Trojan Horse: Containing Sudan Regional Ambitions
Mohammed Hamad
Reading University, UK
In 1993, seven years after the creation of IGADD in 1986, the members of IGADD
decided to make a shift in their sectoral cooperation efforts, represented
by IGADD’s previous mission of combating drought and boosting sub-regional
development. IGADD saw the difficulty of addressing these economic issues
while the political confilicts were ravaging the sub-region without first
addressing these conflicts. Thus, conflict resolution was seen as a central
block in the developmental process. Two “regional conflicts” were
selected to be addressed by IGADD: the civil wars in Somalia and in Sudan.
Sudan peace process under IGADD started in 1994 after an intial encouragement
from not only the OAU and the Sudan government, but also the UN, and various
international players such as EU. Nevertheless, the IGAD’s Sudan peace
initiative has been an uphill exercise. This paper intends to look into the
development of that peace process with emphasis on the relationship between
IGAD as an independent entity endeavouring to keep up the political order
in the sub-region and, and the nature of the sub-regional political system
and how this relationship has been reflecting on IGAD’s peace process*
Internationalization of the Internal Armed Conflict in the Sudan through
Regional Involvement: Qualifying the Character of the Armed Conflict from
a Humanitarian Law Perspective
Mohamed Abdelsalam Babiker
School of Law
The University of Nottingham,UK.
It is entirely possible that neighbouring countries may become involved in
internal armed conflicts, whether by invitation of the established government
to intervene in the conflict or by some other, lawful or unlawful means. Whatever
its precise form, external involvement of neighbouring states internationalises
the armed conflict and changes its legal character. In the Sudan, both Government
and the SPLA receive support from neighbouring states. The Government has
accused such states of supporting armed opposition groups and that their forces
have been engaged in combat within Sudan’s borders. The Government also
has requested war material and military advisors from external actors such
as Arab and Islamic states to help them to fight the SPLA and regaining some
territories. For its part, the SPLA, and its allies have received political,
military and logistical support from neighbouring states for the purpose of
toppling the regime. Such interventions have political, social and economic
implications. However, the purpose of this paper is, in the absence of a declaration
of war on the Sudan by its neighbours, what are the consequences of the involvement
of Sudan’s neighbours in the characterization of the armed conflict
for the purposes of applying the Geneva Conventions and the customary laws
of wars. The outcome of such characterization is important for our purpose,
as parties to the conflict will benefit from protection afforded by the whole
Geneva Conventions applicable in international armed conflicts rather than
the limited protections in internal wars.
The Khartoum Peace Agreement, 1997, and the Machakos Protocol: The
Long Road to Peace
David D. Chand
University of Nebraska
Sudan, the largest country in Africa (1million Sq. miles)
covering a territory about the size of Western Europe or one-fourth the size
of the United States East of Mississippi River, is divided by geography, culture,
race, ethnicity, and religion. It has experienced an intractable war before
and in the aftermath of independence from the United Kingdom in 1956. The
war of liberation in Southern Sudan has been described as a "Civil War" between
the Arab-Muslim North and the African non-Arab-Muslim South in which the former
seeks to superimpose itself cultural values over the latter. From the Southern
Sudan frame of reference (worldview) the war is not a "Civil War" but rather
a war of emancipation or de-colonization demanding the right of self-determination.
By virtue of this right, the people of South Sudan shall determine their political
destiny, economic, social, and cultural well-being and the right to development.
The South has been for establishment of a federal system as an alternative
of sharing power and resources and democratic pluralism or multipartism, and
the separation between religion and the state. This demand has been abandoned
because the Arab-Muslim North had a hidden agenda of institutionalizing a
theocratic state and it is not interested in political power and wealth sharing
with the South. Additionally, it has relegated the South to a permanent second-class
position rather than as an equal in the process of nation building.
This paper will undertake an empirical and critical analysis to determine
why all peace initiatives have failed to achieve peace in Sudan. It will attempt
to illustrate that various actors or players had ignored the significant achievement
made by the Khartoum Peace Agreement in the search for peaceful and political
conflict resolution in Southern Sudan.
In the Twilight Zone between Kampala, Khartoum and Cologne: New Findings
on the Steiner-Affair
Roman Deckert
(Ruhr-University of Bochum)
Sudanese-Ugandan relations between 1969 and 1971 were dominated by the
spectacular case of the mercenary Rolf Steiner. The West German first trained
Southern Sudanese insurgents with the help of Idi Amin, but was then extradited
by Obote to Khartoum. The background of the story has largely remained in
the dark. Was the Ex-Foreign Legionnaire but a maverick or the centre of
a Western conspiracy? New information has been disclosed during research
for a Ph.D.-thesis on the history of German-Sudanese relations. Official
and private documents from the Sudan, the UK and the two Germanies added
with oral history give a comprehensive picture. The results provide evidence
that several secret services were involved, for example those of West-Germany,
the UK, France, the USA and the Vatican. There are very strong indications
that all of these agencies supported Steiner to some degree until they dropped
him. These examinations demonstrate that this affair is a classic example
in the long tradition that Sudan and its neighbours have in supporting