Darfur: Radio Dabanga News Digest Number 16

Eric Reeves

14 June 2015

Image: A child receiving a MUAC (Middle Upper-arm Circumference) malnutrition assessment

This sixteenth installment of Darfur: Radio Dabanga News Digest has as its primary context the evident decision by the Security Council to re-authorize the UN/African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) without changes, specifically with no withdrawal from West Darfur or locations under discussion in South and North Darfur. This was the recommendation of the Secretary General in his May 26, 2015 report to the Security Council on Darfur and UNAMID. A vote is likely in two weeks.

The report compiled for UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon seems to reflect a belated but significant re-thinking of the need for transparency and frankness in characterizing realities in Darfur. Encouragingly, it does not skirt the larger issues, provides a useful over view of what it calls “inter-communal” violence (primarily “inter-tribal” violence), and presents a picture of UNAMID that is both more honest, and thus necessarily discouraging in many respects. On the other hand, there does seem to have been a serious effort to improve the performance of the Mission, with some impressive achievements to its credit. Facilitating talks to end “inter-communal violence” seems an especially important part of the Mission as now conceived—an essential development.

It is still far from an adequate source of security for civilians and humanitarians, and its reporting ability is limited by a host of factors, including denial of access by the Khartoum regime and its proxy local officials. And what is clear from a great many reports not referred to in the Secretary General’s report is that the humanitarian and security situations have continued to deteriorate in ways that are not considered. Here Radio Dabanga remains an indispensible resource.

The current Digest looks at the most revealing dispatches from Radio Dabanga for the past week, and also includes as Appendices: [1] a “bibliography of violence” covering the past six months in West Darfur (culled from last week’s Digest), and [2] key excerpts from the lengthy May 26, 2015 report by the Secretary General (over 11,000 words).

[For previous (weekly) Radio Dabanga Digests, see:

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 1 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1CD

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 2 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1De

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 3 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1Dt

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 4 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1Ei

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 5 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1EL

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 6 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1Fp

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 7 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1FL

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 8 | http://wp.me/s45rOG-6452

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 9 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1Gi

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 10 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1Gt

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 11 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1Hq

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 12 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1HY

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 13 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1Ia

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 14 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1II

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 15 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1Ji

Darfur: Radio Dabanga Digest, Number 16 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1JU — and below

(NB: A useful and quite recent administrative map of Darfur appears here.)

Eric Reeves, 14 June 2015

UNAMID’s future in the face of growing hostility from Khartoum

While re-authorization of UNAMID without change will represent an important stand by the Security Council in resisting Khartoum’s demands—notably, opposition to re-authorization by Russia and China was apparently only modestly energetic—we should not forget that the regime is on record as having said they wish to see the present 17,000 uniformed personnel in Darfur reduced to 2,000 by the end of the year—and this comes this after previous reductions in the size of the originally authorized UNAMID: over 10,000 personnel have been deployed out of Darfur, with more reductions in the offing. Some of the previous reductions—e.g., the reduction of the original 19 Formed Police Units (FPU) to 13—cannot help but have serious consequences for the functioning of UNAMID as a protective force. Particularly in camp situations, FPU can be highly effective, if properly equipped and deployed. Some of the reductions—e.g., the firing of more than 200 native Darfuri translators—seem extraordinarily unwise.

All of these reductions are described as “streamlining,” “reconfiguring,” “increasing efficiency,” or with other terms that disguise the true nature of what has already been done by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and Under-Secretary General for Peacekeeping, Hervé Ladsous, with the approval of the Security Council in its last re-authorization resolution (August 2014). Their “do more with less” motto for UNAMID has already compromised the Mission’s effectiveness, even as remaining personnel are showing signs of becoming somewhat more determined to be effective.

Khartoum’s response to a re-authorized Mission with no change in mandate

What we may sure of is that a Security Council re-authorization of UNAMID without a change in mandate or terms of deployment will greatly anger the Khartoum regime, something certainly well known by uniformed personnel on the ground. The Secretary General’s report highlights, for example, that on 26 April, “the National Intelligence and Security Services refused to allow an emergency medical evacuation of an injured Ethiopian peacekeeper to proceed, by air, from Mukjar to Nyala, citing security concerns. The peacekeeper, who had been injured in an accident, died the same day” (§26).

[All emphases in all quoted material, whether in bold or bold underline, have been added; all editorial comments are in italics and blue, with my initials following—ER]

For the reporting period, the Secretary General notes:

During the reporting period, 60 incidents and hostile acts against UNAMID and its personnel were recorded throughout Darfur, compared to 46 in the previous period. These included armed attacks and carjacking (9 incidents), robbery/road banditry (18 incidents) and office break-in/burglary/theft (33 incidents). (§17)

A highly alarming attack on UNAMID personnel near Kass, South Darfur figures prominently in the report and is excerpted in Appendix 2, along with other key findings. And while the Secretary General’s report notes that “UNAMID continued to experience restrictions of movement, access denials and denial of security clearances for its patrols and other activities” (§25), we may be sure that such challenges will increase significantly in the coming months unless serious international pressure is brought to bear on Khartoum.

The implications for humanitarian work are commensurately ominous:

The worsening security environment in parts of Darfur continued to have significant implications for the safety and security of humanitarian personnel and assets. Carjackings, lootings and general banditry reduce the ability of humanitarian actors to provide assistance, and/or increase the costs of doing so, creating an untenable situation. In most areas of Darfur, United Nations agencies rely heavily on UNAMID for escorts, area security and logistical capacity as a means of mitigating security risks and operating constraints. (§22)

Among the most notable incidents was one that occurred on 10 March, when an unknown armed group attacked a convoy of 19 World Food Programme logistics trucks escorted by UNAMID in Neni village, Northern Darfur. A UNAMID national staff driver was severely injured and evacuated to El Fasher. During the incident, UNAMID troops escorting the convoy exchanged fire with the assailants who subsequently escaped with three vehicles, one contracted fuel tanker and some food items. Only the three vehicles were recovered. On 12 May, a group of armed men carjacked a World Food Programme car in Um Dukhun, Central Darfur. (§24)

During the reporting period, the Government of the Sudan refused clearance for [UNAMID] 68 sorties. (§27)

Access denial has other implications for humanitarian assistance, as highlighted at another moment in the Secretary General’s report:

In addition, local authorities in Zalingei turned down a request by the European Commission Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection Department to conduct monitoring visits on projects in deep-field locations. This is the third time this year that local authorities have denied donors access to monitor their projects in Central Darfur. Such denials hinder efforts by aid organizations in Darfur to mobilize resources, thereby contributing to broader funding challenges. At the time of reporting, only $280 million of the $1,035 million required to meet humanitarian needs across the Sudan in 2015 had been provided (27 per cent). (§30)

[This is a highly worrisome mid-year shortfall, given donor fatigue and international concentration on South Sudan, and again portends acute, life-threatening food shortages—ER]

Such explicit connection of cause and effect is something new in the Secretary General’s reports on Darfur/UNAMID. But this is exactly on the mark: in addition to a general donor fatigue that has grown as the catastrophe in Darfur moves into its thirteen year, many donors and donor countries are wary of funding projects for which there is no oversight. This is especially important since 97 percent of relief workers in Darfur are Sudanese nationals and subject to intense scrutiny and severe punishment for offering “too much” information. Representatives of the EU are just the sort of monitors needed for deep-field projects, and this explains precisely why they are denied access, at the behest of Khartoum’s security services (primarily Military Intelligence and the National Intelligence and Security Services [NISS].

UNAMID, like International Nongovernmental Organizations (INGOs), is also hamstrung my bureaucratic obstacles constantly thrown up by Khartoum:

[C]hallenges resulting from the denial or delayed issuance of visas continue to have an impact on the ability of the Mission to implement the mandate, particularly through gaps in the deployment of personnel appointed to fill existing and sometimes key vacancies. (§31)

The fate of humanitarian assistance in Darfur

In considering the present and future state of humanitarian relief in Darfur, issues of security and access necessarily come first. Nominally, providing security to humanitarians has always been a primary part of UNAMID’s mandate. This is obscured by the dismaying disingenuousness of Permanent Security Council Members from the United Kingdom, France, and the U.S. I highlighted last week in particular the comments of Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant of the UK, which held the rotating presidency of the Security Council for the month of August 2014 when the last re-authorization resolution was passed:

“The resolution prioritizes protection of civilians and humanitarian efforts in UNAMID’s work and requests enhanced human rights reporting from the Mission…” “The resolution requests comprehensive and wide-ranging recommendations on the future mandate, configuration, composition, and exit strategy of UNAMID for next February, and expresses the Council’s clear intention to take prompt action on those recommendations. And we want to use this opportunity to make any necessary changes to improve the working of UNAMID.”

Again, let’s be clear here: protection of civilians and humanitarians was always the primary feature of UNAMID’s mandate under the initial authorizing Security Council Resolution (1769).   Section 15 (i)—in words that are announced immediately following the invocation of Chapter 7 authority—declares that UNAMID is mandated to “protect its personnel, facilities, installations and equipment, and to ensure the security and freedom of movement of its own personnel and humanitarian workers.” Nothing in the August 2014 resolution gives more meaningful “priority” to the protection of the “security and freedom of movement of … humanitarian workers.” To suggest otherwise is to attempt to boost humanitarian protection by merely rhetorical means.

Mark Lyall Grant, UK Ambassador to the UN

The excerpts above and in Appendix 2 provide ample evidence that rhetoric alone is not enough to protect humanitarians, relief delivery, or free access to those most in need…  [Full text with all dispatches, report excerpts, and analysis at | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1JU ]
Copyright 2015 Eric Reeves

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