mushrooming into new opposition groups, only some of which are affiliated to the SPLM-IO, where tensions over military and political strategy as well as personalities threaten the movement’s hard-forged unity. 

REPORT | South Sudan: Jonglei – “We Have Always Been at War”, 22 December 2014

The priority for IGAD Plus must be to secure peace between what for the moment at least are still two broad groupings. No time should be lost engaging hardliners on both sides so as to stop those not in Addis Ababa from spoiling the process. To deter emerging anti-Juba groups from joining the war, a final agreement must have provisions for governance reform that address their grievances. All this requires substantial, coordinated work by IGAD Plus in the region as well as in South Sudan. In particular, giving it special observer status might facilitate Uganda contributing to the negotiations more systematically than at the Heads of State summits. The new mediation should also more carefully weigh how to use both the forms of pressure at its disposal – such as personal sanctions, asset freezes, travel bans, an arms embargo, criminal accountability and use of force – and the types of incentives that might be provided (and by which partner) to encourage compromise. 

REPORT | Sudan and South Sudan’s Merging Conflicts, 29 January 2015

Monitoring and upholding the cessation of hostilities agreement – one of the IGAD talks’ few successes – is vital; there are frequent skirmishes, but it has prevented return to full-scale war.  However, the beleaguered IGAD Monitoring and Verification Mission (MVM) needs urgent improvement; its reporting is not timely and does not regularly identify individuals responsible for violations. Finally, the new UN Security Council sanctions regime needs to be used carefully to support the peace process –  flawed information has already led at least one individual who was not present during an atrocity to be targeted for EU sanction. 

CONFLICT ALERT | Looming Military Offensives in South Sudan, 29 October 2014

To prevent full-scale war taking hold again while the mediation is being restructured, IGAD Plus, including existing envoys, must: 

• pre-empt a government offensive by immediately beginning preparatory work – including with both warring parties – in South Sudan and the region before the next round of talks;
• utilise the preparatory period to establish IGAD Plus’s mediation strategy, including how and by which member to mix pressure and incentives;
• pay specific attention to the conflict’s regional dimensions, including by giving special observer status to Uganda;
• prioritise dialogue with hardline military commanders on both sides to stop those not in Addis Ababa from undermining the process; and
• significantly reform the IGAD MVM to: 
• enable the SPLA-IO to rejoin, which may require establishing an operational base in the SPLA-IO’s Pagak headquarters and moving the Joint Technical Committee from Juba to Addis Ababa; 
• report violations to IGAD Plus and the Security Council within 72 hours; and 
• identify individuals, not just armed groups, responsible for violations, so the Security Council can better justify potential individual sanctions. (Source: ICG)