The former parliamentary Speaker and leader of the Popular National Congress (PNC) opposition party, Hasan al-Turabi, was on Tuesday moved from prison and placed under house arrest in a government "guesthouse", in Kafuri suburb, north Khartoum, Muhammad Dirdiery, spokesman of the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi told IRIN. Turabi was moved for no other than "humanitarian reasons", he said. This was something "usually accorded to politicians in prison", and had "no political significance", he added. 

Turabi had been in detention along with a number of his aides since 21 February, the day after he signed a "memorandum of understanding" with the rebel Sudanese People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A). 

Samson Kwaje, spokesman for the SPLM/A in Nairobi, told IRIN that he feared for the life of Turabi. "It is dangerous for him to be moved. He was much safer with his colleagues in prison," he said. Kwaje said that these "so-called guesthouses" were "ghost houses, where political prisoners are tortured and killed". Kwaje said the international community should bring pressure to bear on the government of Sudan to give Turabi "a speedy trial in a court of law". "I am sure he will be acquitted, since he committed no crime," Kwaje told IRIN. 

The Sudanese government has denied claims by the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), of the capture of the garrison town of Daym Zubayr (7.43N 26.13E) in Western Bahr al-Ghazal State, in southern Sudan. Samson Kwaje, SPLM/A spokesman in Nairobi, told IRIN that the town had fallen on Tuesday. "Daym Zubayr fell at noon [local time] on Tuesday. Our forces are in full control," he said. 

The Sudanese government rejected the claim, saying that the town was attacked, but not captured. The deputy head of mission in the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi, Muhammad Dirdiery, told IRIN on Wednesday that fighting was still going on and government forces "have repulsed the attack". Dirdiery added that he deplored the timing of the attack. "This is intended to sabotage the halt to air strikes," he said. The Sudanese  government announced on 24 May that it was halting air strikes in southern Sudan and the Nubah mountains, with effect from 25 May.  According to Kwaje, the fighting in Daym Zubayr has stopped and people are returning to the town. 

A senior official of the Sudan People's Defence Forces (SPDF) has denied claims of a merger between the SPDF and the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), the two main southern rebel groups. The merger was announced in a declaration issued in Nairobi on Monday, signed by members of the peace committees representing the groups. 

In a press statement released in Nairobi the same day, the SPDF described the declaration as "premature", and said that the member who signed on its behalf "was not authorised by the leadership". The declaration was signed on behalf of the SPDF by the chairman of the SPDF peace committee, Taban Deng Gai, and for the SPLA, his counterpart, Justin Yaac, sources said. 
The two peace committees have been meeting for "the last four to five months" to bring about the unity of the southern forces, Samson Kwaje of the SPLA told IRIN. "This backtracking by the SPDF is unfortunate, but, as far as the SPLA is concerned, the declaration is binding," he said. 
Simon Kun Puk, a member of the SPDF peace committee, told IRIN that his group considered the declaration "null and void" and not binding on the SPDF. 
He said he hoped that despite "this inappropriate action" the unity talks will continue.
Taban Deng Gai told IRIN that "he was fully authorised to sign the declaration" and that there was no split within the organisation.
The SPDF split from the SPLA in 1991, along tribal lines. The SPLA is dominated by the Dinka tribe, while the SPDF is dominated by the Nuer, sources said. 
The Sudanese government described the matter as "an internal rebel matter", and would not comment on it. 

The Sudanese President, Omar al-Bashir, and the main rebel leader, John Garang of the Sudanese People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) are to attend a peace summit aimed at ending the country's 18 year civil war. The meeting, scheduled for 2 June in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi is expected to include high-level representatives from Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Djibouti

Muhammad Dirdeiry, spokesman for the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi told IRIN that he was hopeful the meeting would reinvigorate the peace process in Sudan. "We hope that the meeting between Garang and Bashir will lead to the long-awaited comprehensive ceasefire," he said. The meeting, organised by the Inter-governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), will be the first peace summit between the Sudanese government and the SPLA since 1997. SPLA/M spokesman Samson Kwaje told IRIN that he expected IGAD as a whole would review the peace process. "We hope the meeting will push the peace process forward," he said.

The Khartoum administration had earlier announced on 24 May that it was halting air strikes against the SPLM/A in southern Sudan and the Nubah mountains. "Everybody wants this war to stop, everybody wants a ceasefire," the BBC quoted Sudanese foreign minister, Mustafa Osman Ismail as saying. 

During his visit to Kenya on 27 May, US Secretary of State Colin Powell was quoted as saying that the US was "going to work hard to bring a ceasefire into effect." Powell, who met Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi, current head of IGAD, said the US would appoint a special envoy to press the parties in Sudan to "re-energise" the peace process.

Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir, and the main rebel leader, John Garang of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), are to attend a peace summit aimed at ending the country's 18 year civil war. The meeting, scheduled for 2 June in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, is expected to include high-level representatives from Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Djibouti. 

Muhammad Dirdeiry, spokesman for the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi, told IRIN he was hopeful the meeting would reinvigorate the peace process in Sudan. "We hope that the meeting between Garang and Bashir will lead to the long-awaited comprehensive ceasefire," he said. The meeting, organised by the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), will be the first peace summit between the Sudanese government and the SPLM/A since 1997. SPLM/A spokesman Samson Kwaje told IRIN he expected IGAD as a whole would review the peace process. "We hope the meeting will push the peace process forward," he said.

The Khartoum administration had earlier announced on 24 May that it was halting air strikes against the SPLM/A in southern Sudan and the Nubah Mountains. "Everybody wants this war to stop, everybody wants a ceasefire," the BBC quoted Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Uthman Isma'il as saying. 

During his visit to Kenya on 27 May, US Secretary of State Colin Powell was quoted as saying that the US was "going to work hard to bring a  ceasefire into effect". Powell, who met Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi, the current head of IGAD, said the US would appoint a special envoy to press the parties in Sudan to "re-energise" the peace process. 

The World Food Programme (WFP) has welcomed the United States' donation of food aid worth more than US $60 million to help in the fight against starvation in Sudan. The donation would be used to relieve the suffering of nearly three million drought- and war-affected communities throughout the country, WFP said. This followed the announcement on 27 May by US Secretary of State Colin Powell that the US was pledging 40,000 mt of food for emergency programmes in the country. 

Emergency food aid was badly needed, as Sudan was entering the hunger-gap months when food needs were traditionally at their highest, said Masood Hyder, WFP country representative in Khartoum. "This gift will make the difference between life and death for tens of thousands of innocent men, women, and children," he added. "What the US has done is quite remarkable. Now they have dramatically increased their commitment in a bold humanitarian gesture," he said. 

Sudan's worst drought in decades has hit hardest the regions of Darfur and Kordofan, where there have been three consecutive poor rainy seasons, bringing spiralling malnutrition rates and increased migration to the urban centres. "We've been scraping together every grain of food we could find to tide people over, but the situation had really become desperate, with no significant food shipments in sight," Masood said.

A large-scale humanitarian disaster loomed as the lives of drought-affected populations of central, western and southern Sudan entered a more difficult phase, according to the latest summary report from UNOCHA, for the month of April. In addition to some 600,000 people being in dire need of food and supplies, infant mortality was increasing, malnutrition rates were rising - especially among children, and new segments of society were experiencing vulnerability, it said. Diseases were spreading as a result of contamination of water sources by livestock, which themselves were dying as a result of lack of pasture and water, and there was the prospect of many people in drought areas eating their stocks of seeds for the next planting unless food rations were received soon, it added.

Emergency food stocks had run out, water supplies were drying up and the risk of epidemics was rising, OCHA reported. Relief agencies also faced the cost and logistical implications of airlifting supplies after rains, expected in June, made roads impassable. Kordofan, Darfur and Red Sea State are among the areas most keenly affected. Underfunding of humanitarian appeals for Sudan - the UN's Consolidated Appeal was less than 30 percent funded at the end of April - meant that "if the international community failed to respond quickly to appeals for immediate assistance, vulnerable populations will die of starvation and disease", the report added. [for more details of the OCHA report, go to: http://www.reliefweb.int/w/rwb.nsf/WCE?OpenForm]

US Secretary of State Colin Powell has pledged 40,000 mt of food for emergency programmes in Sudan, and encouraged the government to do everything it could to increase access to all those in need of humanitarian assistance. The US humanitarian envoy to Sudan, Andrew Natsios, travelling with Powell, said the situation was deteriorating very rapidly in northern Sudan, and that had led the US to pledge the additional 40,000 mt of food aid, to be distributed to those in need on both sides of the civil war, the BBC reported. The US Agency for International development (USAID) had diverted a ship carrying 17,000 mt of food in the Indian Ocean from Bangladesh to Port Sudan to save time on delivery, Natsios told journalists after meeting representatives of aid agencies working in Sudan. The food would be in Port Sudan in two weeks, Natsios said. Providing food aid to the north was a change of policy for the US, which in the past had mainly sent humanitarian aid to war victims, and mostly in southern Sudan, Associated Press (AP) reported on Monday.

Powell said the US administration of George W. Bush had almost completed its review of policy on Sudan, and that food aid would have a part to play in it, Reuters news agency reported. The appointment of a new political envoy was not far off and would show that the US was intent on engaging with Sudan - either to re-energise ongoing peace processes or gauge the need for a different direction, Powell said. 

After three months of talks, two rebel movements, hitherto rivals in southern Sudan, on Monday announced a merger to help them better pursue their war for the region's right to self-determination, news organisations reported. Under the agreement, the Sudan People's Democratic Front (SPDF), led by Riek Machar, would dissolve itself and join the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), headed by John Garang, AFP reported, citing officials of the two groups. The merger declaration stated that the movement would battle against genocide, ethnic cleansing, slavery, "wanton looting" of oil and natural resources, and displacement of southern people by "non-indigenous settlers from the north", the report said.

The agreement provided for the immediate cessation of hostilities, facilitation of humanitarian aid and the establishment of a military commission to reorganise the unified movement's military structures, AFP reported. The strengthened SPLM/A reiterated its commitment to the peace process spearheaded by the regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) and the resolutions of the National Democratic Alliance (an umbrella organisation of the SPLM/A and several northern-based opposition groups), it said. The merger declaration deplored the "meaningless and regrettable loss of lives caused by internecine and inter-factional fighting as a result of the our political differences, which only benefit the enemy", the report added. 

Machar defected from the SPLM/A to the government in 1997, becoming assistant president. He resigned this post in February last year, accusing the government of having sent troops to fight his soldiers in the southern Wahdah (Unity) State. Machar comes from the Nuer ethnic group, while Garang is a member of the Dinka community. Ethnic rivalry was one of the reasons for the original split of the SPLM/A in 1991, after which Machar created his own rebel movement. Dinka and Nuer militias are pitted against each other in several areas of southern Sudan. 

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has welcomed the announcement by the government of Sudan that it would halt all air attacks in the country's south and in the Nubah Mountains with effect from 25 May. Annan said he hoped this positive step would "help reduce the sufferings of the people in these areas and will also enhance the prospects for peace". Khartoum announced the decision to halt air attacks on the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) on Thursday, 24 May, and said it was taken in conformity with the government's "solid belief in realising peace and stability in the country". The government said this move reconfirmed its seriousness in making repeated calls for a comprehensive ceasefire, but insisted it would repulse any aggression by any quarter that sought to exploit it.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell, speaking in Uganda on 27 May, welcomed the government's stated intention to suspend bombing in the south, but said it would have to last some time before the US could assess its importance. "I think this is a good step but it can't just be for a short time... We will measure their behaviour, their response to our actions and whether or not we have a basis for moving forward," Reuters quoted him as saying. Powell said it would be premature for the US to reopen its embassy in Khartoum at this point, but that it was going to move ahead with its new strategy on Sudan carefully and prudently. The SPLM/A said on 24 May that it did not believe the government on this issue, and rejected its announcement as "a public relations exercise". 

Meanwhile, the Sudanese Catholic Information Office reported on 25 May that the government had "pelted Tonj, in Bahr al-Ghazal region, with 14 bombs", even as it announced the cessation of air raids on rebel positions in south Sudan and the Nuba Mountains on Thursday. A Catholic priest in Tonj, Fr James Pulickal, said the bomber aircraft struck in the morning - with the bombs falling near the mission's dispensary, on the road to Wau - and again in the afternoon near Tonj River, the report stated. Such bombing incidents had greatly disrupted life in Tonj, with people having to stay in the bush from around 1000 until sunset each day, it added.

The US State Department has reached agreement on a proposal to deliver some US $3 million in logistical support to the opposition coalition group, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), the 'Washington Post' newspaper reported on 25 May. The US administration of George W. Bush would provide funding for office space, radios, staff and training to strengthen the NDA as it confronted the Islamic government in Khartoum,  the paper reported, citing informed US government sources. The $3 million support programme, initially approved by the Clinton administration, was separate from the $10 million in assistance that the US Congress approved last year for the southern-based Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), the paper added. [for further details, go to: http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/world/]

The Sudanese Ministry of External Relations decried the US decision to fund the NDA, saying it was a move in the opposite direction of peace and a sure way of perpetuating the way, Sudanese television reported on 27 May. The statement said this was proof that the US was biased, and illustrated its lack of seriousness in dealing with the two sides in a way that would allow a peaceful settlement, the report stated. If the US did not stop its blatant support - material and moral - for the SPLM/A, then it could serve no role as a neutral mediator in the conflict, it added.

Adventists Development and Relief Agency International (ADRA) has welcomed the release from detention by the government of Sudan of a national staff member, Peter Lujana. He was initially taken hostage by an armed militia, along with three colleagues, on 8 March, but the government took them into its custody after negotiating their release from the militia on 16 March. Two Kenyan staff of the NGO were released by the Khartoum government on 1 April, and a third Ugandan national on 22 April. Lujana arrived in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, to join his family on 24 May, but reasons for the abduction and detentions were still unclear, ADRA stated. The agency operates in southern Sudan as a member of Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS), an umbrella grouping of UN agencies and NGOs delivering humanitarian assistance. 

The government on Thursday said it would halt air strikes against the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) in southern Sudan and the Nubah Mountains with effect from Friday, the official Sudan News Agency, Suna, reported. The decision was taken in conformity with the government's "solid belief in realising peace and stability in the country, and infurtherance to its keen desire to achieve national rapprochement", Suna said, quoting a statement from the government spokesman's office. The move reconfirmed Khartoum's seriousness in making repeated calls for a comprehensive ceasefire, but "without compromising the inherent rights of the Sudanese Armed Forces to protect its personnel and/or its logistics", the statement said. The army also reserved the right "to repulse any aggression from whatever quarter which seeks to score any field victory through the exploitation of this decision", according to the government statement. 

Khartoum also called for "an immediate response from the other sides" in order to promote the peace process in the country, and asked that the international community support this important step and push for a comprehensive ceasefire. 

The SPLM/A said on Thursday that it did not trust the government's statement, and that it was just "a public relations exercise". An official told IRIN that government aircraft had bombed parts of Bahr al-Ghazal, Eastern Equatoria and southern Blue Nile on Thursday, and that it should be judged on what it did and not what it said. He said the SPLM/A was not against a comprehensive ceasefire, but that there were quite a few other items higher on the agenda for Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) peace talks, whenever they took place.  (The IGAD peace process addresses the primary conflict in Sudan between the government and the SPLM/A). 

Canada on Wednesday expressed concern over the war in Sudan and emphasised the need to re-energise the peace process under the auspices of the East Africa regional forum, IGAD. "Without an end to the war, there can be no sustainable progress in Sudan on important questions of human rights, development and good governance," Canadian Foreign Minister John Manley stated in a press release. Canadian Secretary of State (Latin America and Africa) David Kilgour applauded Kenya's decision to host a summit (on Sudan) of IGAD heads of government on 2 June, and pledged continued Canadian support for the IGAD peace process.

"We call on both parties to the conflict to engage genuinely in the IGAD process," said Kilgour. "Progress to a negotiated peace has been far too slow, and Canada has recently joined its IPF (IGAD Partners Forum) colleagues in stressing the need for urgent compromise by the parties, and for stronger political commitment by IGAD members," he added. 

Canada condemned the continued sufering of the Sudanese population inflicted by both parties to the conflict, and persistent violation and abuses of human rights - including the serial bombing of civilian targets by the government of Sudan. Manley specifically cited "the failure by both sides to ensure full, safe and unhindered access of humanitarian organisations to populations in need". 

Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Uthman Isma'il travelled to the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, on Wednesday on a two-day visit to discuss preparations for a regional heads of state summit on the Sudan war, under the auspices of the Inter-Governmental Authority for Development (IGAD), according to news reports in Khartoum. Isma'il would brief Kenyan officials on the Sudanese government's approach to ending the 18-year-old civil war with the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), the reports said.  The minister would also discuss a recent agreement between Sudan and Uganda to normalise relations, since Kenya was expected to host meetings between the two on the implementation of that agreement, AFP reported.  Observers believed Isma'il's trip was related to an impending visit to Kenya by US Secretary of State Colin Powell, who was scheduled to address the Sudanese war, it added. Powell is also expected to meet UN and NGO representatives of Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS), a humanitarian umbrella coordinating relief efforts in southern Sudan. 

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has lifted its ban on livestock imports from Sudan, leading to anticipation in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, that the Gulf states of Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait would do likewise, the Panafrican News Agency (PANA) reported on Tuesday. Muhammad Salih Jabalabi, under secretary of the ministry of animal resources, said the Emirates had lifted the ban after a report by the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) testified that Sudan was free of Rift Valley Fever, the report said. The ban on meat and livestock had been imposed on Sudan and other East African countries in September 2000, following an outbreak of Rift Valley Fever in Saudi Arabia and Yemen which claimed dozens of lives. Jabalabi said the Khartoum government hoped the UAE's lifting of the ban would open the door for similar decisions by the other GCC member states. Sudan earned the equivalent of US $135 million in 1999 from livestock exports, with Saudi Arabia, Yemen, the Emirates and Qatar among the major buyers, PANA reported, citing ministry statistics. 

The removal of the livestock ban would be important for the livestock sector in northern Sudan, if less so for the south of the country, where exports tended to be to Uganda and Kenya, an FAO official told IRIN on Wednesday. The development could also bring an increase in livestock prices in Bahr al-Ghazal, in the south, if more animals were diverted to the north, and this would be welcomed by southern pastoralists, the official added. The combined effects of drought and conflict have given rise to widespread food insecurity, with over 600,000 people at immediate risk, as well as increased pressure on declining water supplies, shrinking pasture and the movement of people and livestock in search of pasture.

The Sudan Guinea Worm Pipe Filter Project has begun the process of distributing nine million filters in an effort to tackle Guinea worm disease in the country, which is the world's largest reservoir of the disease, according to a press release on Tuesday from the Carter Centre, one of the leading agencies in Guinea worm eradication worldwide. The parasitic worm cripples its victims, who become infected by drinking contaminated water. The Carter Centre is working in partnership with Health Development International (HDI), Hydro Polymers of Norsk Hydro and Norwegian Church Aid (NCA) in tackling the disease in Sudan, which accounted for three-quarters of almost 75,000 incidences recorded
worldwide last year. 

The regions of Sudan with the highest incidence were: West and South Kordofan in the midwest, and southern Blue Nile, White Nile and Sinnar in east-central Sudan, the Carter Centre stated. The nature and incidence of the disease, the number of nomads and conflict-displaced people, and the difficulty of accessing safe drinking water gave rise to the idea of producing and distributing pipe filters in Sudan. "The massive Pipe Filter Project has the potential to greatly influence the number of new cases [of Guinea worm disease] in 2002," said Mikkel Storm of Hydro Polymers "However, we must remain aware that it is the continued conflict that leaves many parts of the country inaccessible or difficult to reach, making the prevalence of disease and the actual number of cases unknown." [for more details, see separate IRIN story of 23 May headlined "SUDAN: Aggressive attack on Guinea worm disease"]

Khartoum North Court on Tuesday turned down a prosecution request to extend the detention of jailed opposition leader Hasan al-Turabi, and set a trial date for 27 May, the Associated Press agency (AP) reported. Judge needed more time to interrogate Turabi, who has been in jail since 21 February on charges of a conspiracy to overthrow President Umar al-Bashir, the report said. The judge said Turabi and co-defendants from the People's National Congress (PNC) had not been interrogated since March, and the prosecution had failed to notify Interpol to help arrest two suspects outside Sudan. He ordered the renewal of Turabi's detention for only seven days starting from Sunday, 20 May, to give the prosecution time to prepare for the trial, the report added. 

Turabi and party colleagues from the People's National Congress (PNC) were arrested on 21 February after the PNC signed a memorandum of understanding with the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) two days earlier, which called for an escalation of popular and peaceful resistance against the government.

Turabi helped President Umar al-Bashir to seize power in 1989, but rivalry between the two came to a head in December 1999 when Turabi attempted to use his power in parliament to push for limits on presidential power. Al-Bashir then dissolved parliament and declared a state of emergency. In an interview with the Khartoum daily 'Akhbar al-Yawm' on Tuesday, al-Bashir said Turabi will never be allowed to return to politics. "We will not tolerate nor allow him to return to the scene once again; we will never allow that," he stated. 

The ICRC on Monday announced the resumption of its aid flights in southern Sudan under new, stricter conditions. The agency suspended flight operations on 9 May following an incident in which an ICRC aircraft came under fire and the Danish co-pilot, Ole Friis Eriksen, was killed. The decision to resume service, as of Monday, was based on information indicating that the attack had not been premeditated, but the result of a tragic combination of circumstances, and that the ICRC was not deliberately targeted, the agency stated in a press release. [http://www.icrc.org/eng/news]

The aircraft had been forced by a technical problem to descend to an altitude of 2,500m over the Didinga Hills (4.05 N; 33.31 E) in Eastern Equatoria, an area with plateaus and peaks culminating at over 2,500 m. It was therefore quite near the ground when it came under fire by what appeared to have been a light automatic weapon in an area known to harbour ICRC's flights would be subject to more specific security directives, relating in particular to the zones over-flown and the minimum altitude to be maintained, it added. The agency noted that ICRC aircraft had been over-flying this area for several years, and that all parties involved in the conflict had been kept fully informed. The ICRC continued to pursue its contacts with the parties concerned in order to explore the exact circumstances of the tragedy, it added. 

The international NGO Christian Aid has challenged the European Union (EU) to tackle "the regulatory void" that allows European companies operate in the oil industry in Sudan, where they are allegedly complicit in human rights violations around the oilfields. In a couple of reports on 17 May, Christian Aid alleged that Sudanese government troops and pro-government militias were conducting rights abuses and depopulating oil concession areas to make way for oil production by European and other oil companies. While European companies were answerable only to their shareholders and could ignore human rights abuses, "people in the villages around the oilfields are being killed or thrown out of their homes by a government anxious to clear the way for oil to flow freely", said Mark Curtis, the NGO's head of policy.

Industry self-regulation and voluntary codes of behaviour were failing to address the issue, and political action from the EU was urgently required to press companies into suspending operations to avoid human rights abuses in the name of oil, Christian Aid stated. "The EU also needs to go further and immediately impose a temporary ban on investment in the Sudanese oil industry," it added. If the EU was in any way serious about promoting human rights and development, then it had to seriously address the regulation of companies from within its member states, who were "implicitly helping finance a war which is systematically displacing and killing thousands of people", according to the NGO.
[http://www.christian-aid.org.uk/]

Save the Children (UK) has this week warned that "time is running out to prevent a major disaster in west Sudan". In the worst-affected areas, the nutritional status of children had hit alarming levels, all coping mechanisms were breaking down, and children were already dying due to lack of food, water and emergency medical treatment, it stated in a press release. The failure of the donor community to heed warnings since November about the developing drought situation meant it was already too late to avoid substantial loss of life; an immediate response was vital now to minimise further unnecessary mortality and destitution, according to SCF. 

"We are now facing a serious humanitarian crisis in Darfur," said SCF programme director in Sudan, Robert Folkes. "With the prospect of rains in July, we must move fast to ensure that the food gets in before roads become inaccessible. Urgent steps are needed before then to prevent measles spreading, and to contain diseases such as diarrhoea which threaten children's lives during the rain," he added. [for further details, go to: www.savethechildren.org.uk]

Food insecurity also persisted in southern Sudan, with physical insecurity as the most important determinant, USAID's Famine Early Warning System (FEWS) reported. Food options remained limited, households food stocks were exhausted and markets were bare, so there was "increasing dependence on [food] relief and hard-to-find wild foods", it said. Cereal prices were on an upward trend, and food security prospects in areas currently experiencing shortages remained precarious, it added. [for full Southern Sudan Update, go to: www.fews.net]

The rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) on Thursday claimed to have overrun the government garrisons of Alok and Kubri Kuom, between the towns of Aweil and Wau in Bahr al-Ghazal. It also claimed to have made several attacks on Wau, the capital of Bahr al-Ghazal and a well-defended government garrison town. Fighting was still continuing in the area, according to the SPLM/A. The rebel movement said it had launched the assault to pre-empt a government offensive, and because pro-government forces had been attacking villages around Aweil and Wau, abducting children and driving away livestock. The offensive was also timed to coincide with the eighteenth anniversary of the establishment of the SPLA, news agencies reported. 

The food supply outlook for parts of Sudan was "highly precarious" after two successive years of reduced cereal harvests and depletion of stocks, the FAO's Global Information and Early Warning System on Food and Agriculture (GIEWS) reported on Monday. Despite government efforts to mitigate food shortages by lifting customs duties on food imports and other measures, the food supply situation was likely to tighten further in the coming months with the start of the 'lean season' (before the October/November harvest), it said. The cereal requirement after commercial imports was estimated at 240,000 mt, but the latest estimates of emergency food aid - in pipeline and under mobilisation - amounted to only 55,000 mt, leaving an uncovered gap of about 157,000 mt, it warned. 

Lower harvests and stock levels had led to a sharp rise in cereal prices and reduced access to food for poorer sections of the population, according to GIEWS. "The purchasing power of large numbers of people, particularly pastoralists, has been seriously eroded," it said, adding that vulnerable groups had started migrating for work and joining food-for-work schemes in dramatic numbers. With the 'lean season' just starting and only a fraction of the food aid requirement pledged so far, "the situation is likely to worsen in the coming months", it added. The GIEWS cited the latest estimates of people in need of urgent food assistance because of drought or famine or both, at some 2.97 million people. 

Meanwhile, humanitarian agencies have reported an influx of internally-displaced people (IDPs) into Wau in recent weeks, due partly to the drought situation, but also attributed to increased insecurity arising from raiding by pro-government Murahilin militia forces. USAID's Famine Early Warning System (FEWS) reported that there and elsewhere in southern Sudan food options remained limited, households food stocks were exhausted and markets were bare, so there was "increasing dependence on [food] relief and hard-to-find wild foods", it said. [For full Southern Sudan Update, go to: www.fews.net]

A Sudanese parliamentary delegation led by the Speaker of parliament, Ahmad al-Tahir, has met Ethiopian Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin in his office in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, Ethiopian radio said on Wednesday. Seyoum told the Sudanese delegation that the two countries, which in recent months signed a number of cooperation agreements, were expected to cooperate and develop their "parliamentary and people-to-people" relationships, said the radio. 

The Sudanese Speaker and his Ethiopian counterpart, Dawit Yohanes, discussed ways of bringing the parliaments of the two countries closer together. The process of strengthening relations between the two parliaments was "supplementary" to efforts aimed at establishing an Inter-governmental Authority for Development (IGAD) parliamentary union, said the radio. The two sides first called for the establishment of an IGAD parliamentary union when their parliamentary speakers met in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, in February.  Both sides said that such a union would facilitate communication and create a joint forum for the states of the region. 

The Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) on Thursday reiterated its denial of having had anything to do with the shooting of an ICRC pilot on 9 May, and said the government-controlled media in Sudan were "peddling lies" when they accused it of involvement. The Khartoum-based 'Akhbar al-Yawm' newspaper, among others, had reported that the rebel movement was secretly carrying out investigations into the attack on the ICRC aircraft, which claimed the life of its Danish co-pilot. SPLM/A spokesman Samson Kwaje said the reports were "false and malicious", and that the movement had no reason to shoot at an ICRC plane that was clearly marked. Kwaje said the SPLM/A had reliable information  that the incident occurred west of the Didinga Hills (4.05 N; 33.31 E), some 65 km south of Kapoeta town in southeastern Sudan, over territory mostly controlled by pro-government militias under the leadership of Captain Peter Lorot. The government army, which controls Kapoeta town, was responsible for the incident, because it directed Lorot's operations, he added. 

The SPLM/A welcomed an inquiry into the incident, was "having a useful dialogue and consultation with ICRC" on the matter, and would cooperate fully with any open investigation so that the truth could be established, according to Kwaje. He challenged the government or any other organisation that had evidence contrary to the SPLM/A's assertion of innocence to come forward with concrete evidence. The attack on the ICRC plane shuttle flight between Lokichoggio and the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, was halfway between Lokichoggio (the Kenyan base for most relief operations in southern Sudan) and a stage stop at Juba when the attack occurred. 

Direct exposure of civilians to military activities by various armed factions remained the main cause of displacement in Sudan, believed to have the largest number of internally displaced people (IDPs) in the world, the Norwegian Refugee Council reported on Tuesday. Estimates put the number of IDPs at about four million, although the IDP situation was complex, with different causes and patterns of displacement in different regions of the country, and updated figures for opposition-held areas in southern Sudan unavailable, the report said. Traditional patterns of migration among nomadic communities and the movement of large population groups in search of emergency humanitarian assistance also complicated assessments of the general IDP situation, it added. 

"Military action with a clear intent to displace civilians has been a  common pattern and practice by armed forces on both sides of the conflict," the Norwegian Refugee Council reported. (The main conflict involves the government and the southern-based Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), but there are also cross-cutting conflicts involving pro- and anti-government factional militias.) While control of territory has been a major reason for fighting, the acquisition of resources and assets, or the denial of them to the other side, had also been "a dominant aspect" of the war, the Council stated. Attacks on civilian settlements to disrupt militia recruitment, forced relocation and abductions had also been among the patterns of displacement, it said.

Displacement since the late 1990s had been closely linked to the expanding activities of the oil industry in Unity/Western Upper Nile (Wahdah State) and Upper Nile, the Council reported. Civilians in Unity/Western Upper Nile had been particularly badly affected, because they suffered both from forced displacement related to the oil exploration and fighting between rival rebel groups, it added. Among the significant new developments it noted so far this year were IDP movements into Bentiu, in Unity/Western Upper Nile; in the Nuba Mountains; towards Wau town in Bahr al-Ghazal; and in Juba county in Western Equatoria. [see the NRC's updated country profile on displacement in Sudan at:
http://www.reliefweb.int/w/rwb.nsf/WCE?OpenForm]

The overall food outlook for Sudan this year was highly precarious and the purchasing power of pastoralists, in particular, had been seriously eroded, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) reported on Monday. In a special report from its Global Information and Early Warning System (GIEWS), now accessible on the internet, the agency said the latest estimate of the number of people in need of urgent food assistance, because of drought or conflict, or both, stood at 2.97 million.

The situation was particularly acute for pastoralists, with the drought having caused a substantial increase in the market supply of livestock, depressing prices and thus household incomes. Lower cereal harvests in 1999 and 2000, and subsequent depletion of stocks, meant that prices remained well above average through 2000 and 2001, the GIEWS report stated. The terms of trade, or relative exchange value, of livestock vis-a-vis grain had "deteriorated sharply", it said. For instance, in March 2001 the quantity of sorghum (a staple food) that could be bought through the local sale of a sheep was 300 percent down on March 2000. The terms of trade for goats vis-a-vis sorghum had declined by more than 200 percent in the same period, it added. 

In more general terms, with only a fraction of the appeal for international food assistance pledged so far and the lean season ahead (with the next harvest not due until October/November), the food security situation was likely to worsen in the coming months, according to the FAO. The populations most affected by the effects of last year's drought were mainly located in greater Darfur and Kordofan, Bahr al-Ghazal, Bahr al-Jabal, Eastern Equatoria, Jonglei, Red Sea and Butanah Province in Al-Jazirah State. After anticipated commercial imports of about 1.2 million mt and food aid pledges amounting to 55,000 mt, there was still an uncovered gap of 157,000 mt, the FAO reported. [for the full GIEWS report, go to:
http://www.fao.org/WAICENT/faoinfo/economic/giews/english/alertes/sptoc.htm]

The Sudanese army on Monday said that "the outlaws' movement [the southern-based Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army, SPLM/A]" and "known foreign circles", in order to incriminate Sudan and distort its image internationally, were mounting a propaganda campaign to the effect that Khartoum was bombing civilian targets in southern Sudan. Denying the accusation, the army said it had, on the contrary, been assisting in the delivery of relief to the needy, displaced and war-affected population, the official news agency, Suna, reported. The military would continue to be vigilant in order to "abort all the plots aimed at undermining Sudan's unity and its adherence to the morals of fighting", the report added. The army also accused the "outlaws"  of laying land mines, abducting and  recruiting children, looting and burning towns and villages, the using the war as a means of acquiring personal gain, and being an agent for circles hostile to Sudan. 

Aid agencies and human rights groups, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have long accused the government of Sudan of indiscriminate bombing of civilian targets. In its 'World Report 2001', Human Rights Watch said that the government of Sudan remained a gross human rights abuser, while rebel groups also committed their share of violations. [for more details, see:http://www.hrw.org/wr2k1/africa/sudan.html]

President Umar al-Bashir on Tuesday declared his government's readiness to implement "an immediate and comprehensive ceasefire" and start serious negotiations for the achievement of a comprehensive peace, on condition that the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) agreed to the same. Al-Bashir made the offer during a UN conference on the world's Least Developed Countries (LDCs) in Belgium, Sudanese radio reported.

The Ugandan and Sudanese governments have agreed to restore diplomatic relations at charge d'affaires level, the official news agency, Suna, reported on Monday, quoting Information and Communications Minister Dr Ghazi Salah al-Din al-Atabani. The stated intention followed a diplomatic shuttle mission late last week by Libyan leader Mu'ammar al-Qadhafi to improve relations between them. The neighbouring states, which severed diplomatic relations in 1994 over accusations that each country was helping the other's rebel movements, would also implement the terms of a reconciliation agreement they signed (in December 1999), Salah al-Atabani. Al-Bashir had held a lengthy closed-door meeting with Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni at the weekend (on the sidelines of Museveni's inauguration as president for a second five-year term), during which he stressed Sudan's commitment to implementing the agreement reached with Uganda, the minister added. Museveni said Uganda, too, was ready to normalise relations, and that the two sides had agreed "on all that would prevent escalation of [poor] relations between them", Suna reported. 

Included in the 11-point accord signed by Sudan and Uganda in December 1999 were: a renunciation of the use of force to resolve differences, a pledge to disband and disarm terrorist groups, respect each other's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and cease supporting any rebel groups. They also agreed to return all prisoners of war to their respective nations, locate and return abductees to their families, and offer amnesty and reintegration assistance to all former combatants who renounced the use of force. The agreement, brokered by the US-based Carter Centre, also called for the formation of a joint ministerial committee and technical support teams to establish a timetable of specific steps to implement the agreement. 

Ummah Party (UP) leader and former Prime Minister Al-Sadiq al-Mahdi on Monday blamed the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) for the failure of a meeting hosted in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, on 3 May, during which the Nigerian hosts sought to bring the Sudanese opposition groups closer to a common platform, the Associated Press (AP) reported. The meeting between Al-Mahdi and SPLM/A leader John Garang ended without an agreement which could have led to cooperation between the northern and southern opposition movements. "Garang has used a clear tactic to add other issues to our discussion and bring our meeting in Abuja to a failure," Al-Mahdi told AP after returning to Khartoum. Al-Mahdi, who quit the opposition umbrella National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in March 2000, has urged the SPLM/A to declare a ceasefire so that Sudan's various opposition groups could unite and enter talks with President Umar al-Bashir on ending Sudan's 18-year civil war. Al-Mahdi said Garang had proposed another meeting in June to establish a joint committee between the UP and the SPLM/A, but that he rejected it because he saw it as a means for Garang "stalling" on a peaceful solution. 

In a statement after the Abuja meeting, the SPLM/A said that while Garang welcomed any call for peace talks with the government, he did not see a need for an opposition group to mediate. The movement also said on Monday that it could not commit itself to an Egyptian-Libyan peace initiative for Sudan, because the peace process being facilitated by the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) took precedence. In a meeting with Libyan leader Mu'ammar al-Qadhafi in Uganda on Sunday, Garang asked that Libya try to merge its peace efforts with those of IGAD, Agence France Presse (AFP) reported. It was unfeasible to negotiate under the IGAD initiative and other initiatives at the same time on the same issues, the agency quoted an SPLM/A statement as saying. Negotiations were needed between the warring sides, not a reconciliation conference, as proposed by the Egyptian-Libyan initiative, the SPLM statement added. In 1999, Egypt and Libya began trying to reconcile Khartoum with all rival Sudanese factions and political parties, whereas IGAD has focused exclusively on the government and the SPLM/A. 

The food supply outlook for parts of Sudan was "highly precarious" after two successive years of reduced cereal harvests and depletion of stocks, the FAO's Global Information and Early Warning System on Food and Agriculture (GIEWS) reported on Monday. Despite government efforts to mitigate food shortages, by lifting customs duties on food imports and other measures, the food supply situation was likely to tighten further in the coming months with the start of the 'lean season' [before the October/November harvest], it said. The cereal requirement after commercial imports was estimated at 240,000 mt but the latest estimates of emergency food aid - in pipeline and under mobilisation - amounted to only 55,000 mt, leaving an uncovered gap of about 157,000 mt, it warned.

Lower harvests and stock levels had lead to a sharp rise in cereal prices and reduced access to food for poorer sections of the population, according to GIEWS. "The purchasing power of large numbers of people, particularly pastoralists, has been seriously eroded," it said, adding that vulnerable groups have started migrating for work and joining food-for-work schemes in dramatic numbers. With the 'lean season' just starting and only a fraction of the food aid requirement pledged so far, "the situation is likely to worsen in the coming months," it added. The GIEWS cited the latest estimates of people in need of urgent food assistance, because of drought or famine, or both, at some 2.97 million people.

[On 12 May, IRIN erroneously attributed the results of a emergency nutritional assessment in North Darfur State, northwestern Sudan, to the international nongovernmental organisation MEDAIR. The assessment was, in fact, undertaken by Save the Children-UK, with MEDAIR seconding a nurse and nutritionalist to one of a number of survey teams.]

A convoy carrying 932 refugees left Lafa refugee camp in Kassala on Saturday as UNHCR began the process of repatriating Eritrean refugees living in camps in Kassala and al-Qadarif [Gedaref] states in eastern Sudan. The refugee agency is to initially target 'new' refugees, who fled the serious fighting between Ethiopia and Eritrea in May-June last year. Over 17,000 refugees have registered for voluntary repatriation since UNHCR started its latest registration exercise two weeks ago, the agency stated. It plans to run two convoys a week until July, when seasonal heavy rains are expected to slow the operation.

Convoys carrying returnees and their belongings will be escorted from the camps in Sudan to a reception center in Teseney, Gash-Barka, western Eritrea, where the refugees will be registered and provided with documentation by the Eritrean government, UNHCR said. From Teseney, returnees will either go directly home or pass through transit centers in Hagaz and Barentu; returning refugees would be free to choose their final destinations within Eritrea and would go to existing communities (since no new settlements were envisioned), it added. A target figure of 62,000 voluntary repatriationss has been set for this year, and the repatriation of some 160,000 of 174,000 Eritrean refugees remaining in Sudan is due to be completed by the end of next year. [See SUDAN-ERITREA: Refugee repatriation gets underway]

Sudan will charge with terrorism five Ethiopians who hijacked a military aircraft last month, 'Al-Anba' newspaper said on Sunday. The hijackers would also be charged with conspiring to commit a crime, taking part in a crime and endangering a means of transport, the pro-Sudanese government newspaper said. The news followed comments made by Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Uthman Isma'il last month that the four men and one woman would be tried in Khartoum, as promised during negotiations, and could face the death penalty, 'Al-Anba' said. 

The five military academy students had taken control of the internal flight on 26 April and diverted it to Khartoum, demanding greater political freedoms in Ethiopia. All 50 passengers and crew were released unharmed after the hijackers were given guarantees they would not be extradited to face trial in Ethiopia. Ethiopian government officials had said the hijackers were disgruntled trainee pilots who seized the aircraft hoping to acquire visas to live in Britain or the United States. 

The situation in Sudan's drought belt is "fast approaching that of the mid-80s and early-90s when water, food and pasture shortages in the drought belt led to a great number of deaths of people and livestock, large-scale [population] displacements and tribal conflicts," according to a UNICEF donor update. The drought situation has already worsened particularly in the drought belt areas of western, central and southern Sudan, but April-September would be the worst period, UNICEF reported on 4 May. Most seasonal streams and hafir dams [surface water reservoirs] had dried up, food supplies were running out and diseases were spreading due to contamination by livestock of water sources, it said, adding that some 600,000 people were at risk of starvation. In Western Darfur State (among the worst affected areas, along with Northern Darfur and Kordofan states), the price of sorghum, a staple grain, was two to three times its normal price at this time of year, it added. The government has now recognised the existence of a crisis, but there is concern over the inadequacy of information on drought requirements and on the authorities' plans to respond, according to humanitarian sources.

The estimated food requirement to address the drought situation in Darfur and Kordofan alone is almost 48,000 mt, but food stocks are running low and the UN agencies' consolidated appeal for some US 194 million is just 21 percent funded so far, according to humanitarian sources. The duration of the humanitarian emergency in Sudan and uncertainty about the exact situation and needs of the country may be among the reasons for donors' apparent reluctance to commit funding even in the face of a new crisis, they added. 

Meanwhile, armed conflict remained a key impediment to improving the situation of women and children in Sudan, and children would continue to be deprived until agreement was reached to end Sudan's main conflict - between the government and the southern-based Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) - and the various tertiary conflicts, UNICEF reported on 4 May. Vaccine-preventable diseases remained a threat, with immunisation cover around 40 percent nationwide, but much lower in some states, such as Western Darfur, where it stands at only 8 percent. "Until such time as accord is reached to end the main conflict and secondary/tertiary conflicts among the numerous warring groups, children in Sudan will continue to be deprived of their basic rights to health, education and other services," the UN children's agency added. 

Libyan leader Mu'ammar al-Qadhafi visited the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, on Thursday on the first stop of a mission to discuss Sudanese-Ugandan relations, the Associated Press (AP) reported. Al-Qadhafi and Sudanese President Umar Hasan al-Bashir were to discuss "the role that Libya can play in normalising relations between Sudan and Uganda", it said. The Libyan leader travelled on to Uganda on Friday for talks with President Yoweri Museveni, according to news reports. 

Sudan and Uganda severed diplomatic relations in 1994 over accusations that each country was helping the other's rebel movements. Last year, they signed an agreement - not yet implemented - under which Khartoum agreed to disarm the Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), based in southern Sudan, and both countries agreed to restore diplomatic relations, and deploy Libyan and Egyptian observers to monitor their common border.

While in Sudan, Al-Qadhafi was scheduled to hold talks with Al-Bashir on a Libyan-Egyptian plan to end the 18-year civil war in Sudan. Also this week, Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo sent special presidential envoy Ibrahim Babangida to Khartoum as part of his efforts to try to end the war. "Nigeria is now undertaking a peace initiative, and my visit is part of the consultations between the two countries," Babangida, a former Nigerian president, was quoted as saying. Obasanjo was last week reported to have met John Garang, leader of the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) and Al-Sadiq al-Mahdi, leader of the opposition Umma Party

Severe drought across many parts of Sudan continued to affect several million people, many of whom are at acute risk of severe food insecurity over the coming months, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) reported on Thursday. The WFP has warned that as many as three million people face disaster (600,000 as a result of drought and 2.4 million because of the civil war) unless food assistance reaches them. Low and sporadic rainfall had severely affected agricultural production and depleted water resources; in addition, stagnation in the livestock trade had reduced access to this traditional source of extra income, further eroding the coping capacities of the affected communities, according to the IFRC. Low immunisation coverage and the usual health risks related to a scarcity of safe drinking water threatened to increase the incidence of death and illness through preventable diseases, the IFRC stated. Access to safe water, emergency food and medical care had been identified as the most critical interventions required, it added. 

Meanwhile, a localised nutritional assessment by the international NGO Medair in Northern Darfur State indicated that an average of 11.4 percent of children were moderately or severely malnourished. This was below the 20 percent threshold that would have indicated a really serious situation, but it was still worrying given that there were still six months before the next harvest can be expected, the agency reported. A lack of food and water had already caused many people to migrate to the state capital, Al-Fashir, where a nutritional survey indicating that 26 percent of migrant children were malnourished was "of great concern," Medair added. 

The Danish co-pilot of an International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)  aircraft was killed when it came under attack between Lokichoggio, northwestern Kenya, and Juba in Western Equatoria, southern Sudan, early on Wednesday morning. The staff transport shuttle flight between Lokichoggio and the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, was halfway between Lokichoggio (the Kenyan base for most relief operations in southern Sudan)  and a stage stop at Juba when the attack occurred, ICRC spokesman Michael Kleiner told IRIN on Wednesday. The aircraft had just climbed back to its assigned altitude after a technical problem forced it to descend briefly to 6,500 feet (2,000 metres) when it came under attack, the ICRC stated in a press release. The pilot heard what sounded like "explosions", after which the co-pilot, Ole-Friis Eriksen (26), died instantly. The pilot, who was not injured, turned back to Lokichoggio and landed safely at 0850 local time, some 50 minutes after takeoff, according to Kleiner. 

There were no passengers on the flight, for which prior notice had been given and authorisation had been received from all the parties on the ground, Kleiner said. There were two "impact marks" near the co-pilot's seat and another on the right wing, but it was "much too early" to comment on what exactly had hit the plane and how the incident had come about, he added. The ICRC had decided to suspend all its flights to southern Sudan, the agency stated on Wednesday afternoon.

At least 60 people were killed on 6 May in clashes between people of the (black African) Zaghawah tribe and an Arab tribe in the area of Bi'r Tawil, in Darfur in western Sudan, the Khartoum daily newspaper 'Al Ayyam' reported on Wednesday. The clashes erupted when a group from one tribe killed a man from the other and stole his camel; the second tribe then sought revenge, according to the report, which did not specify which tribe instigated the conflict. Fifty-six Zaghawah men and four members of a joint military and police force who contained the fighting were killed in the clashes, the paper said. 

UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Kenzo Oshima said on Wednesday he was "deeply saddened" to learn of the death of the Danish ICRC pilot flying on a humanitarian mission over southern Sudan. The tragedy, which followed the brutal killings of six ICRC workers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo less than two weeks ago, "underscored the dangers faced by humanitarian personnel in delivering assistance to those in need", he added.

Ole-Friis Eriksen was killed instantly in the attack, on a flight for which prior notice had been given and authorisation received from all the parties on the ground. The incident occurred roughly halfway between Lokichoggio and Juba, reportedly when the aircraft had just climbed back to its assigned altitude after a technical problem had forced it to descend briefly to 6,500 feet (2,000 m). The ICRC has suspended all its flights to southern Sudan pending the outcome of an investigation. 

The Sudanese government and the rebel Sudanese People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) have each accused the other of responsibility for killing a Red Cross pilot in an attack on an ICRC flight between Lokichoggio, North-Western Kenya, and Juba in southern Sudan, on Wednesday.

The government of Sudan categorically denied that its forces had fired on the ICRC aircraft, Muhammad Dirdiery, Deputy Head of Mission at the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, told IRIN on Thursday. He said that the aircraft had come under fire while it was flying over rebel-held areas, and an SPLA statement accusing government forces of responsibility was "totally baseless" since there were no government forces in the area. The Sudanese government called on the international community to "condemn this barbaric act perpetrated by the SPLA", he added. 

SPLM spokesman Samson Kwaje said that his movement had no forces in the area of the attack, which he placed in the Loronyo (4.39N 32.38E) area of Torit County [Eastern Equatoria], and said that the government and allied militias controlled the towns of Kapoeta, Torit and Juba, as well as the countryside around them. "The SPLM/A "therefore puts the blame squarely on the government of Sudan and its allied militias", which comprised the so-called Equatoria Defence Forces (EDF), the (Ugandan rebel) Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) and various Kapoeta-based groupings under Peter Lorot, Chief Lokipapa and Paul Langa, Kwaje added.

The US State Department on Wednesday voiced opposition moves to plans in the US Congress to withhold American dues to the UN because of last week's ouster of the US from the UN Human Rights Commission in a secret ballot, which saw Sudan and other "human rights abusers" elected. The non-election of the US was galling enough to US congressmen, but the election of Sudan - which is on the US list of states sponsoring terrorism, and was recently described by US President George W. Bush as "a disaster for all human rights" - had reinforced a deep disillusionment in the US Congress about the UN, the Associated Press agency (AP) reported on Wednesday. 

The Human Rights Commission election, by 54 UN member states on the UN Economic and Social Council, follows a series of public disagreements between Sudan and the new US administration, which has come under strong pressure domestically to take a harder line against Khartoum on human rights - and particularly religious rights. News organisations reported Bush's "human rights disaster" comments and an allegation that Khartoum was using humanitarian aid for southern Sudan for its own interests and not to relieve suffering; these were strongly denounced by Sudanese presidential adviser for the South, Makki Ali Balayil. He also denounced the US appointment of a special humanitarian coordinator for Sudan, saying that it appeared from Bush's comments that "the new envoy will proceed from a hostile attitude, and from ideas and convictions which have been formed beforehand and which are not related to reality," AFP quoted Balayil as saying. 

The latest session of the UN Human Rights Commission, which concluded on Monday, expressed "concern at violations in areas under control of the government, including restrictions on freedom of religion, expression, association and peaceful assembly, arbitrary arrest and detention without trial, and cases of torture". It also called on Khartoum "to cease immediately all indiscriminate aerial bombardments of the civilian population", and for the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) "to abstain from using civilian premises for military purposes".  It urged all parties to the conflict to respect and protect human rights; to put in place an effective and monitored ceasefire; to resume peace talks immediately; and to stop the use of weapons against the civilian population.

The ruling National Congress party has defended its recent measure of detaining former Speaker of Parliament Hasan al-Turabi, now leader of the opposition Popular National Congress (PNC), and party colleagues as normal and essential for the upholding of the security of the citizens, according to the Sudanese newspaper 'Akhbar al-Yawm' on Tuesday. Press statements by Professor Ibrahim Ahmad Umar, Secretary-General of the National Congress, said that the measures were necessary because of claims by the PNC that it was its sacred duty to try to overthrow the government, the report said. Ibrahim said the government could not stand idly by in the face of such developments, and denied reports to the effect that the security arms of the state were evaluating political information and acting in the light of it without consulting the government, the report added. 

The Danish co-pilot of an International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) aircraft was killed when it came under attack between Lokichoggio, northwestern Kenya, and Juba in Western Equatoria, southern Sudan, early on Wednesday morning. The staff transport shuttle flight between Lokichoggio and the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, was halfway between Lokichoggio (the Kenyan base for most relief operations in southern Sudan) and a stage stop at Juba when the attack occurred, ICRC spokesman Michael Kleiner told IRIN on Wednesday. The aircraft had just climbed back to its assigned altitude after a technical problem forced it to descend briefly to 6,500 feet (2,000 metres) when it came under attack, the ICRC stated in a press release. The pilot heard what sounded like "explosions", after which the co-pilot, Ole-Friis Eriksen (26), died instantly. The pilot, who was not injured, turned back to Lokichoggio and landed safely at 0850 local time, some 50 minutes after takeoff, according to Kleiner. 

There were no passengers on the flight, for which prior notice had been given and authorisation had been received from all the parties on the ground, Kleiner said. There were two "impact marks" near the co-pilot's seat and another on the right wing, but it was "much too early" to comment on what exactly had hit the plane and how the incident had come about, he added. The ICRC had decided to suspend all its flights to southern Sudan, the agency stated on Wednesday afternoon. Though this attack occurred less than two weeks after the murder of six ICRC staff in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and was "another blow to the ICRC and to humanitarian action, it was also "profoundly different from what occurred in the Congo - when the staff members were taken from a Red Cross vehicle and murdered. After that act, the ICRC vowed to continue to fulfil its humanitarian mandate in dangerous and difficult places.

The rebel Sudan People's Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M) has denied responsibility for an attack on Wednesday morning which claimed the life of the co-pilot of an ICRC aircraft, saying the Red Cross was a neutral humanitarian organisation with which it collaborated. The plane was shot at north of Torit (in Eastern Equatoria), which was a government-held area and where the SPLA had no forces, SPLM spokesman Samson Kwaje told IRIN. "We have no forces in that area, but there are government forces in Torit, Kapoeta and Juba," he said, adding that the plane was "definitely" fired on by either government forces or by a government-backed militia. The Sudanese embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, told IRIN it had no information about the incident. 

The Red Cross provides medical care to war victims and regularly evacuates war wounded from southern Sudan to a 560-bed field hospital in Lokichoggio. Its planes were bombed three times last year while on the ground in rebel-held southern Sudan, the Associated Press agency (AP) reported on Wednesday.

At least 60 people were killed last Sunday in clashes between people of the [black African] Zaghawah tribe and an Arab tribe in the area of Bi'r Tawil, in Darfur in western Sudan, the Khartoum daily newspaper 'Al Ayyam' reported on Wednesday. The clashes erupted when a group from one tribe killed a man from the other and stole his camel; the second tribe then sought revenge, according to the report, which did not specify which tribe instigated the conflict. Fifty-six Zaghawah men and four members of a joint military and police force who contained the fighting were killed in the clashes, the paper said.

A Khartoum court has ordered a two-week extension of the detention of former Speaker of Parliament Hasan al-Turabi, now leader of the opposition Popular National Congress (PNC), and of three of his colleagues, AFP reported on Wednesday. Khartoum Criminal Court Judge Mu'tasim Taj el-Sirr said the extension was requested by the state prosecutor on the grounds that the detainees' interrogation had not yet been completed, the report said. The four PNC officials have been in detention since February, when they were arrested after the PNC signed a memorandum of understanding with the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), it added. Turabi and the other three PNC members were charged with attempting to undermine the government by force and collusion with an armed organisation. The southern-based SPLA has been at war with the government of Sudan since 1983, demanding democratic self-government and a secular state. 

Ethiopia and Sudan have signed an agreement to strengthen trade and business links along their common border, the Ethiopian pro-government Walta Information Centre said on 5 May. The Sudanese-Ethiopian joint ministerial commission meeting in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, agreed to improve trade, transport and communication links between the two countries. Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Uthman Isma'il and Ethiopian Trade and Industry Minister Kasahun Ayele were reported to have discussed the political situation in the Horn of Africa, and agreed to coordinate their positions under the aegis of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD).

Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi was quoted as saying during the meeting that Ethiopia was "willing to further consolidate its amicable and cordial ties with Sudan".

Both countries had emphasised the need to increase Ethiopia's access to Port Sudan and to facilitate Sudanese oil exports to Ethiopia, Walta said. Mustafa and Ayele also discussed the creation of a Sudan-Ethiopia rail link, and the establishment of a free trade area between the two countries. The meeting followed efforts by the Sudanese-Ethiopian border committee to agree on the management of their common border, which has been disputed in some areas.

The opposition Ummah Party (UP) leader, Al-Sadiq al-Mahdi, and the head of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), John Garang, have begun talks on a possible cease-fire, the Sudanese newspaper 'Al-Ra'y al-Amm' reported on 5 May. Meeting in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, in the presence of President Olusegun Obasanjo, the two Sudanese leaders agreed to a proposal for opposition groups to unite and enter into peace talks with the Khartoum government, the newspaper said. 

'Al-Ra'y al-Amm' said Garang had called on the Sudanese government to "adopt a clear and frank position on the issues contained in the Mahdi proposal". Garang said the SPLM and Mahdi's UP agreed on the proposal, but that "differences remained" between the SPLM and the Khartoum leadership. 

The government of Sudan has responded to criticism by United States President George W. Bush, who recently described Sudan a disaster area for human rights, the BBC reported on 6 May. Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Uthman Isma'il was quoted as saying Bush's remarks would not lead to peace in Sudan, but would exacerbate relations with Washington. Information Minister Ghazi Salah al-Din al-Atabani accused the US of prolonging Sudan's civil war by backing southern rebels against Khartoum, the BBC said.

On 29 April, Ghazi had expressed satisfaction at the approach of the new US administration to Sudan, saying it was more positive than that of its predecessor. US Secretary of State Colin Powell on 26 April had told the House of Representatives' Commerce, Justice, State and Judiciary Committee that the Bush administration had "developed a road map on how to approach the authorities in Sudan".

In a speech last week, President Bush said the Khartoum government had been abusing religious freedoms, and had denied food aid to those unwilling to convert to Islam. The US has also repeatedly accused the Sudanese government of harbouring terrorist groups, a charge Sudan has consistently denied. 

The voluntary repatriation of 62,000 Eritrean refugees from Sudan will begin next week, the official Sudanese news agency, Suna, reported on 6 May. The refugees will be returned to their homes from the Sudanese border camps of Qulsah, Al-Laffah, Wad Shaqarab and Wad Sharif, Suna said. Suna quoted the Sudanese commissioner for refugees, Muhammad al-Aghbash, as saying that the voluntary repatriation programme would be completed by the end of July, in time for the start of the next rainy season.

Eritrean President Isayas Afewerki told the UN Special Representative, Legwaila Joseph Legwaila, on 22 April that Eritrea considered the return of the displaced persons before the start of the rainy season a top priority. A report to the UN Security Council on 19 April said that only a few thousand refugees had so far returned, most to areas of the TSZ which were under Eritrean control during the hostilities. A committee had been established to provide humanitarian assistance to returning civilians in the TSZ, the Suna report added. 

Canadian Foreign Minister John Manley told parliament on Thursday that he recognised revenue Talisman's operations in Sudan was helping finance the Sudanese government, including military operations. But Manley also said that there was evidence that Talisman might even be helping to ease the plight of refugees and impoverished villages in war-affected southern Sudan, Agence France Presse (AFP) said on Thursday. He told parliament that he had no plans to introduce legislation to stop Talisman from operating in Sudan. Were it not for the engagement of Talisman, "it would be a much worse situation", Manley was quoted by AFP as saying. He rejected arguments from opposition MPs, who had called on the government to ban Canadian firms from investing in Sudan while the conflict continued. He said he did not want to create a precedent that would have to apply to other situations around the world; but he shared concerns that revenues from Talisman and other foreign companies were "fuelling the aggression and exacerbating the hostilities". 

Meanwhile, Sudan was on Thursday voted to take up membership of the Geneva-based UN Commission on Human Rights, while the US - which has had uninterrupted membership since 1947 - was voted off. Sudan was elected unopposed to one of the four African seats, which drew criticism from the US-based Human Rights Watch that "an abusive country cannot honestly pass judgement on other abusive countries", AFP said. 

The Sudanese government has instituted measures to regulate the stay of foreigners in the country in order to limit the spread of AIDS, 'Al-Ra'y al-Amm' newspaper reported on Wednesday. The Ministry of Interior had instructed the Immigration Department to issue residency permits to foreigners only after they had been found HIV-negative, the paper said. Any foreigner found to be HIV-positive would be deported, the paper quoted the head of the Immigration Department, Brigadier Bashir Ahmad Bashir, as saying. 

Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir will chair the National AIDS Committee. The committee was set up on Monday, and includes representatives of relevant ministries and civil society organisations, as well as religious leaders. The involvement of the president would help the national fight against the disease, by giving it a much higher profile, Muhammad Dirdeiry, spokesman of the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi, told IRIN. He said that Sudan had one of the lowest prevalence rate - one and a half percent - in the region. According to Dirdeiry, the most affected populations were those in refugee camps and in some of the war zones. 

The main objective of the committee was to "increase awareness of the disease and educate people about the danger of AIDS", he said. Sudan was surrounded by high-prevalence countries, so "we cannot afford to be complacent," he added.

Demands by the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) that oil exploration and exploitation operations in southern Sudan be suspended before a ceasefire could be established have been rejected by the Sudanese government. Ibrahim Mattar, a Sudanese government official, told IRIN that the demands were "unacceptable conditions" and were blocking agreement on a ceasefire. He said the government had no intention of suspending oil operations. 

He said previous demands were that a "comprehensive political settlement" be reached before a ceasefire could be established. Mattar told IRIN from Khartoum that the government felt that the SPLA did not have a "clear cut objective" and were deliberately blocking talks. He said the Sudanese government would "keep all doors open" to attain a peaceful end to the war. 

The SPLA has also accused the government of blocking peace talks, by refusing to discuss issues relating to autonomy and religious freedom. 

The Sudanese parliament has called for the appointment of a prime or chief minister, 'Al-Khartoum' newspaper said on Monday. It said the call was made by a member of parliament belonging to the ruling National Congress party. Abdullah Badri, one of the MPs representing Khartoum State, said he made the proposal after questions were raised on the right of the first vice-president to present the government's speech in parliament, 'Al-Khartoum' said. 

The chairman of the parliamentary legislative and justice committee, Isma'il Hajj Musa, said the constitution allowed for the appointment of a prime minister. Constitutional amendments would be discussed by parliament during its second session, and would address the issue of a prime minister if it arose, 'Al-Khartoum' said. Ambassador Abd al-Rahman Hamzah, director of the office of the Sudanese government's official spokesman, declined to comment on call for a prime minister, but told IRIN that "parliamentarians have full liberty to discuss any issue". 

Amnesty International has called on the Canadian oil company, Talisman, to prevent human rights abuses in and around its oilfields in southern Sudan. The international human rights organisation said on Tuesday that there was a significant risk that Sudanese government forces would use roads and airstrips, built to serve the oilfields, to commit human rights violations. It said there was "little evidence" that Talisman had taken any action to protect civilians from bombings or against forced displacements in its area of operations. Amnesty International released the statement on the eve of a meeting of Talisman shareholders.

As the Sudanese government attempted to establish control in the new Kaikang [9.18N 29.09E] oilfield, Amnesty said it feared human rights abuses would spread. Civilians had suffered forced displacement and unlawful killings by government-allied forces from the Hajlij and Unity oilfields since 1999, Amnesty added. It expressed concern that oil revenues would be used by the Khartoum government to increase military expenditure. Military spending had increased by 96 percent since 1998, and now stood at 84 billion Sudanese dinars per year. Amnesty quoted the Sudanese government army spokesman, General Muhammad Uthman Yasin, as saying Sudan was already manufacturing mortars, tanks and armoured personnel carriers as a result of income from oil exploitation. The Sudanese government has denied committing human rights abuses as a result of oil operations. 

The United Nations Commission on Human Rights expressed concern at human rights violations by the Sudan government, including restrictions on freedom of religion, expression, association, and peaceful assembly. It also pointed to arbitrary arrests, detention without trial, and cases of torture. The Commission - which concluded its fifty-seventh session in Geneva on 27 April - said it welcomed the cooperation Sudan had extended the UN Special Rapporteurs on Human Rights. 

The statement called on all parties to the Sudan conflict to respect and protect human rights, put in place an effective cease-fire, and stop using weapons against civilian populations. The government should "cease immediately" all indiscriminate aerial bombardments of the civilian population. It called on the southern-based Sudan Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA) to abstain from using civilian premises for military purposes. 

International donors had pledged less than one third of the emergency food needed for drought-stricken Sudan, the World Food Programme (WFP) said on Monday. WFP information officer Lindsey Davis told IRIN that governments and agencies had pledged only 55,000 mt of the 171,699 mt of food aid required to feed both northern and southern Sudan this year. 

Davis said the drought-affected regions were "in dire straits" and needed urgent deliveries of food aid. In the worst-hit areas of Darfur and Kordofan, western Sudan, WFP needed to deliver about 4,000 mt of food per month, but only had enough to deliver 1,000 mt per month, she said. 

Davis told IRIN that donors were being very slow to make good their commitments, and food pledged for the emergency operation was not expected to start arriving until August. She said the next three to four months would be a serious problem for WFP if no more food was forthcoming. "We need food now," she said. 

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has agreed to a formula for Sudan to reschedule its debt repayments, the governor of the Central bank of Sudan, Sabir al-Hasan, announced on Sunday, Agence France-Presse (AFP) said. AFP said it was the first time such an agreement had been made in 17 years. The agency said Sudanese Finance Minister Abd al-Rahim Mahmud Hamdi had asked the IMF managing director, Horst Koehler, to expedite implementation of the plan. A joint Sudanese-IMF meeting is expected before the annual IMF conference later in the year. Sudan was also keen to "recover" its rights under the Lome trade and aid agreement between the European Union and the developing countries, because they had been frozen "for political reasons", AFP quoted Central Bank Governor Hasan as saying. 

The official Sudanese government spokesman, Information Minister Ghazi Salah al-Din al-Atabani, has expressed satisfaction at approach of the new US administration. He commended the "language" of the new US administration, regarding relations between the US and Sudan, and said it was more positive than that of the former administration, 'Al Ra'y al-Amm' newspaper reported on Sunday. "This is the first time that the US is adopting a direct approach to Sudan since 1998," Muhammad Dirdeiry, spokesman for the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi, told IRIN. 

US Secretary of State Colin Powell set three conditions for relations with Sudan to improve, Reuters reported on 26 April. He said Sudan would have to cooperate with the US on a peace plan for the south, which could lead to "a higher level of US representation" in Sudan. Khartoum would have to stop the aerial bombardment of southern towns and villages, and ease restrictions on humanitarian relief to the south. The US would like to see the Sudan get rid of "any vestiges of terrorist organisations within the country". The US has repeatedly accused the Sudanese government of harbouring terrorist groups, a charge Sudan has consistently denied. Powell was testifying before the appropriations sub-committee of the House of Representatives' Commerce, Justice, State and Judiciary Committee. He told the panel that the Bush administration "have developed a road map on how to approach the authorities in Khartoum", according to Reuters. 

The sub-committee chairman, Frank Wolf, who visited southern Sudan in January, showed Powell a video on the effects of Sudanese air force bombings and urged him to name a special envoy for Sudan, Reuters reported. Powell, however, told the panel that "before you name someone you have to have a clear policy for that person to carry out, and we are still coming up with that policy", according to Reuters. 

Dirdeiry told IRIN that Sudan welcomed US involvement in the Sudanese peace process, but wanted the sanctions imposed on it lifted. He said that before there was any such US involvement, Sudan should be removed from the US State Department's list of states sponsoring terrorism. 

A joint Ethiopian-Sudanese ministerial meeting held in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, will discuss the fate of the five hijackers of an Ethiopian aircraft, who had pleaded not to be extradited, a Sudanese official told IRIN. The two sides had agreed "not to make an issue of the extradition of the hijackers", the source said. The four men and one woman, who surrendered to Sudanese authorities after releasing their hostages, are in custody in Khartoum awaiting trial. At a press conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Seyoum Mesfin said that "if Ethiopia feels it is important to demand their extradition, it will do so." 

A Sudanese official told IRIN that the two countries had signed an extradition treaty in 1964, but the Ethiopian government had not so far presented "a formal application for extradition" of the hijackers. A request by Ethiopia for extradition would be "considered", the official said.  As part of the negotiations to release the hostages, the hijackers had been given "firm guarantees" against extradition, news agency said. 

The Sudan government has said that it is essential to act quickly on a serious problem of drought in a number of affected regions. In a high-level meeting between government officials, diplomats and humanitarian agencies this week in Khartoum, the government called for "swift action domestically and at the international level". Senior officials said erratic rains, long dry spells and a bad distribution of rains had led to a critical "food gap" in many areas, including the Darfur states, the Kordofan states, the Red Sea, Kassala and White Nile states, as well as some parts of southern Sudan. The government said that while assistance provided so far by the government and the international community had helped to stabilise the situation, it was time to act quickly "to prevent a human crisis". 

The government had established a high-level committee under the chairmanship of the first vice-president, charged with maintaining food security. A technical committee under the chairmanship of the humanitarian aid commissioner had also been established to deal with "emergency situations related to food security". Affected states, provinces and localities had also formed committees, an official source said. Measures taken had included mobilising food and cereals from areas of surplus for dispatch to areas of need, providing drinking water, encouraging importation of cereals and wheat flour by the private sector, and initiating projects in cooperation with humanitarian agencies. Government officials told diplomats and humanitarian agencies that one of the necessary measures taken over the crisis was "recognition of the fact that there is an actual problem created by drought". 

Humanitarian sources told IRIN that it was "very good news" that the Sudan government had acknowledged the extent of the crisis, and that it would hopefully encourage donors to commit more urgently needed funds. 

A group of about 53,000 displaced people in Bentiu, capital of Wahdah State in southern Sudan, is affected by some of the highest malnutrition rates reported in southern Sudan. World Food Programme (WFP) information officer Lindsey Davis, who has just returned from Bentiu, told IRIN that there was a 24 percent global malnutrition rate among the displaced, due to chronic malnutrition. The number of displaced in Bentiu has recently increased, Davis said. In April 1999, there were about 20,000 displaced people, which increased to 60,000 in August 2000. Some of the displaced had returned to their homes, mainly around Ler and Jikaing, south of Bentiu, causing figures to drop, until another increase last October. A new wave of arrivals started in February-April this year, Davis said. People interviewed said their homes had been attacked, burnt and looted by militia.

WFP said the displaced were receiving monthly food distributions, and that therapeutic and supplementary feeding centres had been set up. 

Humanitarian sources told IRIN that the displacement was believed to be linked to the fact Bentiu was "in the heart of the oil concession area". The Sudan government has strenuously denied that it has caused civilian displacement in oil areas in conflict-affected southern Sudan. 

The Sudanese-Ethiopian border committee will present an agreement to a joint ministerial meeting to be held in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, between 30 April and 3 May. The recently established Sudanese-Ethiopian committee had been commended for its "positive results" by Sudanese Foreign Minister Dr Mustafa Uthman Isma'il, official Sudanese television said on Wednesday. Isma'il held talks with the governor of Al-Qadarif State, northeastern Sudan, Prof Al-Amin Daf'allah, who heads the Sudanese side of the committee. The governor of Al-Qadarif said the two sides had agreed on a number of issues, particularly border trade, customs duty, and security. 

Sudan and Ethiopia were eager to "develop and integrate" Al-Qadarif State with Tigray State in northern Ethiopia, an official Sudanese source said. The two regions were agriculturally productive, with Al-Qadarif, considered to be the "bread basket" of Sudan, producing some 60 percent of the nation's sorghum, the source said. The existing road from Al-Qadarif to Mekele, the capital of Tigray, is being repaired and upgraded. Free movement of people and goods has been encouraged. Plans for Ethiopia to provide Al-Qadarif State with electric power were being considered, the source said. The official said Tigray State would benefit through having better access to the Red Sea, as the road to Al-Qadarif connected to Port Sudan. "That makes Port Sudan closer to Mekele than the Eritrean port of Massawa or the Somali port of Berbera," the official said. Tigray State used the Eritrean port of Massawa until the Ethiopian-Eritrean border war began in 1998. 

The colonial border between northern Sudan and Ethiopia was "not demarcated", and some areas, including plantations, had been disputed between the two countries, the official explained. Good relations between Ethiopia and Sudan had encouraged the two countries to settle the issue at this time, with a joint committee headed by the governors of the two states, the official said. 

Six Sudanese opposition figures have been released from jail by an appeal court pending the outcome of their trial. The six are all members of the home-based wing of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) secretariat, official sources confirmed to IRIN. The NDA brings together the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLA) and several northern opposition groups. Those released are Joseph Okelu, the home-based NDA's secretary-general, Ali Ahmad al-Sayyid, Al-Tijani Mustafa, Muhammad Wid'atallah, Muhammad Mahjub and Muhammad Sulayman, news agency said. They were arrested in early December last year during a meeting with a United States diplomat, and were accused of espionage. The US diplomat, Glenn Warren, was later expelled from Sudan. 

A lower court had earlier rejected the release of the six on the grounds that they faced charges which carry the death penalty, Agence France-Presse (AFP) said on Wednesday. The appeal court overturned the court's ruling, asserting that the charges carried an alternative sentence of life imprisonment. The six were released on Wednesday and allowed to go home, news agency said. Official sources said their release on bail was effected in accordance with "normal judicial proceedings" and not for political reasons. 

Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir on Tuesday declared a job and wage freeze within the government and for state-owned companies, in an effort to introduce new economic reforms. Muhammad Dirdeiry, spokesman for Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi, told IRIN that the government wanted to eventually privatise a number of state institutions, including the post office, Sudan Air, the railways, and electricity. The freeze on government jobs and wages was announced to "lay the ground" for privatisation, he said. 

The presidential decree orders all ministers not to approve new appointments and promotions in state-owned companies and corporations, news agencies said. It came a day after Finance Minister Abd al-Rahim Hamdi announced he was going to carry out sweeping privatisations of state enterprises and economic reforms. Official sources told IRIN that Sudan had made an "important economic leap" despite being isolated by international financial institutions over the last decade, including oil exploitation and privatisation of the telecommunications sector. Sudan had continued to pay about debts of about US $60 million per annum. Recent talks with the International Monetary Fund had been successful, and Sudan anticipated resuming full membership, Dirdiery said. 

Sudanese armed forces are in full control of the Blue Nile area, southeastern Sudan, despite rebel claims to the contrary, according to the official spokesman of the armed forces, Staff Lt-Gen Muhammad Bashir Sulayman. The rebel forces had "collapsed" because of a successful security operation carried out by the army in the area, official Sudanese media quoted him as saying on Tuesday. According to Sulayman, a rebel "infantry platoon" had surrendered to the army with all its equipment in the Yaradda area [11.15N 34.55E], after the government Had taken control of Mantopia, Mahayliq and Mazbaqah. A number of field commanders from the rebel movement had defected or surrendered, and would be treated well, the army spokesman said. 

The spokesman of the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) in Nairobi, Samson Kwaje, rejected the government statement, saying that the SPLA had repulsed a government offensive in Blue Nile. He told IRIN that the SPLA remained in control of the key towns of Kurmuk, Qaysan and Ulu, held since January 1997. According to Kwaje, government action in Blue Nile was linked to oil concessions in Adar Yill, northeastern Upper Nile, recently given to a Chinese company. The SPLA spokesman said the government wanted to "cleanse" the area, which borders southern Blue Nile, for oil purposes. The Sudan government has denied that it has a "displacement policy" in oil areas. 

Talks between John Garang's Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) and Riek Machar's Sudan People's Democratic Front (SPDF) held in Nairobi, Kenya, have failed so far to reach a formula for a merger, or to resolve differences over the leadership of armed opposition in southern Sudan. The committee had been examining ways to unify military operations, the Sudanese newspaper 'Al-Ra'y al-Amm' said on 21 April. According to the report, the committee had agreed on the need for political and military coordination and to unite their armed forces; but fundamental differences had emerged over the status of each side within the leadership of the armed movement

However, SPLA sources in Nairobi told IRIN that the talks were continuing, and that the issues being debated were "highly confidential". The talks were described by SPLA spokesman Samson Kwaje as part of an ongoing effort to bring the two groups together, initiated by church groups in 1991. When Riek Machar split off from the mainstream SPLA in 1991, fighting between militia from the two factions led to widespread killings inside southern Sudan. Animosity between the SPLA and the Upper Nile-based SPDF has continued, a regional expert said. 

Humanitarian agencies warn that food and water shortages are most severe in West Darfur, western Sudan, where livestock prices have fallen against grain prices, and food-for-work schemes are attracting large numbers of people from distant areas. The UN-OCHA Sudan Report for March, released this week, said the majority of people arriving at the food-for-work sites were women. An assessment mission in West Darfur by Medecins Sans Frontieres-Holland in March revealed a poor harvest, due to pests, insecurity and insufficient rainfall. People were surviving by reducing meals, selling their assets, eating wild food, migrating to find labour, and seeking income-generating activities like collecting grass, and cutting wood. The assessment mission found that the state health structure was largely not functional, that primary health care was unavailable, and that secondary health care was limited. Low vaccination coverage of meningitis and measles had left the area vulnerable to outbreaks of epidemics. Four teams, with government, World Food Programme (WFP) and NGO representatives, carried out a needs assessment mission of West Darfur from 31 March. A nutrition survey in North Darfur has also been conducted. Relief food has so far been distributed through food-for-work schemes only.

Last month WFP warned that as many as three million people face disaster in Sudan unless food assistance reaches them. On 29 March 2001, WFP stated that it will run out of food by mid-April unless immediate action is taken.

A government source told IRIN that officials were working closely with humanitarian agencies, and had last month dispatched 30,000 mt of wheat to the area. The humanitarian situation was considered "serious", the source said. 

The Sudanese interior minister, Maj-Gen Abd al-Rahim Muhammad Husayn, has said his ministry will act on a spate of armed robberies in Darfur, western Sudan. The minister said in a briefing to the National Assembly that his office was committed to curbing armed robberies in Darfur, by "training, reinforcing, and effectively equipping" the police, the 'Al-Sahafah' newspaper said on 19 April. Local media reported on 18 April that the governor of Southern Darfur State had appealed for help with insecurity in the region. 

The insecurity in Darfur was linked to "arms smuggling and proliferation of small arms in the region", Muhammad Dirdiery, spokesman of the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi told IRIN. Darfur has a long border with Chad and the Central African Republic. Tribal militias using small arms raided each other, he said. This, coupled with a "serious humanitarian situation" in the area, had contributed to the current insecurity, he told IRIN. Dirdiery said the government was "strengthening and reinforcing the security forces in the region." 

A Sudanese plane dropped 16 bombs in and around the southern Sudanese town of Narus, Eastern Equatoria, on 22 April, Catholic church sources said. Two bombs landed in Narus marketplace and another two hit the church school, destroying adjacent buildings. According to the sources, one child was evacuated to a Kenyan hospital in critical condition, and two people sustained minor injuries. 

A plane carrying relief for the Nuba Mountains was bombed on 16 April at Kawdah (11.06N 30.31E) airstrip. A press release by the Italian NGO Koinonia Community said government planes dropped a total of about 14 bombs in three attacks, killing one person and injuring two. The first attack took place when hundreds of civilians had gathered at the airstrip around a relief plane on the ground. The arrival of a second plane carrying relief masked the noise of the approaching bomber, the press release said. The pilot of the approaching relief plane aborted the  landing, and escaped unharmed, as did the plane on the ground, which took off immediately with its passengers. Kawdah airstrip is in an area controlled by the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA). The airstrip was described by the NGO as a vital link for civilians and the SPLA. 

"For a long time, relief organisations, human rights groups and churches have been pushing to gain access to the Nuba Mountains to deliver food and other relief supplies," the NGO said in the press release. The Sudan government has denied that government air force bombers attacked the Kawdah airstrip. 

A Russian-Belarus oil company Slavneft will join a consortium of oil companies to prospect for oil in Sudan, the Russian Interfax news agency reported on 22 April. The move was part of a government effort to diversify the oil industry and open it up to all investors, Muhammad Dirdiery of the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi told IRIN. Slavneft would operate in northern and central Sudan in the Melut basin, and would start work by December 2001, Dirdiery said. 

According to the official Sudanese News Agency (Suna), President Umar al-Bashir met Slavneft executives on 21 April. Company executives pledged to provide unspecified "social services" to the populations of their area of operations, said Suna.

Seven refugees have been killed and scores injured in violent clashes in Kakuma refugee camp in north-western Kenya, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said on Tuesday. The UN agency reported that fighting broke out late on Sunday between rival groups of Dinka people respectively from the Bor and Bahr al-Ghazal regions of southern Sudan. The conflict is thought to have started between "two refugees at a water trench", UNHCR said. In a statement, UNHCR spokesman Kris Janowski said NGO and UNHCR staff had been temporarily withdrawn from the camp as a security measure. Clashes had continued on Tuesday, although no further casualties were reported, he said.

According to UNHCR estimates, there are currently over 60,000 refugees in Kakuma, mainly from southern Sudan. In 1998, a similar incident in the same camp left six refugees dead and several others seriously injured. "Conflicts and tensions in Sudan itself have been occasionally reflected in hostility between different groups of refugees in Kakuma camp," Janowski said. 

Opposition leader Al-Sadiq al-Mahdi has called on the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) to accept a ceasefire and hold talks. At a press conference in Khartoum, the former prime minister and leader of the Ummah Party said that this would allow various opposition groups to unite in "an unarmed struggle for talks with the government", Associated Press (AP) reported. 

Mahdi told journalists that his Ummah Party had agreed on a direct dialogue with the SPLA, which was yet to commence. He said he would ask the US government - during a visit planned for May - to support a "comprehensive political solution in Sudan". The US had played a positive role in supporting human rights and humanitarian issues in Sudan, but had "historically committed mistakes because of lacking full awareness of all the dimensions of problems in Sudan", AP quoted Mahdi as saying.

Interim President Abdiqassim Salad Hassan discussed the issue of the Somali peace process with Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir by telephone on Monday, Abdirahman Dinari, the director of information for the Somali president, told IRIN. The two leaders discussed ways by which Sudan could best help in "completing the Somali peace process", Dinari said. At issue was the appointment by Bashir, current chairman of the regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), of a special IGAD envoy to Somalia. The Somali Transitional National Government (TNG) had rejected the appointment, saying it was "not in the interest" of the Somali people. 

However, the Somali president reassured Bashir that the TNG would welcome the envoy and cooperate with him, Dinari said. He said the initial rejection of the envoy by the TNG, conveyed in press statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on 6 April, was a result of "lack of  communication". The two leaders also discussed the strengthening of bilateral relations. 

Sudanese journalist, Alfred Taban, was released from detention on Tuesday afternoon, after being held without charge for nearly a week. Taban, chairman of the board of Sudan's main English daily, 'Khartoum Monitor', also worked for Reuters news agency and the BBC. A Reuters official confirmed that Taban had been released, but that no details of his experience were yet known other than the fact Taban had told Reuters that he was "fine". 

Taban had been arrested and held by State Security Authority after he tried to attend a news conference by church leaders in Khartoum last Wednesday, following the cancellation of an Easter ceremony on April 10. More than 50 Christian protesters - almost all from the predominantly Christian south - convicted of taking part in the demonstration against the government order were flogged, church leaders said. The Sudanese government said the order had been necessary for security reasons. 

The Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) says it has repulsed an attack by government forces in Benderu, southern Blue Nile. Spokesman for the SPLA Samson Kwaje told IRIN on Tuesday that the SPLA had "intercepted" about 1,000 soldiers from Brigade 97 of the Sudanese Army, and captured a number of heavy weapons, including two T-52 tanks and a number of transport vehicles. According to Kwaje, about 157 government soldiers were killed, and more than 100 wounded. Four Prisoners Of War (POW) were taken by the SPLA, Kwaje said. The government offensive aimed to attack Qaysan and Kurmuk, on the Ethiopian border, Kwaje said. Kurmuk, a strategic border town, has been in the hands of the SPLA since 1997. Kwaje denied that the SPLA used the border town for food supplies, and said the SPLA was "successfully cultivating in Blue Nile" to support itself. 

The Popular National Congress (PNC), one of the main opposition parties, has refused to cut its ties with the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM).  The announcement was made by a senior official of the PNC, Bashir Adam Rahmah, the Associated Press (AP) said on Monday. The PNC, headed by the former Speaker of Parliament, Hasan al-Turabi, said it would stick to its agreement with the SPLM, despite pressure from the government to rescind it. 

Turabi was arrested on 21 February after signing an accord with the SPLM, along with some senior members of his party. President Umar al-Bashir said on Sunday that Turabi would be charged with attempting to overthrow the government.

The announcement by the PNC came after a six member delegation of Islamic scholars from Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Pakistan, after negotiating over a period of five days, failed to reconcile the government and the PNC. The delegation called for the release of all  "prisoners of conscience", but also called on the opposition not to sign "any agreements with the SPLA without government authorisation", said the AP report. Rahmah accused the government of wanting "to rid itself from freeing Turabi and other political detainees", AP said. 

People taking part last week in a demonstration against a Sudanese government order to move an Easter service from central Khartoum have been convicted and flogged. Up to 53 Christians were flogged after they were convicted of rioting over the order to move the services, the Sudane Council of Churches (SCC) said on Friday. Those convicted received between 15 and 20 lashes, and up to 20 days in prison, international news agencies said. Officials from the SCC told journalists that four women and two children were among those punished, and that no defence lawyers were present. The demonstrators were almost all from the predominantly Christian south. 

The Christians were arrested on Tuesday 10 April while protesting against an official order to transfer an Easter ceremony to a smaller venue in the Khartoum suburbs. Church leaders said it was difficult to move the service with such short notice, and that the alternative venue was unsuitable. Interior Minister Maj-Gen Abd al-Rahim Husayn later said the ceremony was licensed to be held in a closed place, rather than a public square, and had been moved for security reasons to avoid possible sectarian clashes, the Associated Press (AP) said. 

The government has detained without charge prominent Sudanese journalist, Alfred Taban, after he attended a news conference by church leaders in Khartoum. Taban tried to attend the news conference following the cancellation of an Easter ceremony on Tuesday April 10. Chairman of the board of Sudan's main English daily, 'Khartoum Monitor', Taban also works for Reuters news agency and the BBC. Neither his family nor his colleagues have heard any news of him since the arrest, the BBC said on Monday. A senior BBC official, Barry Langridge, said the BBC was making "urgent, high-level representations to the Sudanese government" reflecting concern over the arrest and fears that Taban may have been ill-treated. 

Taban is being held by the State Security Authority under emergency laws, Nhial Bol, manager of 'Khartoum Monitor', told AP. Bol said local journalists had been in contact with officials of the National Press Council, an independent organisation which monitors the media, to lobby the government for Taban's release. Taban, from the southern Sudanese town of Kajo Kaji, was detained for several months in 1990 for criticising the government of President Umar al-Bashir. 

President Umar al-Bashir announced on Sunday that mediation attempts had failed between him and the detained former Speaker of parliament and opposition leader, Hasan al-Turabi. At a news conference in the capital, Khartoum, Bashir told journalists that Turabi would stand trial on charges of conspiring to overthrow him. A group of Islamic scholars had failed in their mission to mediate between the two former political allies and friends. Bashir said Turabi's Popular National Congress had refused to rescind an accord signed with the southern based Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), which was the reason why mediation attempts had failed, Associated Press (AP) said. The mediators, led by Yemen's Abd al-Majid al-Zindani, met Turabi in a central Khartoum prison on Saturday 14 April. Bashir told journalists that legal action against Turabi would "continue in accordance with the law", and denied previous reports that Turabi would be exiled or placed under house arrest, Agence France-Presse (AFP) said. 

Sudanese Christians were arrested and others injured on Wednesday in clashes between police and protesting Christians in the capital, Khartoum. The Christians were protesting against a government order to transfer Easter services from central Khartoum to the suburbs, Agence France-Presse   (AFP) said. 

Thousands of Christians - almost all from the predominantly-Christian south - gathered in front of the All Saints Church in Khartoum and began stoning cars. The protest came after about 40 Christians were detained on Tuesday, when the order was issued, AFP said. The secretary-general of the Sudan Council of Churches, Enock Tombe Stethen, said the church had refused to transfer the celebration because of short notice, and because the proposed venue was "unsuitable". A number of journalists were also detained on Wednesday when they attempted to attend a press conference by church representatives, news agencies said. 

Muhammad Dirdiery, Deputy Head of Mission in the Sudanese Embassy, Nairobi, told IRIN that the service had been transferred for security reasons "to avoid a confrontation between Muslims and Christians". He blamed hardline Christian groups in the west of fomenting trouble in Sudan, and said the demonstrations had been inspired by "religious right-wingers". Dirdiery said it was part of a campaign by western evangelist groups to portray the war in Sudan as a religious war, which, he said, was an "oversimplification" of the conflict. "Sudan respects the  right of all people to practise their religion, but the government has a duty to maintain law an order," he told IRIN. 

Spokesman for the southern-based Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) in Nairobi, Samson Kwaje, told IRIN that the government had "ruthlessly suppressed" the Christian meeting, which was an inter-denominational service led by a visiting German evangelical preacher, Reinhard Bonnke. Kwaje condemned the action by police and said tear gas canisters had been used against church members. He it was "clear intolerance" by the government and an attack on religion. "It shows us that we can never go anywhere with the question of separation of religion and state." 

Church leaders had called for an investigation into the clashes and a meeting between Christian leaders and President Umar al-Bashir, AFP reported.

A report released by the Canadian oil company, Talisman, operating in Sudan, said its executives had engaged the Sudanese government in a dialogue over human rights abuses in the south of the country, site of the oil project. But Talisman said, in the first of a series of reports responding to criticism regarding its role in Sudan, that the company had limited influence over how a sovereign government spent its money, Reuters news agency said. This was in response to charges by international human rights organisations and aid agencies that the Khartoum government has been using newly acquired funds from the Hajlij oil development in southern Sudan to fuel its war effort against the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) in the south. Talisman, which has a 25 percent stake in the consortium developing the oil, also pointed out that the consortium's code of ethnics proposed that the Sudan government should not use its oil equipment for any military activity. 

The spokesman for the SPLA in Nairobi, Samson Kwaje, told IRIN that he was "surprised" by Talisman's defence, as the company had previously stated that it was working closely with the government to ensure that profits were used for development and rehabilitation purposes. Kwaje said this demonstrated that Talisman did have influence over how the government spent its money. The SPLA spokesman qualified that oil installations were considered a "legitimate target" in the conflict, but that the SPLA was not "primarily targeting the oil workers themselves". He said he hoped that oil companies would be "judicious enough not to bring foreign workers into a war zone".

The Sudanese government has strenuously denied that oil exploration is being used to fund the war-effort. 

Sudan would start producing aviation fuel this year at the Khartoum oil refinery, the official Sudanese news agency (Suna) said on 10 April. The announcement was made by the Sudanese minister of energy and mining, Dr Awad Ahmad Al-Jaz, in a briefing to the National Assembly. 

The minister informed the assembly that his ministry would also promote the "operational capacity" of Al-Ubayyid and Abu Jabrah refineries. He told the assembly there were plans to increase the "oil-pumping capacity" of the pipeline to 230,000 barrels per day (bpd), and expand the capacity of Port Sudan oil refinery to 70,000 bpd, Suna said. The pipeline was currently producing 200,000 bpd, a Sudanese official told IRIN. 

The Sudanese government has set up a commission to probe the crash of a military aircraft on 4 April in which 15 senior army officers, including the minister of state for defence, Colonel Ibrahim Shams al-Din, were killed. Muhammad Dirdiery, Deputy head of Mission in the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi, told IRIN setting up the commission was "a routine procedure". 

He said the commission was likely to examine "why so many senior officers were on the same plane" and why the plane was not diverted when it was discovered that weather conditions were poor. Dirdiery said that the plane crashed during a sandstorm at Adar Yill, near Jonglei, southern Sudan. He said the probe would also look into ways of improving the capability of rescue teams in remote areas like Adar Yill. 

The aircraft was carrying 40 Sudanese army and security commanders. A London-based newspaper, 'Al-Zaman' said on 9 April that the officers were travelling to inspect the military equipment in the oil-rich area of Adar Yill. 

A senior member of the opposition Popular National Congress (PNC) was released from detention on Saturday 7 April, Agence France-Presse (AFP) said. The PNC was established by former Speaker Hasan al-Turabi, who remains in detention. Muhammad al-Hasan al-Amin, secretary for legal affairs for the PNC, was released on Saturday after charges against him were reduced. Al-Amin was previously charged with "inciting war against the state" and calling for the overthrow of the government, charges which carry the death penalty. He was now charged with "collusion and disturbing public order", which carry no more than a month in prison, AFP said. Abdallah Hasan Ahmad, the deputy-secretary general of the PNC, told journalists he hoped that Turabi and other jailed PNC members would also be released, and said the charges against them were insubstantial. A Sudanese government official said the reduction of charges did not represent a softening of attitude towards Turabi and his party, but was "purely a judicial matter". Turabi and other senior members of his party were arrested on 21 February after Turabi signed an agreement with the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM). The SPLM has condemned the arrests and detentions of opposition members, and said it was an attempt by the government to stifle freedom of expression and association. 

The Sudanese government has accepted a United States proposal to postpone the debate on the lifting of sanctions imposed on Sudan, a Sudanese official has confirmed to IRIN. The Sudanese government accepted the US proposal to allow for more coordination between the US and the non-aligned countries in the Security Council. Sudan is keen to avoid confrontation with the new US administration, as "there are encouraging signals" regarding the relations between the two countries, the official said. Sudan would also like to secure the adoption of a unanimous vote in the Security Council on the lifting of sanctions. Last week, Egyptian President Husni Mubarak held successful discussions with the US administration on Sudan-US relations, the official said. 

As a sign of the thawing relations between the two countries, Sudan had dispatched Ambassador Al-Khidr Harun, from Tokyo, to Washington, where he had been instructed to reopen the Sudanese Embassy at the "charge d'affaires" level, said the official. The embassy was closed in 1998 after the US bombing of a pharmaceutical factory in Khartoum, allegedly connected to Usama bin Ladin. 

The United Nations has diverted food to Sudan to help bridge the flow of emergency food aid needed for more than three million people. World Food Programme (WFP) spokeswoman Lindsey Davis, told IRIN that food destined for Ethiopia had been diverted to Sudan when the consignment arrived in Port Sudan on the Red Sea coast. She said 23,200 tonnes of maize had been diverted to help 2.4 million war-affected victims in Sudan. "It is really only enough for one month, and it doesn't solve the problem," Davis said. 

Earlier this year, WFP made an urgent appeal for US $135 million for war- and drought-affected people in northern and southern Sudan. According to Davis, the donor response has been very poor, and recent donations from Japan, Switzerland and the Netherlands will provide only 10,000 tonnes of food aid. "This diversion is an emergency measure, and we have a long way to go," Davis said. The northern states of Darfur and Kordofan had been hit hard by drought, while in the south, northern Bahr al-Ghazal, eastern Equatoria and Jonglei (north of eastern Equatoria), fighting had exacerbated drought conditions, the agency said. 

The demobilisation of 3,500 child soldiers from the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) carried out by UNICEF at the end of March 2001 is unrelated to the resettlement of Sudanese refugee children to the United States, a UN spokesperson has said. Sudanese local media last week said the Sudan government had protested against the "resettlement" of children from southern Sudan to the United States, and said that it had been done "without the knowledge or consultation of the government of Sudan".

A UN spokesperson said that the reports were confusing "two unrelated humanitarian operations".  The resettlement to the USA of Sudanese children from Kakuma refugee camp, Kenya, was carried out under the auspices of UNHCR. The demobilisation of the child soldiers was carried out by UNICEF, and the children are presently in Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS) transit facilities in Rumbek County, Bahr al-Ghazal, awaiting reunification with their families within Sudan. The UN confirmed that these children were not being resettled to the United States. 

The crash of a Sudanese military plane at Adar Yill airstrip, Upper Nile region, was caused by bad weather, a Sudanese official told IRIN. The government representative said a sandstorm had caused bad visibility, and the pilot misjudged the distance. A government spokesperson in Khartoum ruled out the possibility that a rebel attack had brought the plane down, the BBC said. 

Thirteen senior military officers, including the minister of state for defence and nine generals, were killed in the crash, an official confirmed to IRIN. The 16 survivors, including those injured, have now returned to Khartoum. At least six of the survivors were injured, while 10 escaped unhurt in the accident. The dead were buried in Adar Yill, the official said. 

A Sudanese military aircraft carrying 31 senior army officers from the capital Khartoum to Adar Yill, Upper Nile, crashed at the Adar-Yill airstrip on Wednesday. "The plane lost control on touchdown," a Sudanese official at the Nairobi embassy told IRIN. The official said that 15 people had been killed, including Colonel Ibrahim Shams al-Din, the minister of state for defence. Sixteen others were rescued from the aircraft, including the deputy chief of staff of operations, General Ja'far. According to the official, Shams al-Din was a member of the Revolutionary Council that overthrew the civilian government in 1989, and brought the current head of state, President Umar al-Bashir, to power. He said Shams al-Din and the officers were on a "routine visit to a military post". 

In a report monitored by the BBC, Sudanese official television said the general command of the Armed Forces had announced "the death of its martyrs... [who] were on an inspection visit in the area". Names of the dead released by the government were Staff Lt-Gen Amir Qasim Musa; Maj Dr Malik al-Aqib al-Haj al-Khadr; Maj-Gen Bakri Umar Khalifah; Maj-Gen Sayyid al-Ubayd Abd al-Halim; Maj-Gen Kamal-al-Din Ali al-Amin; Maj-Gen Ali Arik Kakuwan; Maj-Gen Yasin Arabi Muhammad; Maj Faysal Isa Abu Fatmah; Brig-Gen Eng Umar al-Amin Karrar; Staff-Brig Ahmad Yusuf Mustafa; Staff-Brig Jemmy Apolo Modeh; Col-Eng Uthman Ahmad al-Mustafa; Lt-Gen Umar Uthman Ali Garamba; and Cpl Muhammad Ahmad Muhammad Ya'qub. 

The Government of Sudan has protested to the United Nations over its role in the resettlement of children from southern Sudan to the United States. The government criticised the UN for its role in the transportation of children from areas controlled by the Sudan Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA) "without the knowledge or consultation of the government of Sudan", the official Sudanese news agency (Suna) said on 3 April. A letter delivered to the UN Secretary-General's office by the Sudanese permanent mission to the UN in New York called on UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to reconsider the operation. The message followed a previous complaint over the resettlements addressed to the UN representative in Khartoum, Suna said 
UNHCR spokesman Paul Stromberg told IRIN that names and details of places of origin of refugee resettlements were not given out as a matter of principle, and that this applied to refugee movements throughout the world. However, Stromberg said that an explanation of the resettlement programme had been given to the Sudanese government. 

At the end of the visit by the President Daniel arap Moi of Kenya to Khartoum, Sudan, the two governments issued a joint communiqué, the Sudanese News Agency (Suna) said on 30 March. The communiqué said talks between Moi and Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir had focused on ways to "re-invigorate" the peace process for southern Sudan. The two sides agreed to hold a summit of the regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) committee on southern Sudan as soon as possible, Suna said. The two presidents said there was need for progress in the peace initiative to achieve a "permanent and just peace".

During the talks, Moi suggested that the Sudanese government include freedom of religion and worship in its constitution, the government-run Kenya Broadcasting Corporation (KBC) radio said. He also suggested that southern Sudan be granted autonomy, within an "acceptable non-federal or federal structure", KBC said. 

Moi also visited the Petroleum Research Centre in Khartoum and the refinery at Al-Jayli, north of Khartoum. He congratulated Sudan on becoming a "leading petroleum producer", KBC radio said. Moi called for the promotion of trade between Sudan and Kenya and within regional trade bodies like the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa). 

Meeting in Khartoum, Sudan, the Nile Council of Ministers have agreed to cooperate on development projects. The participating ministers approved a number of Nile basin development projects, including projects for irrigation, electricity and the environment, Suna said. Projects to develop research, training and exchange of information on water resources were also approved, Suna said. Nile basin countries include Sudan, Ethiopia, Egypt, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Burundi, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. The decision was reached at the end of a meeting held from 28 to 30 March. 

The closing session of the meeting also approved the establishment of projects for the eastern Nile group of countries. These are Sudan, Egypt and Ethiopia, with Eritrea participating as an observer, said Suna. Among the projects to be carried out in the eastern Nile area were the establishment of early warning systems and preservation projects. The Nile group scheduled the first meeting of the International Consortium for Cooperation on the Nile (ICCON) - a donor group led by the World Bank - for 26 June in Geneva, local Sudanese and Ethiopian news agencies said. 

Three million people face disaster in Sudan unless food assistance reaches them, the World Food Programme (WFP) has warned. As war- and drought-induced hunger sweeps across the country, WFP will run out of food by mid-April unless immediate action is taken, WFP said on 29 March.  More than 600,000 people are affected by drought in the north and south of the country, and another 2.4 million people are affected by the ongoing civil war.

Disaster will strike unless the Sudanese government clearly asks for international assistance or itself outlines a "realistic plan of assistance", Masood Hyder, WFP Country Director for Sudan, warned. He said that parts of Sudan were experiencing the driest season in living memory, even compared to 1984. "This year it is concentrated and harsher," was his comment. Hyder said he had just returned from Northern Darfur and Kordofan states in western Sudan, where lack of water was a serious problem. A WFP team confirmed that the capital of Northern Darfur, Al-Fashir, had no water left in its reservoirs, and that the largest dam in the region, the Mellit Dam, "is bone dry". Water has to be purchased at high prices. Pastoralists cannot sustain their livestock. "Distress sales have resulted in livestock prices plummeting to such an extent that very little grain can be purchased in return." 

Mansoor warned that there would be a disaster in Sudan unless donors responded promptly on humanitarian grounds to the needs of the people . "There will be a disaster if the food does not arrive on time," he said. 

Two Kenyan nationals working with the US humanitarian agency Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) were handed over to the Kenyan ambassador on 31 March, in Khartoum. The release followed a plea by the visiting Kenyan President Daniel Arap Moi to the Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir, a government source told IRIN. 

The Kenyans were among the four ADRA workers abducted by a militia group loyal to Gordon Kong Chuol on 8 March. They were released by the militia on 16 March, but were then held in government "safe house" until Saturday. According to official sources, the humanitarian workers were held for being in the country "without proper visas". 

The Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) said a UN Human Rights observer should be appointed for Sudan, and should have access to both government and rebel-held areas. SPLA spokesman Samson Kwaje told IRIN that the appointment of an observer was important, "because human rights are being abused frequently". He pointed to the arrest of opposition leaders, including Hasan al-Turabi, and the forced displacement of civilians around the oilfields in south. Kwaje said there had also been a policy of displacement in Bahr al-Ghazal, with the government deliberately settling "non-indigenous" people from northern areas. "We believe the situation needs to be watched very closely." According to Kwaje, the SPLA had held talks with a representative from the UN Human Rights Commission and had called for such an appointment to be made. 

Last week, the Sudanese government rejected recommendations by the UN Human Rights Commission for an observer to be appointed for Sudan. The government said it would accept the input of an international human rights expert, but that an observer was "not necessary". 

Yusuf Kuwah Makki, rebel regional governor of the Nuba mountains, died of cancer on 31 March in London, UK. A senior member of the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), Kuwah had been replaced as regional governor by Commander Abd al-Aziz Adam al-Hinu, a spokesman for the regional secretariat office told IRIN. Spokesman Yunan Musa Kunda said Kuwah's death had been announced in Nuba on the same day through the radio network. His body would be flown back to "the liberated areas of [the] Nuba mountains", but the time and place would not be announced because of possible security problems, Kunda said. The spokesman described the reaction in the Nuba Mountains as "quiet" as people had been aware of Kuwah's state of health for some time; he had been diagnosed with cancer in 1998. There had been no access to the Nuba mountains for international aid agencies this year, Kunda said.

Humanitarian sources told IRIN that while humanitarian access had been agreed "in principle" with the government, modalities of access had not been worked out. The government wanted all humanitarian access to the Nuba mountains to come from bases in western government-controlled areas, while the SPLA wanted relief to come either from a third country or from SPLA-controlled areas in southern Sudan, the source said. 

The chairman of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) has appointed a special envoy for Somalia. Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir, in his capacity as the current chairman of IGAD, appointed Ambassador Ali Abd-al-Rahman al-Numayri as a special envoy for Somalia, a Sudanese official told IRIN. The appointment of a special envoy was agreed at the last IGAD summit, the official said. 

Special envoy Al-Numayri was formerly a junior minister at the foreign ministry, and served as an ambassador in the region for 30 years. He will assist the IGAD subcommittee on Somalia, and will act as focal point on the resolution of the Somali conflict. 

Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi flew to Khartoum on Thursday to hold talks with Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir on the peace process in Sudan and Sudanese-Kenya relations. A Sudanese official said the meeting would focus on reactivating the peace process in Sudan, and the negotiating mechanism of the regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), Sudanese state radio said on 29 March.  Kenya was the seat of the IGAD secretariat on peace, and President Moi was expected to discuss ways of reactivating its work, the radio said. Moi has said he hoped the meeting with Bashir would lead to a peace summit on Sudan. 

The US administration and the United Nations should demonstrate more commitment to resolving the crisis in Sudan, said Roger Winter, Executive Director of the US Committee for Refugees (USCR) in a testimony to US Congress on 28 March. He said Sudan was suffering the longest uninterrupted civil war in the world, and that more than 2 million Sudanese were estimated to have died of causes directly or indirectly linked to war and "repressive Sudanese government policies". Winter recommended that US President Bush appoint a Special Envoy as a major foreign policy priority, and should help create an environment for successful negotiations - by "intervening politically to force the [government] to negotiate seriously for a just peace". Winter called on the US administration to take decisive action if the government continued to bomb civilian targets in the south. "The US government should regard each bombing as a violation of international humanitarian law... [and] should pressure or embarrass the UN Security Council into appropriate action." He said the Sudan government had used food as a weapon with "virtual impunity", and that the US should lead or impose "an entirely new approach to Operation Lifeline Sudan [the UN umbrella group working with the permission of the government in southern Sudan]". Winter also criticised what he called the "craven dash to Sudan by European oil companies", saying it had compromised the will of European governments in forming international policy towards Sudan. 

The Sudanese government has denied media reports that the government was close to an agreement with former speaker of parliament Hasan al-Turabi, that will lead to his release. Muhammed Dirdeiry, Sudanese Embassy Deputy Head of Mission in Nairobi, told IRIN that Turabi was still in jail and the treason case was still "moving forward." "There is no room for political deals, and the criminal case will follow the laid down procedures," he said. The former Speaker of parliament and leader of opposition Popular National Congress was arrested last month, after he signed an agreement with the leader of the southern-based Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM). The Memorandum of Understanding signed in Geneva, on 19 February said Sudan was "on the verge of collapse under the regime's totalitarian and high-handed approach", and recommended that "peaceful popular resistance must be stepped up". 

The Sudanese government has said a group of 113 people seized by the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA)in 1997, had been repatriated. Muhammad Dirdeiry, Deputy Head of Mission in the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, told IRIN that the group was taken when the SPLA overran Yei, Western Equatoria, southern Sudan. "They were mostly northern traders residing in Yei and its environs," he said. According to the government, the group was first taken by the SPLA to neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)in 1997, where their release was eventually secured with the help of international humanitarian agencies. After their release, members of the group made their way through Uganda into Kenya. The Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi assisted with their repatriation to Sudan, Dirdeiry said. 

Meanwhile, more than 60 Ugandans who escaped from the Sudan-based Ugandan rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) are to be repatriated. A UNICEF official said the 62 people had been held in captivity by the LRA in different parts of southern Sudan over several months. Twenty-six of them are children. They were taken to Khartoum, where they received medical treatment, and will be flown from the Sudanese capital to Entebbe, Uganda. This is the fourth group of former rebel captives to be repatriated from Sudan since December 1999, when Kampala and Khartoum signed an agreement to normalise relations, the BBC said. 

Residents of the southern Sudanese city of Wau, capital of the western Bahr al-Ghazal region, complain they have come under renewed attack from the Murahilin Arab militia. The Murahilin had recently abducted dozens of women and children, and carried out robberies and attacks in the Wau area, the BBC said on Monday. Residents told the BBC that "some 3,000 men" arrived in the city three weeks ago on trains and horseback and carried out the attacks. The Sudanese military - which has a large garrison in Wau - had been criticised for failing to act against the Murahilin, said the BBC. The military denies this. 

Humanitarian sources told IRIN that the area around Wau had experienced recent attacks, as well as two recent raids near Aweil. Allegations of abductions were difficult to confirm until security in the area improved, said the source.

The Sudanese government has rejected recommendations by the UN Human Rights Commission that a human rights observer be appointed for Sudan. Justice Minister Ali Muhammad Uthman Yasin held a news conference on Sunday and said the government was firm in its decision to reject the observer, but would accept the input of an international human rights expert on a provisional six month programme, official media said. According to Yasin, the expert would work as a consultant under the auspices of UNDP and would advise on developing activities for national capacity-building to strengthen and protect human rights. In rejecting the appointment of an observer, Yasin said, "We are convinced that our religion respects, honours and fully preserves human rights." 

A Sudanese official told IRIN that a human rights observer was "not necessary" and that the situation in Sudan did not warrant such appointment. Muhammad Dirdiery, deputy head of mission in the Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi, told IRIN that the agreement with the Commission to appoint an international expert showed that Sudan was prepared to cooperate with the international community on ways to improve human rights. Dirdiery said the expert would advise the government. 

A key board member of the Swedish oil company Lundin Oil defended his seat despite fierce international criticism of the company's exploration activities in Sudan. Sweden's former prime minister Carl Bildt, who is a member of parliament, said he was "convinced that the foreign presence and not least the oil are possibilities for peace and development in Sudan in the long term." He made the comments in an open letter to the Swedish press, Reuters news agency said on 20 March. Bildt is also a United Nations envoy to the Balkans. Complaints by humanitarian agencies regarding the presence of foreign oil companies in southern Sudan resulted in criticism of Bildt's position by Swedish newspaper editorials. He said in the open letter that he expected his UN position to be "gradually phased out." 

Lundin Oil shares rose on Tuesday as a result of his comments. International critics, including the NGO Christian Aid, have criticised Lundin Oil for participating in well drillings in war-affected southern Sudan. Christian Aid said the government had a brutal strategy of displacement around the oil fields - an accusation the government denied. 

The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination said that while Sudan had shown increasing willingness to cooperate with international agencies in the field of human rights, there was continued concern over abductions, displacements and discrimination. It said there were continuous reports and allegations regarding the abduction by armed militia of primarily women and children belonging to different ethnic groups. The Committee said it was "deeply concerned" about allegations of forced relocation of civilians from the Nuer and Dinka ethnic groups in the Upper Nile region, involving "significant military force". 

Sudan should do everything in its power to "achieve a peaceful settlement of the war," said the Committee. It said the on-going civil war was fuelled "by a complexity of issues relating to ethnicity, race, religion and culture, and involving violations of human rights by all parties." A Sudan official told IRIN the government strongly refuted accusations that the army was involved in a strategy of displacement, and said it was seeking peaceful solutions to the civil war. 

Four aid workers with the Adventists Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) are being held in a Government house in Khartoum, a humanitarian source in Sudan told IRIN. Aid agencies have had no access to the group, or any explanation from the government as to why they are being held. "We are hopeful that they will be released soon, but also concerned for their well being," the source said. 

The four aid workers - two Kenyans, one Ugandan, and one Sudanese – were abducted on 8 March in Kajokeji, southern Sudan, by pro-government militia loyal to Gordon Kong Choul.  Their release was secured on 16 March, after the Sudanese government sent a team to negotiate with the militia, the source said. 

The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and the Sudan Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA) said a fresh round of talks with the government could only be held if certain conditions were met. SPLA spokesman, Samson Kwaje, told IRIN that the conditions included the release of all political prisoners, the lifting of the state of emergency, and the suspension of clauses in the 1998 constitution relating to Islamic Sharia. Other conditions include the lifting of the Public Securities Act, and removing the ban on political parties, Kwaje told IRIN.

The southern-based SPLA and the NDA - which brings together northern opposition groups - have set the conditions in relation to talks proposed  by an Egyptian-Libyan peace initiative. Kwaje said the new initiative did not involve the Inter-Governmental Authority of Development (IGAD), which held the last round of unsuccessful talks. 

A government official, Mohamed Dirdiery, said the conditions were new, and had not been raised in previous talks brokered by IGAD. He told IRIN the government would prefer to merge the two processes, and have "one peace initiative that would encompass both the northern opposition and the south." 

The Sudanese government has denied claims by British development agency, Christian Aid that atrocities are being committed by the government in areas around oil fields. In a report released on 15 March, the agency said the oil giants BP and Shell should divest their shares in companies whose parent corporation is "complicit in atrocities" in Sudan. The report presents new eyewitness testimonies about government attempts to clear the land of civilian populations for oil exploration. It said there had been thousands of deaths and displacements, and that oil companies "can no longer justify doing business in Sudan." 

The Sudanese government has rejected the allegations and termed them as "part of a smear campaign against the Sudanese government" by some circles of the NGO community, deputy head of Mission in the Sudanese Embassy, Mohamed Dirdiery, told IRIN. He said the Canadian Foreign Ministry had sent a "fact finding mission" to Sudan on this issue and found "the allegations were baseless". Dirdiery denied that there was a "deliberate" government policy to move people from the oil areas. "There is no such policy" he told IRIN. 

Dan Collison, head of Christian Aid's Sudan programme, told IRIN that a deliberate government policy of displacement around the oil fields had begun in earnest in 1999 - "that's when the government adopted a scorched earth policy to exploit oil". He said rebel activity also affected civilian populations, with the oil factor "making a bad situation worse". Long-term conflict between southern-based rebels and the government, and between southern parties, had always affected civilians, he said, but the "oil war" had intensified suffering. 

According to Collison, Christian Aid has contacted oil companies directly involved, particularly Canada's Talisman Energy and Sweden's Lundin Oil. He said Talisman's response was that oil revenue would benefit the country, and that it had put human rights monitoring mechanisms in place. "Our response is that those mechanisms are not working because displacement is greater than ever", Collison told IRIN. [For full text of report see www.christian-aid.org.uk]

The Sudanese government has some reservations, but does not reject outright a new proposal put forward by the US-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) to end the civil war in Sudan, a Sudanese official told IRIN.

Sudanese media reports had said that the President of Sudan, Omar El-Bashir had rejected the recommendations made by CSIS in its report entitled "US Policy to End Sudan's War", released on 26 February. But the official denied these reports and told IRIN: "the President expressed reservations on the two system-one state call made in the report". According to the official the report calls for a form of "confederation" which is not acceptable to the Sudan government. The official said that Sudan will welcome any initiative that will contribute to peace and was in favour of unitary state with federal system," along the lines of the US  system". The report, "US Policy to End Sudan's War" is available on the CSIS website: http//www.csis.org/press/ma

A committee set up by the Ministry of Justice to look into possible charges against the former speaker of parliament Hasan al-Turabi has recommended two criminal charges. A Sudanese government official told IRIN on Monday that Turabi would be charged with "inciting hatred against the state" and sedition. Both counts were punishable by death or life imprisonment under the Sudanese criminal code, the official said.

Turabi was arrested on 21 February, along with many senior members of his party, the Popular National Congress (PNC). The arrests followed the signing on 18 February, of a "memorandum of understanding" between Turabi and the Sudanese People's Liberation Movement (SPLM). According to the official, "the possibility exists that all members of [Turabi's] political bureau will also be charged". He said once formal charges had been presented, the process "will move swiftly", and Turabi is likely to be brought before the courts within two weeks. 

Meanwhile, a spokesman of the SPLM, Yasir Arman, said in an interview with the London-based Arabic language newspaper 'Al-Sharq al-Awsat' that Turabi's arrest was"pre-planned". Arman said in an article published on 9 March that the SPLM had signed the agreement with Turabi, because of "a clear change in Dr al-Turabi's political approach".

Severe drought across many parts of Sudan was affecting several million people, many of whom were at acute risk of severe food insecurity over the coming months, the International Federation of the Red Cross/Red Crescent said in an appeal released on 2 March. It called for Swiss Francs 2,582,404 (equivalent to US $1.6 million) in "cash, kind and services" to meet the needs of 289,000 beneficiaries for six months, concentrating on relief activities in Northern and Southern Darfur, and the Red Sea states.

According to the Federation, access to safe water as well as emergency food is a critical intervention. Stagnation in the livestock trade has reduced a traditional source of extra income, and many of the poorer families have already lost or traded all their animals. "The most vulnerable people are either subsistence farmers or small-scale pastoralists, whose means of livelihood is now threatened by the drought,"  the appeal said. "The price of food staples in the markets has increased dramatically over recent weeks." Agricultural labouring opportunities are also becoming scarce, causing migration. "The nutritional status of the population is expected to deteriorate rapidly unless an additional provision of food can be assured until the next harvest," the Federation warned. 

The Sudanese Ministry of Energy and Mining on Monday announced the discovery of a new oil field in the south-west of the country. In a statement to the press, under-secretary Hasan Ali el Toam said the first well in the field had a "proven productivity of 4,620 barrels a day". The oil field was discovered by a consortium of companies consisting of the Austrian OMV, Swedish Lundn, the Malaysian Petronas, and Sudapet of Sudan, news agencies said. 

Sudan had a target production of 400,000 barrels of oil a day by the end of this year, a Sudanese official told IRIN. With this new discovery that target "could be surpassed" he said. The new find is near another oil field already producing oil. The official described the new oil field as being in Northern Sudan [a political definition] on the border with the south. International human rights organisations and humanitarian workers say that massive displacement has been caused by government troops and pro-government militia moving populations away from prospective oil fields. 

Factional fighting in southern Sudan could lead to famine unless the US intervenes diplomatically with rebel forces and other parties, the US-based Human Rights Watch said. In a letter sent to US Secretary of State Colin Powell, Human Rights Watch called on the new Bush administration to use its influence with southern factions to stave off potential crisis. Human Rights Watch recommended that the US insist that all military support to southern factions be stopped and a cease-fire be imposed. It also called for US convened peace talks in the south. 

"This is a good example of where early and skilful US diplomatic intervention can make all the difference," Jemera Rone, Sudan researcher for Human Rights Watch, said. In a statement released on 3 March, Rone said various factions of the Nuer tribe were fighting a "no-holds-barred war" among themselves, which threatened to re-ignite conflict between the two largest tribes in the south, the Nuer and the Dinka. "The US has tremendous clout with southerners. Now is the time to use it," Rone said. 

In a report on Sudan released 12 March, Human Rights Watch said the inter-Nuer and inter-Dinka conflict was "in violation of both traditional Nuer and Dinka practices of war and international humanitarian law." Abuses included the burning of homes, villages, community structures and reserves of grain, as well as the killing of women and children. Other parties involved in the inter-south conflict include the government army, and government-backed Nuer militia - particularly the militia of Gordon Kong Chuol and Simon Gatwich; Riek Machar's Sudan People's Democratic Front/Defence Forces (SPDF); and, the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA). 
[For full text see www.hrw.org/hrw/campaigns/sudan98/sudan-analysis.htm]

A Catholic bishop said on Friday that up to a million displaced people were suffering from hunger, thirst and disease in the northern Bahr el-Ghazal region in southern Sudan. After visiting the region, Caesar Mazzolari, Bishop of Rumbek, said that he had seen about 55,000 people in very poor condition around Malwalkon. According to the Bishop, the displaced are the result of military confrontation between the government-aligned Arab Murahiliin militia and the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA). 

The conflict in early February northwest of Malwalkon resulted in homes, food and property being burned as well as theft of livestock, said a report released by the Diocese of Rumbek. Civilians caught up in the battles fled to safer areas, but were without food, water, shelter and medical supplies. Mazzolari called for the swift implementation of an internationally-funded feeding programme in the region as well the urgent supply of tents, blankets and medicine. He estimated that at least twelve boreholes would need to be sunk in the affected area to supply fresh water to those in need.

WFP information officer, Lindsey Davies, told IRIN on Wednesday that the agency had planned to feed 113,000 displaced people in the Aweil East district in February. Unfortunately due to security considerations we were only able to feed 55,000 people," she said. "Lack of pledges from donors has meant that there is a break in the food pipeline and much more food is urgently needed," she added. Davies stressed that WFP could feed many more people now the security situation was better, but only if food was made available. She pointed out that resources were currently so limited that only 25 percent rations were being distributed. 

By late on Wednesday, a total of 3,200 former child combatants from the Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA) had been airlifted out of the Bahr el Gazal conflict zone in southern Sudan, Martin Dawes of Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS) told IRIN on Thursday. The children were airlifted to four UNICEF-run transit centres in Rumbek county in southern Sudan.

The six-day airlift was carried out by WFP aircraft used for UN relief operations in southern Sudan. "The airlift is now complete, but we'll continue transporting former child soldiers by road to the transit facilities," Dawes said. UNICEF in Rumbek said it knew of a further 340 demobilised children still in the conflict zone who would be evacuated by road over the next ten days. 

Dawes pointed out that the operation to evacuate and rehabilitate child soldiers in Sudan was ongoing and that thousands remained both within the SPLA and various militia groups. "We reached agreement with the SPLA that all their child soldiers would be demobilised, but helping young combatants in the militias will be much more difficult" said Dawes. 

The children airlifted out will receive education, vocational training and trauma counselling. UNICEF said children for whom no family members can be traced will remain under the long term care of local authorities and NGOs, as close as possible to their communities of origin. 

The Sudanese Peoples' Liberation Army (SPLA), the largest group opposing the Sudanese government, denounced the state's decision to try six opposition members on espionage charges. "These are trumped up charges, and a way to muzzle democracy", SPLA spokesman in Nairobi, Samson Kwaje told IRIN on Wednesday.

The six are all members of the domestic National Democratic Alliance (NDA)  secretariat. The NDA brings together the SPLA and northern opposition groups. The six accused include Joseph Okelu, the NDA domestic secretary general, Ali Ahmed al-Sayyed, Al-Tighani Mustafa, Mohamed Widaat Allah, Mohamed Mahjoub, and Mohamed Suleiman, according to agency reports. They were arrested in December for meeting a US diplomat who was later deported, reportedly for meeting opposition members.

Kwaje told IRIN that all the accused are members of various opposition parties. "They have every right to meet with anyone, including diplomats,"  he said. "We are calling on the international community to put pressure on the government to stop this trial."  The deputy head of mission of the Sudanese embassy in Nairobi, Dirdeery Ahmed, told IRIN that the six accused will get a fair trial in a civilian court. "They will be given every opportunity to defend themselves, and will not be tried under emergency laws", he said.

The United Nations has warned the international community of an impending humanitarian catastrophe in Sudan. The warning was made in a press release issued by OCHA on Friday. The UN Consolidated Inter-Agency Appeal for Sudan, launched three months ago was recently revised to take account of the drought in central and western Sudan. The revised appeal calls for US $244 million in food and other assistance to meet the emergency needs of war and drought affected communities. 

Of the total targeted population of more than three million people, 600,000 are aid to be "at immediate risk". This requires urgent funding of US $60 million, according to the press release.  The UN's Under-Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs, Kenzo Oshima, has expressed deep concern about the very poor response from the international donor community to the critical humanitarian situation developing in the Sudan. To date, only about one percent of the necessary funding has been pledged by international donors. 

The press release notes that unless money is urgently pledged, WFP will be unable to feed people in need after March, with the critical hunger period beginning in April and May. UNICEF is in a similar position. The agency will be unable to continue with present levels of emergency intervention in water, sanitation and health sectors. A planed FAO vital seeds distribution programme is also threatened. 

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) announced on Tuesday that more than 2,500 former child soldiers had been airlifted out of conflict zones and into safe areas.

"Rehabilitation and family tracing can begin," according to a press release issued by the UN's Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS). The operation started on Friday and continued throughout the weekend. The former child soldiers were flown from the Bahr el Gazal combat zone in southern Sudan, by two planes operated by WFP.

The children were taken to reception centres, where local and international NGOs provided them with medical check-ups and other basic care. The operation is continuing until Tuesday, with some children being moved by road. The children ranged in age from 8-18 years and were demobilized from military camps run by the Sudan Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA), following a commitment made by an SPLA commander to UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy, in October last year.

The children fall into two categories, according to the press release. Those with military training who never saw combat and those who saw combat and experienced other traumas. The first group could be reunited with their families and communities in three to four months. The other group requires more long-term care and will be provided with more formal vocational training. 

The Centre for International Strategic Studies (CSIS), an independent think tank based in Washington, on Monday released a study entitled "US Policy to End Sudan's War". The report highlights what it calls the Sudanese government's policy of bombarding humanitarian relief sites, human rights abuses and its failure to combat slavery.

According to the report, the 18-year old civil war, which has killed more than two million and left more than four million internally displaced, has galvanised broad bipartisan support within Congress. The document calls for Sudan to be placed high on the agenda of the new Bush administration. 

"The report provides US policymakers with a pragmatic and focused strategy for bringing a just and lasting peace to Sudan," said John Hamre, CSIS president and CEO. 

The report, "US Policy to End Sudan's War" is available on the CSIS
website; www.csis.org/press/ma

Sudanese President, Lt. General Omar al-Bashir announced a new cabinet on Friday, Sudanese radio, monitored by the BBC reported on 23 February.

The new 31-member Cabinet is as follows: Lt. Gen. Omar el-Bashir: president; Ali Osman Mohammed Taha: first vice-president; Moses Machar: vice-president; Maj. Gen. Salah Ahmad Mohammed Salih: minister of presidential affairs; Gen. Al-Hadi Abdalla Mohammed al-Awad; minister of cabinet affairs; Mustafa Osman Ismail: minister of external relations; Maj. Gen. Bakri Hassan Salih: minister of defence; Maj. Gen. Abdel-Rahim Hussein: minister of interior; Abdel Rahim Hamdi: minister of finance and national economy; Awad Ahmed Al-Jaz: minister of energy and mining; Ali Mohammed Osman Yassin: minister of justice; Ghazi Salah Eddin Atabani: minister of information and communications; Nafie Ali Nafie: minister of federal government; Joseph Malwal: minister of aviation; Majzoub al-Khalifa Ahmad: minister of agriculture and forests; Samia Ahmed Mohammed: minister of welfare and social development; Jalal Yusuf Mohammed Digair: minister of national industry and investment; Riek Gaye: minister of animal resources; Abdel-Hameed Mousa Kasha: minister of external trade; Zubair Bashir Taha: minister of science and technological research. 

Ali Tamim Fartak was appointed minister of general education and instruction; Mohammed Tahir Ailla: minister of roads and telecommunications; Kamal Ali Mohammed: minister of irrigation and water resources; Gen. (retired)Alison Manani Magaya: minister of labour and administrative reform; Ahmad Bilal Osman: minister of health; Abdel Basit Abdel Magid: minister of culture and tourism; Lam Akol: minister of transport; Sideek Al-Sharif Ibrahim Yusuf Al-Hindi: minister of international cooperation; Gen. (retired) Tigani Adam Tahir: minster of environment and urban planning; Mubarak Mohammed Al Majzoub: minister of higher education; Issam Ahmed Al-Bashir: minister of religious guidance and endowments; Abdel-Basit Sabdarat: minister of parliamentary relations; Hassan Osman Rizzig: minister of youth and sports; Col. Martin Malwal Arop: minister at the council of ministers without portfolio.

Responding to a recent report by Reuters entitled "Sudan says oil drilling causes no mass displacement", WFP in Sudan on Thursday denied that it was unaware of forced displacements, as stated in the article. In a letter to Reuters, WFP Deputy Country Director Nicholas Siwingwa said that no comment had ever been made to that effect. 

Siwingwa added that WFP had witnessed an increasing number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) requiring food assistance in oil fields in the southern Unity state. Siwingwa put the current number of IDPs in the region at over 36,000 and added that oil interests in the area had exacerbated the uprooting of people from their homes. 

Roger Winter of the U.S. Committee for Refugees (USCR) a non-governmental organisation, said in a press release that ethnic cleansing linked to oil development in southern Sudan was causing massive civilian displacement. " Tens of thousands of Sudanese civilians have fled from the region during the past year as the government seeks to expand its oil operations," he said. 

President Umar al-Bashir has formed a new government. Sudanese state television on Thursday reported that 16 members of the of the preceding 25-strong administration would stay on to join the new 31-member new government. Eight members of the outgoing administration retain their posts, including the key portfolios of defence, foreign affairs and justice, according to an AFP report on Friday. Former Presidential Affairs Minister Abd al-Rahim Muhammad Husayn is now interior minister. The new cabinet also includes six ministers from southern Sudan.

Later on Friday, AP gave the total number of ministers as 29, and said that, of these, 23 were members of the ruling National Congress party. The ministries of industry, health and international cooperation were allotted to members of a breakaway faction of the Democratic Unionist Party, while a member of the Muslim Brotherhood was given the religious affairs portfolio. Members of the southern United Democratic Salvation Front retained the portfolios of animal resources and aviation, which it held under the previous government. Earlier this week the Ummah Party, led by al-Sadiq al-Mahdi, declined to participate in the new government, according to the report. 

The authorities have released without charge two human rights lawyers who were arrested in December for speaking out against the arrest of seven opposition politicians. Ghazi Sulayman and Ali Mahmud Hasanayn were released on 17 February, under a presidential decree, local newspapers said. The two human rights lawyers protested against the arrest of opposition politicians detained during a meeting attended by a US political officer. The US official was expelled, while the seven opposition politicians are expected to stand trial on charges of spying and undermining the constitution.

The detention of the two lawyers and the opposition politicians provoked protest letters to the government from international human rights organisations like the US-based Human Rights Watch, which demanded they be fairly tried or set free. 

Former Sudanese parliamentary speaker and erstwhile ally of President Omar al-Bashir of Sudan, Hassan al-Turabi, was arrested on 21 February, along with many of Turabi's aides, a senior Sudanese official confirmed to IRIN on Thursday. 

The arrest follows the signing on Sunday of a "memorandum of understanding" between Turabi and the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), led by John Garang, which has been fighting Sudan's leaders for the past 17 years. 

The official told IRIN that Turabi "has been arrested under the national security act, for endangering the country's national security." He added that many of Turabi's aides have also been arrested and detentions "are still going on". Security forces reportedly detained at least 20 members of Turabi's Popular National Congress (PNC) party in different parts of the country, the Associated Press quoted a retired army general, Mohammed Amin al-Khalifa, as saying. Khalifa, who said he was in hiding, told AP that Turabi had been transferred to the maximum security Kober prison, east of Khartoum. 

Armed police were deployed around the headquarters of the PNC, as well as the offices of the pro-Turabi Rai al-Shaab newspaper, which did not publish on Thursday, AP reported. 

No formal charges against Turabi and his aides have been announced, but the men are expected to be brought to court soon, the official told IRIN. 

Turabi, the former head of the militant National Islamic Front (NIF), was a close ally of President Bashir and is credited with being the mastermind of the 1989 military coup that brought Bashir to power. 

The two men had a falling out in December 1999 when Bashir dismissed Turabi as parliamentary speaker. Eight months later Turabi set up the PNC and has since become one of the government's harshest critics. 

Meanwhile, Sudanese radio, monitored by the BBC, reported that Sudanese Information Minster Ghazi Salah-al-Din had described the agreement between the SPLA and Turabi "as a declaration of a political alliance to fight the government, an alliance which does not use legalized methods". 

The report quoted the minister as saying said that any group dealing with the SPLA "to set up a strategic alliance" would be treated in the same manner as Turabi's movement (see IRIN focus on Turabi's arrest - "A relationship gone sour"). 

President Umar al-Bashir attended the anniversary of the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) in the Tigray regional capital, Mekele, northern Ethiopia. The Sudanese president left on 17 February for a two day visit to participate in the celebrations, the official Sudanese news agency Suna said. He was accompanied by the Minister of External Relations Dr Mustafa Uthman Isma'il, the Minister of Roads and Communication, Muhammad Tahir Illah and other senior officials. The Minister of External Relations said the visit of the Sudanese delegation represented the keenness of Sudan "to consolidate its ties with neighbouring countries, especially Ethiopia which is linked to Sudan with the longest land border", Suna said. The minister said that the two countries recently agreed on forming a joint ministerial committee and one for development of a border area between Sudan and Ethiopia. He said Bashir would hold talks with Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, which would, among other things, "review the Somali issue". Sudan is the chairman of the regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development, IGAD. 

Sudan released without charge two detained human rights lawyers who were 
arrested in December for speaking out against the arrest of seven opposition politicians. Ghazi Suleiman and Ali Mahmud Hassanein were released on Saturday, 17 February, under a presidential decree, local newspapers said. The two human rights lawyers protested against the arrest of opposition politicians detained during a meeting attended by a US political officer. The US political officer was expelled, and the seven opposition politicians are expected to stand trial on charges of spying and undermining the constitution. 

The detention of the two lawyers and the opposition politicians provoked protest letters to the government by international human rights organisations, like the US-based Human Rights Watch, which demanded they be fairly tried or set free. 

The Sudanese and Ethiopian parliaments have issued a joint statement after representatives met in Khartoum, state-run Sudan television said on 14 February. Sudanese Parliamentary Speaker Ahmad Ibrahim al-Tahir held talks with Dawit Yohanes, speaker of the Ethiopian House of People's Representative and agreed to establish a parliamentary union for the regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD). 

A communiqué issued by the two parties called for the establishment of a parliamentary union for the IGAD states to facilitate communication and to establish a forum for cooperation between the regional states, Sudan television said. It also called for the establishment of an "African general parliamentary assembly."  The statement said the joint assembly would serve as a channel for dialogue between the representatives of the African people "to overcome the problem of discrimination and disruption and bring about unity, cooperation and integration". Ethiopian speaker, Dawit Yohanes, said the talks held in Khartoum and the agreement signed would strengthen relations between the two countries. 

Human Rights Watch said that there was deep concern over the detention without trial of eight opposition political activists, a lawyer, and a human rights activist in Sudan. In a letter sent to newly sworn-in President Umar al-Bashir, the US-based human rights organisation asked that the detainees be formally charged or released immediately. "In the event that any of these individuals are reasonably suspected of criminal acts, we urge you to try them promptly according to international standards of fair trial."

The eight detainees were imprisoned on 6 December when government security forces broke up a gathering of leaders of political parties, and expelled an American diplomat who was attending the meeting. Those arrested were accused of plotting to overthrow the government. After signing a protest sent to the Ministry of Justice and promising to defend those arrested, a lawyer and human rights activist were then also detained. The detainees are reportedly kept in solitary confinement in Kober prison, Khartoum, Human Rights Watch said. 

In the first week of February, an intensive vaccination campaign was launched in the Omdurman El-Salaam Displaced Persons Camp in response to an outbreak of measles. The international health organisation MEDAIR said the campaign was launched after discussions with the local Ministry of Health, as a standard precautionary measure. In information sent to IRIN by MEDAIR, the organisation said three cases of measles had been seen in the first week of February at MEDAIR's Primary Health Care Centre in the camp - "this number of cases counts as an outbreak." It said measles was "a highly contagious disease, and can have a devastating effect, especially amongst malnourished children and is particularly dangerous in a crowded camp situation." 

On 10 February the vaccination team immunised 780 children, aged six months to five years, in the camp.  Health and community workers were mobilised in the local community, visiting homes and schools to ensure children in the target range were vaccinated. MEDAIR said vaccines were supplied by UNICEF, through the local Ministry of Health. 

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) made an urgent appeal on Tuesday for US $135 million for 2.9 million Sudanese affected by drought and civil war in both government and rebel-held areas. Masood Hyder, WFP's Country Representative in Sudan, said from Khartoum there was a "looming crisis" which needed an urgent response. "We don't have time on our hands,", Lindsey Davis, WFP Information Officer, told IRIN - "the point is, if nothing is done now people are definitely going to be running out of food by April." 

In January, humanitarian agencies sounded the alarm after a joint WFP and Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) report confirmed that erratic rains had severely affected crop production last year with serious food and water shortages emerging in a number of districts. WFP said in a press release issued on Tuesday that food deliveries had already been increased through food for work activities and school feeding programmes in the north. In the south, emergency food distributions continued, the press release said. It said drought had widened to hit both the northern and southern parts of Sudan, particularly in north Darfur and Kordofan regions, as well as Eastern Equatoria and northern Bahr el Ghazal. Drought in the south had been made worse "by continued fighting". In the western cattle farming areas of Kordofan and Darfur, food prices had more than doubled. Families were selling their livestock to raise cash to buy food, said the WFP statement. "Grain stores are already low and cattle are fetching a pittance at market. Water points are drying up and villages have started to empty", it said. Malnutrition was rising in Eastern Equatoria and parts of Bahr el Ghazal and Jonglei, warned WFP. "Hunger is expected to be worst in the 1998 famine zones of Bahr el Ghazal and in Upper Nile where the conflict continues", said the statement. 

Humanitarian access is being denied to civilians in areas of Nuba Mountains controlled by the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), an organisation for the Nuba Mountains said on Tuesday. A statement released by the Nuba Relief Rehabilitation and Development Organisation said the government had continued a war against civilians in the Nuba Mountains. "Despite a limited number of visits by the UN in 2000, the government of Sudan (GoS) has finally refused to concede access to the SPLM areas while appealing for an increase in humanitarian assistance in the GoS controlled areas," the statement said. It said civilians had been killed and displaced, as well as being abducted, and used as forced labour by the military. "Because of recent poor harvest, the region is reporting no surplus areas and because of widespread insecurity, there is minimal to no access to grain markets... host communities are unable to support the recently displaced," the statement said. 

Humanitarian sources told IRIN that UN access to Nuba was "a continual problem" despite the fact the UN was given the go-ahead to carry out assessments in 1999. Humanitarian agencies have been told by the government that all access must go through government-controlled areas, which is not acceptable to the SPLM, said the source. Conditions for Nuba Mountains differ from humanitarian access to southern Sudan, which comes under the negotiated UN Operation Lifeline Sudan. Non-governmental organisations involved in the region are "very concerned about Nuba Mountains", said one humanitarian source. A government military offensive picked up in December and moved into Western Kadugli County, Nuba Mountains, said one humanitarian worker with experience in the area. "What we see is the government attacking farms and homes and forcing people to come to the government-controlled areas", said the source. 

President Umar al-Bashir was sworn in on 12 February for his second term of office, and said he would work toward achieving peace in the south. In his inaugural speech Bashir said he would work toward building a "strong and unified Sudan", the official Suna news agency said. He said the question of the south was a priority, and that peace in the Sudan would be based on "diversity, religious freedoms, and participation in decision making." Peaceful solutions should be sought within the regional mediations and bilateral initiatives and Sudan should refrain from "internationalising" the issue, Bashir said. In his speech, he promised "multiparty elections" but did not elaborate, Agence France-Presse (AFP) said. Bashir took the presidential oath before 12 African heads of state, including Libya's Moamer Kadhafi and Nigeria's Olusegun Obasangjo, who are in Khartoum for a summit of the Community of Sahel-saharan States (COMESSA), AFP said. 

The president said the government had struggled to cope with a weak economic structure and limited export possibilities as well as being dependent on foreign aid. But economic development would improve, and petroleum revenues would be used for "effecting development, services and achieving peace... and the rehabilitation of what the civil war destroyed", Suna said. Bashir also said he would deal with corruption, as well as expand public services and education. He referred to Sudan's relationship with the United States of America, and called for a "constructive dialogue" under the new administration. The US continues to advocate sanctions against Sudan because of its alleged involvement with terrorism. 

The summit of the Community of Sahel-Saharan States (COMESSA) opened in  Khartoum on Monday, 12 February. It included five new members, Egypt, Morocco, Nigeria, Tunisia and Somalia, Agence France-Presse (AFP) said. Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir declared the summit open after the chairman of the regional organisation, Chadian President Idriss Deby, gave a brief introduction. Bashir called on COMESSA to work against desertification and poverty, AFP said. COMESSA was created in 1998 by Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi, and was established by a grouping with primarily economic objectives. Its 11 members were Burkina Faso, Central African Republic, Chad, Djibouti, Eritrea, Gambia, Libya, Mali, Niger, Senegal and Sudan, until the five new countries increased membership to16.

The Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) said it had captured the army garrison of Temenya, north of Kassala, eastern Sudan. An SPLA press release said Temenya was a strategic military camp situated between Adararia and Aroma on the Khartoum-Port Sudan road. A 30 metre-long bridge was destroyed in the attack on 5 February, the SPLA said. Traffic had been brought to a halt for three days after the attack, until an alternative route was opened by the government, said the statement, which was released on 10 February. According to the SPLA, the attacking force was a "special National Democratic Alliance (NDA) commando force".

But the government said Temenya was a police post, and did not have the strategic importance claimed by the SPLA. 

The decision of the Sudan government to imprison two journalists for failure to pay fines has been condemned by international freedom of expression organisations, including the Vienna-based International Press Institute (IPI) and the Canadian-based International Freedom of Expression (IFEX). The two journalists were imprisoned on 4 February for three months after failing to pay a fine of 15 million Sudanese pounds, some US $5,800, after being found guilty of libel. Amal Abbas, editor of the newspaper 'Al-Rai Al-Akher', and Ibrahim Hassan, a reporter, answered libel charges after writing an article in August 2000 alleging corruption in local government in Khartoum state. 

A statement issued by IPI said the fines imposed on the two journalists, and one of some US $390,000 imposed on the newspaper, were "disproportionate to the alleged crime". The fine against the newspaper was the highest fine ever imposed in Sudan against a publication, AP said. IPI said the decision to imprison the journalists violated freedom of expression rights. "Furthermore, the matter becomes more troubling considering the facts that the article that formed the basis of the charges concerned itself with a government institution... governments can use a number of channels, including the media, to respond to allegations made against them", IPI said, on 5 February. The organisation has written to President Omar al-Beshir urging him to annul the sentences and use civil courts to settle cases of libel, slander and defamation. 

President Omar el-Beshir has appointed 26 delegates from southern Sudan to the newly elected parliament. All 26 represent constituencies in war-torn southern Sudan where elections did not take place, the state-owned 'al-Anbaa' newspaper said on 5 February. The southern appointments include a prominent member of the opposition party United Democratic Salvation Front (UDSF), Joseph Malwal Dong, minister of survey and urban development. The UDSF was formed by southern rebel factions that signed a peace agreement with the government in April 1997, Reuters said. Malwal Dong was appointed to represent his Rumbek constituency in the Bahr al-Ghazal region. Most of the other southern delegates appointed were leading members of the ruling National Congress party, 'al-Anbaa' said. 

The ruling party won a sweeping victory in December elections - which were boycotted by most political parties - with Bashir re-elected president with 86.5 percent of the vote. Civil war in southern Sudan prevented elections going ahead in many parts of the south. The ruling National Congress Party controls 90 percent of the 360 seats in parliament, AP said. 21 seats are being contested in the courts for irregularity and fraud claims. 

Meanwhile, the new parliament elected ruling party member and legal adviser to the president, Ahmed Ibrahim el-Tahir, as its speaker on Monday. It also elected Angelo Beda, from southern Sudan, as deputy speaker and Abdullah Ahmed al-Hardalou as second deputy speaker, AP said. 

Ethiopia's military chief of staff, General Gebre Tsadikan, arrived in Khartoum on a four-day visit designed to strengthen military relations between the two countries. He arrived on Sunday, 4 February, leading a military delegation, Sudan state television said. The visit is in response to an invitation from his Sudanese counterpart, General Abbas Arabi, the report said. Joint talks between the two leaders were held at the armed forces headquarters. 

Registered opposition political parties have been ordered to turn in unlicensed weapons, used to guard their leaders and offices. Mohammed Ahmed Salim, who oversees political parties and organisations, told journalists on 1 February he had received a letter from the interior ministry instructing him to ask parties to deliver weapons unlawfully held by their followers, Agence France Press (AFP) said. He said possession of such arms violated the Weapons and Ammunition Act a swell as the Political Parties and Organisation Act which bans military or paramilitary organisations and use or manifestation of force of arms. 

Observers said the only militant, armed parties were Hassan al-Turabi's Popular National Congress, Sadiq al-Mahdi's Umma party, and the south Sudanese United Democratic Salvation Front, of which Hassan al-Turabi's party appears to be the biggest challenge to the recently reelected President Omar al-Beshir. 

A federal advisory panel on religious freedom overseas has urged the new US administration to impose tougher santions on Sudan. In its first recommendations to the new administration of US President George Bush, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom said tougher sanctions were needed because of atrocities allegedly committed against the Christian minority by the Islamic majority, Associated Press (AP) said. It advocates imposing a military no-fly zone over Sudan and wants to provide humantiarian aid to opposition forces. 

Susan Rice, a former assistant secretary of state for African affairs, denounced the Sudan government during the hearing for making "cheerful proclamations of change" while continuing repression. Rice recently visited southern Sudan and alleged a slave trade continued with the knowledge of the Sudan government. Observers said th panel may have success in gaining the attention of President Bush, who has had a steady dialogue with church officials as he works to expand the role of religious groups in social programmes, AP said. 

The Sudan government has called for improved Sudan-US relations, and said it is working on thawing the "chill" between the two countries. 

A bus carrying 28 people plunged into the River Nile on 30 January, when it collided with a truck, on the Shambat bridge connecting Khartoum and Umdurman.  Police have confirmed to journalists that 22 people died in accident, and bodies are still being identified. 

Police immediately arrived and rescued four people from the mini-bus, state-run televisison said on Tuesday. Police General Abdel Baqi Mustafa told the press that the minibus was crossing from Khartoum to Omdurman in the evening rush hour, when the truck travelling in the same direction hit and pushed it into the river, AFP said on Tuesday. 

The Minister of External Relations Dr Mustafa Uthman Isma'il said he hoped that relations between Sudan and the US would improve under the new US administration.  He said the Sudan government attached great importance to Sudanese-American relations, as well as to "the importance of removing the chill and tension in the bilateral relations which occurred during the epoch of the former American administration", the official news agency Suna said in a report on 26 January. In a statement to Suna, the minister said Sudan was keen to cooperate with the new administration and to know how it defined its policy towards Sudan.

The southern-based Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) said it had captured three government stations and three oil wells near Bentiu, Upper Nile. SPLA spokesman in Nairobi, Samson Kwaje told IRIN that the oil wells were attacked last week and about 80 government soldiers killed, and that heavy fighting continued in the area. According to the SPLA, the clashes began on Friday, 26 January, near the oil city of Bentui, some 800 km south of the Sudanese capital of Khartoum. The SPLA said the oil wells were "burning". 

An statement issued in Cairo by SPLA commander Yasser Arman accused the Khartoum government of "using oil revenues to suppress the Sudanese people and extend the civil war." He also warned foreign oil companies to leave the country. The statement said that "SPLA renews its warning that oil-extracting areas are legitimate military targets and that thousands of poor people have been displaced and their villages burned down because of the work of the oil companies", news agencies said. 

The SPLA announced last year that government-run oil installations were legitimate targets in the civil war, including those supported by foreign oil companies, but this is the first reported such attack. In May 1999, residents in oil-rich Bentiu took several foreign oil experts captive, demanding the government appropriate a share of oil revenues to development projects and the improvement of local services. Oil and the distribution of resources had "always been one of the issues between north and south, but is now the focus of the conflict militarily", a regional expert told IRIN. 

Official military spokesman General Mohamed Osman Yassin said the government had driven back a rebel attack on oil fields near Bentui, Upper Nile. He told news agencies that there had been "some loss of life" of government troops, but said oil production and exploration continued. Yassin denied that the oil fields had been destroyed, and said the attack took place outside the production area. According to the military spokesman, civilians fled the from the SPLA attack, which took place on Friday.

Meanwhile, the government said on Thursday 25 January that production of oil would increase to 400,000 barrels per day in the year 2005, compared to the current production of 200,000 barrels daily. The secretary-general of the Ministry of Energy and Mining, Hasan Ali al-Tawm also said there were indications that more oil fields existed, including Al-Mijlad basin, Western Sudan - which extends to 1200 km in length and 300 km in width - as well as Malut basin between Barah, western Sudan, and Adariel, southwestern Sudan. He also mentioned the area between Khartoum and Ad Dindar, central Sudan, the Red Sea area, North Eastern Sudan, and North Western Kordofan areas in western Sudan. He made the remarks in a lecture at the University of Khartoum, which were carried by the official Sudanese news agency Suna. 

Minister of State at the Ministry of External Relations, Gabriel Roric Jur, said there would be a referendum over the status of the south. He told Radio France Internationale, in a broadcast monitored by the BBC on 27 January, that a referendum would improve relations between north and south, whatever the outcome. Unity of the country and a federal system was "a must", said Jur - but if separation was the result it was important to have good neighbourliness. He said the government had already signed an agreement with a breakaway faction of the southern based Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), then led by Riek Machar from Upper Nile. According to Jur, the agreement included the option of self-detirmination for the south, but there had been no positive response from the mainstream SPLA leader John Garang. 

The issue of self-detirmination for the south along with the separation of religion and state remains one of the main stumbling blocks for regionally brokered peace talks between the government and the SPLA, humanitarian sources told IRIN. 

President Omar Hassan al-Beshir visited Juba, the capital of war-affected southern Sudan, and said peace would be the priority of his second term of office. He made the stopover on his way back from the funeral of the later Congolese president Laurent Kabila, held in Kinshasa, state-run Sudanese television said on 25 January. 

During the visit, Bashir addressed a large gathering, and met senior local officials. "Peace is the most important item in my second term of office and my first visit (since re-election) outside Khartoum is Juba to reaffirm the importance of peace," the independent Akhbar al-Youm quoted him as saying at the public rally. Bashir said at the rally that those still carrying arms should stop fighting and embrace peace, Reuters news agency said. The president visits Juba, which has the largest government garrison in the south, about once a year, Reuters said.  Bashir heard in a briefing with local governors that many displaced people had been arriving in Juba from surrounding areas because of the effects of drought and lack of food, Reuters added. 

A senior member of the opposition Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), Dr Ahmad Bilal, has said that his party will participate in the next government of Sudan. Bilal said his party was in full agreement with the ruling National Congress party with regard to policies and programmes, the official Sudanese news agency (SUNA) reported on Sunday. Bilal said, however, that the nature of his party's participation had not been discussed or detailed, and that the matter was being worked out at committees level, Suna said. The announcement was made after the opposition Umma Party said earlier this week that it would not participate in the new government. 

Sudanese government planes bombed civilian and humanitarian targets in southern and central Sudan 152 times last year, according to the US Committee for Refugees (USCR). Last year's bombings meant that aerial attacks occurred on average nearly three times a week during 2000, the USCR stated. Executive Director Roger Winter visited southern Sudan in January, where he investigated a new bombing site in the Bahr al-Ghazal area and spoke to civilian survivors. "The Sudanese government's objective seems to be to push people from their homes in preparation for a large new military offensive, and to depopulate areas to begin exploitation of expanded oilfields," Winter said in the report. 

The USCR statement, released on Monday in Washington DC, USA, said there were eight confirmed attacks on civilian and humanitarian targets in the first three weeks of this year. It accused the government of using larger, more powerful bombs and helicopter gunships in some of its most recent attacks. Humanitarian sources told IRIN that there was concern over significant population displacement due to a "major military offensive by the government in the south". 

Leader of the Umma opposition party, Sadiq al-Mahdi, said that he would have no part of the new government without a political agreement. Sadiq al-Mahdi, a former prime minister, told journalists that the government was "totalitarian", Reuters said on 22 January. In a press conference, he said "we cannot continue to negotiate with the government indefinitely and we have decided irrevocably not to take part in this totalitarian government." He said the Umma party had reached deadlock with the government, but gave no details. Some Umma officials had said the party would only join a coalition when a comprehensive political settlement had been reached. 

Special precautions have been adopted to try and increase food supplies in Sudan, said Minister of Agriculture Abd-al-Hamid Musa Kasha. The minister told the press that precautions included a special work plan aimed at increasing the productivity of cereals through irrigated schemes, and purchasing strategic food reserves. Northern Darfur and Northern Kordofan in western Sudan were affected by low rainfall, as well as other areas, said the minister. He called on the government to give due concern in the second presidency mandate to rehabilitate irrigation schemes, and to finance agricultural operations to improve food security, said the official news agency SUNA. Humanitarian sources told IRIN that food needs in Sudan would increase "significantly" in the coming year, and that there were fears of a "looming crisis", particularly in the south. 

President Umar al-Bashir will take oath as president of the republic for a second five-year term on 12 February. He will take the oath before the National Assembly during the first session of the newly-elected assembly, the official news agency SUNA said on 19 January. Regional and international figures have been invited to the ceremony. The date for the swearing in was announced by Secretary-General of the National Assembly Ibrahim Muhammad Ibrahim in a press conference held at parliament buildings. A speaker of the house will be elected on 5 February. According to the Secretary-General, the assembly will consider more than 65 provisional orders that had been issued during its absence. 

Missionaries working in southern Sudan said that the war was no longer one for liberation. In a statement sent to IRIN, 30 Comboni Missionaries gathered for an annual assembly said that they had come to the unanimous conviction that the war in Sudan was "not any longer a struggle for freedom of the Sudanese people and for the defence of human rights".  The statement said that after working in the "liberated areas" of southern Sudan, they had come to the unanimous conviction that the war in Sudan had become "immoral and a tragic farce". It said religion was distorted and misused as a means for other interests, and that the war had become "a struggle for power, business and greed". It said the number of victims of the war had increased and that "humanity in Sudan is getting lost". "Corruption, tribalism and fratricidal hatred are fostered... The word "liberation" is abused... (with) Northerners against Southerners, Northerners against Northerners, Southerners against Southerners, Nuer and Dinka are fighting against Arabs. Nuer and Arabs are fighting against Dinka. Dinka against Dinka. Nuer against Nuer..." 

The missionaries said that aid was prolonging the war. "NGOs and churches prolong the fighting through the relief aid that unknowingly supports also the warring factions," the statement said. It appealed to all sides to put down weapons and intensify mediation for peace, and said the "political and economic powers of the world" should give up greed and self interest to stop the war. The Italian Catholic Comboni missionaries, named after the first bishop of Khartoum, have had a long history of involvement with Sudan. 

Britain should make use of a planned visit to London by rebel leader John Garang to push ahead peace efforts and establish a ceasefire. Sudan's ambassador to Britain Dr Hasan Abidin said the British government should put pressure on leader of the Sudan Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA) to respond to the call for a comprehensive ceasefire. He said in a statement to SUNA, monitored by the BBC, that he hoped Garang's visit would not be aimed at "expanding the war culture and continuing circulation of his old agenda." Meanwhile, a government official called on the European Union (EU) to exercise "political and diplomatic pressure" on Garang to return to the negotiating table and "sign an agreement for a comprehensive ceasefire". The remarks, carried by the official Sudanese News Agency (SUNA) on 17 January, were made by Undersecretary of the Ministry of External Relations Ambassador Awad al-Karim Fadlallah and were directed to ambassadors of the countries that Garang "intended to visit on 20 January". 

Spokesman Rufus Drabble at the British High Commission in Nairobi told IRIN that there had been no confirmation of Garang's intended visit, although the SPLA leader had expressed interest in taking up the invitation by the British government. "He has been invited to visit Britain to match the visit by the Sudanese Foreign Minister last year, but it is not a funded visit", qualified Drabble. The British government would hope to arrange meetings with the foreign office and the Sudan Desk office, and possible with ministers, to "expose Garang to a range of UK opinions on Sudan", the spokesman told IRIN. 

Thousands of people have fled rebel-held areas in Sudan's Nuba mountains and sought sanctuary in government controlled territory, a Sudanese government official said on 17 January. State-run Sudanese television showed on Tuesday night thousands of civilians, mostly women, naked children and elderly people, in the Nuba Mountains town of Kadugli, about 900 km southwest of the capital Khartoum, Associated Press (AP) said. The television report said about 30,000 such people had fled to Kadugli and its surrounding areas after the army defeated a rebel force in the Nuba Mountain area. Mohamed Haroon Kafi, a former member of the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), told AP that more people were expected to follow after the government victory: "These people have been under check by the rebel movement, not allowing them to move outside and ... not provided with any services." Kafi is now a state minister in the Khartoum government. 

A statement by the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), received by IRIN 18 January, denied that government forces had scored recent victories, including in the Nuba Mountains. It said the government had started a dry season offensive before the end of December when civilian targets were bombed at Kawuda and neighbouring villages: "The few ground attacks that were staged by the GOS army and the People's Defence Force (PDF) have been repulsed with heavy casualties." The SPLA said "claims by GOS that its forces have "liberated" 30,000 Nuba civilians from rebels are... ludicrous". 

Humanitarian sources told IRIN that humanitarian access to Nuba Mountains "had always been a problem" and that any assistance would have to be requested by the government, separate from the established UN Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS) agreement. 

The Sudanese People's Defence Forces (PDF) will soon launch a new brigade, the Sudan government said. The Commander of the PDF, Brigadier Umar al-Amin Karar, said the Homeland Shield Brigade would be launched to "operation zones" and would be mobilized soon, the Sudanese News Agency (SUNA) reported on 13 January. 

Karar said new training centres were ready and open to receive recruits. He said that the PDF were backing up the armed forces, Suna reported. Meanwhile, the coordinator of the PDF Ali Ahmed Kurti, said that mobilisation of the Homeland Shield Brigade would be at various localities, and that he appreciated the participation of the civil service recruits in the PDF, said Suna. 

A border trade agreement was signed between the Ministry of foreign Trade and the Northern State(Sudan), Libya and Egypt, Sudanese Television reported on 16 January. The agreement, amounting to US $5.09 million dollars, is intended to boost border trade with Egypt and Libya, said state media. 

The Northern State governor, Dr. Al-Mu'tasim Abd-al-Rahimal Hasan, said the state was happy to promote the exchange of foreign trade with Egyptianprovince of Aswan , and with Libya through Kufrah road, Sudan Television reported. 

Nine foreigners have been arrested in Kenya, who police say are connected 
to terrorist activities. Most of the suspects are Sudanese nationals and were arrested by the Special Crime Prevention Unit (SCPU). A spokesman from SCPU in Nairobi confirmed to IRIN that the nine foreigners had been arrested and were being held in custody. He said they were expected to be produced in court by the end of the week and would initially be charged with staying in Kenya illegally.

According to a state television report on 16 January, monitored by the BBC, they were arrested after a one-year investigation on NGOs run by "foreigners". Head of the SCPU Peter Kavila said the suspects had been operating under the cover of two NGOs with roots in Sudan. One of the organisations dealt with "recruiting people from our country and taking them to Arabian countries, purportedly for employment" said Kavila in the broadcast. Detectives seized seven Sudanese passports, 10 Kenyan passports, three Comoron passports, two Eritrean passports, and one Ethiopian passport. 

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has resumed repatriation of some 13,000 Ethiopian refugees in Sudan. In a press briefing in Geneva on Tuesday, UNHCR spokesman Kris Janowski said the refugees had volunteered to go home after blanket refugee status for Ethiopians who fled their country under the former regime of Mengistu Haile Mariam was lifted. He said that UNHCR believed "conditions that drove the refugees out of Ethiopia have changed significantly" since the collapse of the regime in 1991.

On Tuesday the sixth convoy, carrying 900 Ethiopian refugees, left Tendba and Um Gulja refugee camps, Eastern Sudan, to Ethiopia. The returnees have been promised arable land, as well as reintegration packages which include nine-month food ratios, basic household supplies and a cash reintegration grant, Janowski said. 

Tens of thousands of refugees have returned to Ethiopia with UNHCR assistance since the collapse of Mengistu regime. These included 72,000 from Sudan, and 80,000 from Kenya. There are still 12,000 Ethiopian refugees in Sudan. Since mid-December, UNHCR said it had assisted 2,400 refugees to return home, in an operation that is expected to be completed before the end of January. This will pave the way for the closure of the camps that hosted the refugees for nearly a decade, the UNHCR spokesman said. 

Both the government of Sudan and rebels groups have violated human rights in the civil war, say the US-based Human Rights Watch in its World Report 2001. The government has "stepped up its brutal expulsion of southern villagers from the oil production areas and trumpeted its resolve to use the oil income for more weapons," said the report. Under the leadership of President Omar el-Beshir the government had intensified its bombing of civilian targets, denied relief food to needy civilians, and abused children's rights, particularly through military and logistical support for the Ugandan rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), said Human Rights Watch. The Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), the principal armed movement based in the south, had "continued to loot food (including relief provisions) from the population, sometimes with civilian casualties, recruit child soldiers, and commit rape." Gross human rights violations in Sudan came from the fact that "On both sides, impunity was the rule." The government's human rights record was a factor in the UN General Assembly vote in October that denied a Security Council seat to Sudan, said the report. It said that efforts to end the war had stalled on the issues of the relation of religion to the state and self-determination. 

The British Archbishop of Canterbury has protested to the government about the destruction of the Episcopal Church Cathedral in Lui, western Equatoria, southern Sudan. In a letter to the Sudanese ambassador in London, he said the bombing of the church "highlights the continued targeting of undoubted civilian centres by the government of Sudan." It said Lui was a renowned centre of religious life, education and health care and "has never been a military centre, except during the period 1995-97 when it was a base for government troops." "When such a centre is consistently targeted it is hard to avoid the conclusion that the intentions to harm and terrorise the civilian population," said the letter, dated 16 January, 2001. It requested that the letter be forwarded to President Omar el-Bashir, and that he "clearly state that the armed forces will not target civilian centres of population, but only legitimate military targets, and then to abide transparently by this commitment."

The European Commission has approved euro 15 million (US $14.1 million) to maintain delivery of humanitarian assistance to Sudan. A statement posted on 15 January by the European Community Humanitarian Office (ECHO) said the assistance would aim to reduce morality rates among the most vulnerable sections of the population and to promote increased self-reliance in the war-affected society. It said that the country was entering its eighteenth year of civil war.
"Administrative structures have all but collapsed in the South and there are large numbers of internally displaced people (IDPs) in both government and rebel-held areas." The aid would be directed through ECHO and would focus on health, water/sanitation, food security, non-food relief and logistical support both in government-controlled and rebel-held areas. According to the statement, "the security situation in Sudan remained highly volatile, jeopardising the safety of relief workers." The ability to obtain access to affected populations and security considerations would be key to the success of future proposed interventions, ECHO said.

The government has refused to ratify an international treaty on women's rights, saying it contradicts national traditions. The remark made by President Omar el-Beshir, was published in the international and local press on 14 January. The official news agency SUNA gave no other details on Beshir's announcement regarding the Convention of Eradication of all forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). Beshir's remarks came almost five months after UNICEF Deputy Executive Director Karin Sham Poo urged him to sign the convention which she said "seeks to remove harmful practices and maintain equality between men and women." She has urged the government of Sudan "to ratify CEDAW and make its commitment to its women not a passive one but an obligation for the succeeding generations to honour and uphold. The reports on Beshir's refusal were posted on the UNICEF website.

The Government of Sudan has exempted the imports of sorghum, maize, and other cereals from customs duties, and other taxes on Monday. The decision is linked to shortfalls in these stable commodities in some parts of the country, the Associated Press (AP) said. Earlier this month the government decided to lift a ban on importing sorghum and millet. A statement from the Sudanese Ministry of Finance and National Economy said the ministry would "shoulder all taxes and fees imposed by seaports authorities or others on imports of sorghum and animal fodder." Unofficial estimates in Sudan suggest a food shortage of about 1.2 mt in western, southern, and south-central regions, AP said. Humanitarian sources told IRIN that there was "great concern" over the food situation in Sudan, and that food needs would rise significantly this year.

Seven opposition members of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) will be brought before a court in the coming days. The Sudan news agency (SUNA), monitored by the BBC, said that the Minster of Justice Ali Mohamed Uthman Yassin investigations provided sufficient evidence for trial. He made the announcement on 13 January. The seven members of the NDA were arrested last month while meeting with an American diplomat in Khartoum. 

According to SUNA, the documents found on the defendants referred to ways of undermining the government of Sudan. If convicted of high treason, the defendants could face up to 10 years to life in prison, said the Associated Press. 

In the last two months of the year 2000 the Khartoum airforce conducted over 50 bombings in South Sudan, killing over 47 people, for the most part civilians. This was the tragic toll published today by the Sudan Focal Point association based in Nairobi (Kenya). The worst-hit region by the government Antonov planes was Equatoria, with over 20 bombings. In one of the latest attacks, on the city of Lui, 2 people were killed and the Cathedral of the local Episcopal church was destroyed. Between 7 and 8 air raids were instead carried out in both Bahr al Ghazal and the Blue Nile in the south. Sporadic attacks were also reported on targets in the High Nile and southern Kordofan. Yesterday another government raid was denounced in Mariel Bai (Bahr al Ghazal), in which 11 people were killed and some 120, for the most part women and children, were abducted. The raid was attributed to the People’s Defence Forces, but the dynamics of the attack were typical of those carried out by the Baqqara, nomad herders of Arab origin. The regime of Khartoum supplies these Islamic tribes with armoured vehicles and automatic weapons, given them a sort of go ahead to carry out continuous raids against villages of Sub-Saharan ethnic groups, such as the Dinka. In the past the Baqqara were known for robbing and abducting women and children, avoiding any form of bloodshed.

Pro-government militia operating in southern Sudan have seized 122 women and children in a mass abduction in the Bahr el-Ghazal area of Mariel Bai. UNICEF spokesman for Southern Sudan, Martin Dawes, told IRIN that his organisation had put forward its concerns about recent abductions, which started last month, to the government in Khartoum. "We have reports of abductions and raids and hope to put people into the field to investigate and record names of those abducted," he told IRIN. But the present insecurity prevented the mobilisation of field staff, said Dawes. 

A Reuters report said the pro-government Popular Defence Forces (PDF) militia had seized 122 women and children, killed 11 people and wounded two in the targeted area some 950 km southwest of the capital Khartoum. The Sudan government has previously vowed to combat the practice of abductions in the south, said the report. Also involved were Arab raiders of the Baggara tribe, known as the Muraheleen. Raiders from the Muraheleen reportedly stole 5,075 heads of cattle from the Dinka tribe in the Bahr el-Ghazal villages of Acuro, Ajok, Wunkir, Nyinameeth and Nyinaccor, according to the information gleaned by UN officials. 

A government plane bombed and destroyed the Frazer Cathedral at Lui, western Equatoria, southern Sudan, on 29 December. A letter from the Bishop of the Diocese of Lui, Reverend Bullen Dolli, said that Lui had been repeatedly bombed despite being "a civil population centre best known for its religious and educational life." In a letter dated 2 January, made available to IRIN, the bishop appealed to the international community to "restrain the Government of Sudan from committing atrocities". He said it would be shameful "on humanity in general and the OAU, UN Security Council in particular, to watch, hands folded" while the atrocities continued. The letter appealed to the World Council of Churches and the All Africa Conference of Churches to raise the profile of the situation in Sudan "and vigorously advocate for a quick, just and peaceful resolution of the longest war on the African continent." 

Large numbers of displaced people around Upper Nile in southern Sudan were putting pressure on local populations whose food needs were not secure, and fears were growing of a humanitarian crisis, UNICEF spokesman Martin Dawes told IRIN on Wednesday. Humanitarian agencies have indicated that food needs will increase in Sudan, and contingency preparations are underway to address the approaching crisis. "We are extremely concerned", said Dawes. 

Food needs will increase by about 20 percent in 2001, compared to the year 2000, according to the the World Food Programme. WFP press officer Lindsey Davies said there was an urgent need for prompt action to avoid a repetition of the scenes of 1998, when there was a major famine in Bahr el-Ghazal province in South Sudan. "There is real cause for concern over a looming crisis that will face more than 3.2 million people in Sudan due to the combined effects of civil war and worsening drought, both in the north and south of the country", Davies said. 

Diplomatic sources told IRIN that military activity in southern Sudan, especially in greater Bahr-el Ghazal, had come earlier than usual. Annual cycles of fighting in Sudan tend to be dictated by seasonal weather patterns. "It seems to be a strategic process to secure the oil fields", said one regional diplomat. There has been a recent increase in the number of raids in Bahr el-Ghazal involving the pro-government militia, the Peoples Defence Forces (PDF), the source said.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Mussa said in a visit to the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, on Tuesday that the time was right for a peace conference involving all Sudanese factions. Before leaving Khartoum, he told journalists that Egypt was "seriously working toward holding a meeting soon of inter-Sudanese reconciliation, because the time is now more favourable than before", AFP reported. But opposition representatives said President Omar al-Bashir had dashed hopes of reconciliation by insisting on Monday that he would continue the war option in the south and imposing Islamic law nationwide, the agency said. Egypt and Libya are sponsoring a joint peace initiative for Sudan. This is in parallel to the mediation efforts of the region Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), which has sponsored peace talks between the government and the southern-based Sudan People's Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M). 

The human rights organisation Amnesty International has expressed concern about eight opposition political activists and two lawyers who have reportedly been held without charge in solitary confinement for over a month. In an urgent alert issued on Tuesday, Amnesty said one of the detainees, Ghazi Suleiman, a lawyer from the Sudanese Human Rights Group, had been hospitalised twice since his arrest and there was concern that he had been tortured in custody. President Bashir had amended the National Security Law on 10 December 2000, removing the right to challenge detentions of less than 93 days through the courts, Amnesty stated. Bashir had also extended the State of Emergency, declared in December 1999, until the end of 2001, it added. 

Sadiq Al- Mahdi, the leader of the Ummah Party and former prime minister, has accused Washington of trying to foment civil war in the north of Sudan. The London-based Arabic language newspaper, Al-Sharq al-Awsat, monitored by the BBC, reported on 4 January that Al-Mahdi accused President Bill Clinton's administration of "planning to transfer 6,000 fighters of the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) from southern Sudan to the eastern borders". This move is aimed at expanding the war to the north "where it will have more impact on the current government," said the report. 

Al-Mahdi accused the US administration of putting a lot of pressure on Ethiopia and Eritrea to support this plan. He added that he was not hostile to the US, but was "fiercely opposed" to its policy towards Sudan. According to Al-Mahdi the aim of the US policy was, to create a secular state, like Turkey, in the Sudan; gain control over Sudanese oil sites and to alienate Sudan from "its Arab environment" said the report. The US has consistently denied such reports. 

President Omar Hassan Bashir has extended the state of emergency in Sudan for a year. The official Sudan News Agency (SUNA) gave no reasons for the extension of the emergency, which was first declared on 12 December 1999, during President Bashir's power struggle with former parliamentary Speaker, Hassan al-Turabi.

Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir has extended the state of emergency in the country by one more year. The Sudanese news agency (SUNA) reported on Wednesday that the president had issued "a republican decree" renewing the state of emergency for another year. The state of emergency was declared in December 1999 after Bashir fell out with his erstwhile ally, the former speaker of parliament, Hassan al-Turabi.

Meanwhile, the government of Oman has lifted the ban on Sudanese livestock. SUNA reported that the Sudanese minister of animal resources, Dr. Abdallah Sid Ahmad, received a message from his Omani counterpart, Dr. Ahmad Bin-Khalfan Al-Rawahi, informing him of the lifting of the ban. Oman imposed the ban after the outbreak of Rift Valley Fever in Saudi Arabia and Yemen late last year. 

The re-elected president of Sudan, Omar al-Bashir, has announced that he will form a government with fresh faces. The Sudanese news agency (SUNA) reported on Wednesday that the president announced the coming period "necessitates... the formation of a new government, with new faces" to cope with "recent developments".  The president also said he looked forward "to a positive chapter" in relations with the US. He went on to say that Sudan would endeavour to work with the new administration in Washington, and that "errors of the past" would be overcome, the SUNA report said.

At a news conference broadcast live by Sudan state television and Omdurman radio on 29 December, monitored by the BBC, the chairman of the General Electoral Commission (GEC), Abd al-Mun'im al-Zayn al-Nahhas, declared the incumbent president and candidate of the National Congress party, Lt-Gen Umar Hasan Ahmad al-Bashir, the winner of the presidential election. Nahhas said Bashir had received 86.5 percent of the vote, with his nearest rival, former President Ja'far Muhammad Numayri, taking 9.6 percent of the vote. The GEC chairman said about 8,153,372 people had participated in the polls through 50,000 voting centres. 

Meanwhile, the nine-member observer team from the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), led by Ambassador Pascal Gayama, has praised the manner in which the elections were conducted. In a statement released in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, on 29 December, and carried by the Sudanese News Agency (SUNA), the team said that, "having observed the elections in various parts of the country", it wished "to commend the GEC for the arrangements that allowed the Sudanese people, including those outside the country, to freely exercise their democratic rights". In this respect, the team also wished "to congratulate the Sudanese people in general for their maturity, patience and the disciplined manner which they manifested throughout the process". 

The team noted, however, that in a country of about 30 million people, "it was inevitable that there would be some logistical challenges", which it hoped "will be overcome in future elections". Noting that "some major political parties had boycotted the elections", it said that nonetheless "it was encouraging that the leaders from all sides expressed their readiness and commitment to embark, after the elections, on a dialogue", which would "hopefully bring about national reconciliation". To sum up, the OAU team expressed the view "that the overall exercise was an important step towards democratisation and that it was conducted in a conducive atmosphere and in a satisfactory manner". 

Asked to comment on the election results, the spokesman for the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) in Nairobi, Samson Kwaje, told IRIN: "We don't accept the results of the election." He said this was because no elections had taken place "in the 42 percent of the country under the control of the SPLM/A" and that throughout the rest of the country "only 20 percent of the voters participated in the elections because supporters of the main opposition parties [such as the Ummah Party and the Democratic Unionist Party] were told by their party leaders to boycott them". Kwaje also said it was clear to the SPLM/A that the results had been "heavily rigged in favour of Bashir". 

Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika arrived in Khartoum for a three-day official visit on Sunday, Sudan television, monitored by the BBC, reported. His visit was scheduled to coincide with Sudan's independence day anniversary, on Monday. He was met at the airport by President Umar al-Bashir, ministers and other senior government officials. The television showed Bouteflika subsequently addressing journalists, whom he told: "Through you I thank the fraternal Sudanese people and the confidence they have in my brother Umar al-Bashir as his presidential tenure was renewed." He recalled Bashir's visit to Algeria and meeting him elsewhere "on many occasions", during which "we analysed our issues from a new perspective and reached the point of recognising the need to strengthen ties in all fields". "I think our bilateral positions are in agreement on Arab and African issues," he said. 

During the celebrations marking Sudan's 45th independence anniversary on Monday, which he attended together with Bashir, Bouteflika said in a speech delivered to mark the occasion that he was willing to help Sudan bring about national reconciliation. He said he would "join hands with President Bashir for solving all issues that need contribution and coordination with efforts exerted by other parties for achieving national reconciliation in Sudan", AFP reported on Monday. He called on all the Sudanese opposition groupings and the government "to sit down for negotiations, putting aside their differences for the sake of the interests of the country and the people", according to the report. AFP also cited the Sudanese press as reporting statemements according to which Algerian Foreign Minister Abdelaziz Balkhadim ruled out any Algerian initiative for solving the conflict, but noted that "there are efforts by President Bouteflika to bring viewpoints closer, making use of his relations with the government and the opposition". 

More than 3.2 million people in Sudan are facing serious food and water shortages because of civil war and widening drought. The WFP December Update called the situation "a looming crisis". 

According to WFP, some 700,000 more people are considered vulnerable this month, compared to estimates made only a month ago. "An additional appeal may be made on the basis of the assessment recently implemented by WFP and FAO [Food and Agriculture Organisation]", WFP said. It warned that lack of basic equipment, such as pumps to draw water from wells, "gives people little choice but to become nomadic when surface water supplies dry up". People affected by drought and war had started selling off cattle, causing a drop in livestock prices, warned WFP. According to the WFP December Update, "grain prices have gone up, which means that not much locally produced grain is being harvested". 

A joint WFP and FAO report released on 22 December said rainfall in Sudan had characteristically been late, absent or uneven, which had affected crops at critical growth stages. Both northern and southern states had been affected. But insecurity was the major cause of food aid need in Sudan, said the FAO/WFP Crop and Food Supply Assessment. It said WFP - currently feeding 1.7 million people in Sudan - continued to meet food aid needs in an emergency operation because of "unpredictable food crop production and changing security circumstances". The operation would be extended until March 2001.