United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has pledged the UN's continuing support for the talks aimed at ending conflict in southern Sudan. He said the peace process had reached a critical phase with the signing on 26 May of three key protocols on power-sharing and the contested areas. 
In a message read during the formal launch of the final phase of talks between the Sudanese government and the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM/A) in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, on 5 June, Annan said the UN would send an advance team to support negotiations between the two parties. 
The Sudanese government and the SPLM/A have signed six protocols, which, together with two annexes, are to make up a comprehensive peace agreement. Technical committees are expected - within two months - to prepare annexes governing the implementation of the protocols and comprehensive ceasefire arrangements and guarantees. 
Muhammad Ahmad Dirdeiry, the Sudanese deputy ambassador in Nairobi, told IRIN on Monday that work of the final phase would start on 22 June. 
Dirdeiry said the two protocols - on a comprehensive ceasefire and on modalities of implementation - together with the other protocols already signed "will together form a comprehensive peace agreement, the signing of which would signal the pre-interim period" lasting six months, and lead to an interim period of six years. At the end of the period, "a referendum on whether to remain in a united Sudan" or separate will be held in the south, Dirdeiry told IRIN. 
Efforts by IRIN to obtain comment from the SPLM/A were unsuccessful. 
Annan also called for a "concerted international response" to the crisis in the western Sudanese state of Darfur, where fighting between government forces and allied militias on the one hand and two armed rebel groups on the other hand has displaced up to two million people. 
"The crisis in Darfur continues to cause appalling suffering that demands a concerted international response," said Annan in his message.

A declaration to launch the ‘final phase’ of the peace negotiations on Sudan was signed today in Nairobi (Kenya) by Sudan Vice-President Ali Osman Taha and the leader of the SPLA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army). As reported by international press sources, the document was undersigned in the Kenyan presidential offices, in the presence of the Head of State Mwai Kibaki. The declaration confirms the pledges already indicated in the protocols signed by the sides last May 26 on the last issues to be resolved for a ‘global and inclusive’ accord that ends a war underway for 21 years between Khartoum and rebellion of the South. The ‘final phase’ opened today foresees the examination of the “application modalities of the accords, the monitoring mechanisms of the cease-fire and other necessary measures to consolidate and guarantee security of peace”, as explained by the Kenyan Foreign Minister on the eve of this meeting. From July 2002 the Islamic government of the North and the separatists of the SPLA (that does not however represent the complex ethnic-political mosaic of South Sudan, but only the main armed group) reached an agreement that foresees the right to a referendum on the self-determination of the southern territories after a six-year transition period and the non-application of Sharìa (Islamic law) in the South; in the past months an accord was also reached on the equal sharing of oil proceeds from the rich deposits of the nation and on the administration of the armed forces during the transition period, which should be accompanied by a large-scale United Nations peace mission, currently being studied. The complex conflict in Sudan – often represented only as a religious contrast between the North (Arab and Muslim) and the South (inhabited by prevalently Christian and Animist black populations) – since 1983 resulted in an unconfirmed number of victims claimed by famine and disease; an over all death toll of 2-million, while at least double of displaced and refugees.

The Sudanese government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) have taken major steps towards ending their 21-year old conflict. After two years of negotiations, they have signed six key protocols governing a referendum on southern Sudan after a six-year interim period; security, wealth-sharing and power-sharing arrangements during the interim; the status of Abyei; and the status of southern Blue Nile and the Nuba mountains. 
On 5 June, they will resume negotiations to thrash out implementation details, as well as a formula for a comprehensive ceasefire and international monitoring and peace-keeping. Two annexes plus the six protocols will then make up the comprehensive peace agreement. 
Last week's breakthrough that officially ended the bilateral "political" negotiations was welcomed by all concerned and widely hailed as the beginning of the end of Africa's longest-running civil war. But, Sudan watchers say, a number of potential spoilers remain, not least the numerous armed militias in the south. 
According to the South Africa-based think-tank, the Institute for Security Studies (ISS), an umbrella of southern militias known as the South Sudan Defence Force (SSDF) poses a serious threat to harmony in the whole of Sudan. 
"Armed, angry at being left out of the peace process, and fearful that decisions are being made that will affect its interests, the SSDF poses a major challenge to both the peace process and to the success of the proposed six-year transitional period," says a report entitled "The South Sudan Defence Force: A Challenge to the Sudan Peace Process". 
To view the report go to <a href="http://www.iss.co.za/AF/profiles/Sudan/sudan1.html" target="_blank">www.iss.co.za</a> 
The SSDF demands attention for a number of key reasons, says ISS. Although its membership is constantly in a state of flux, it has several thousand members who could mobilise thousands more, particularly among the Nuer community, who constitute southern Sudan's second largest ethnic group after the Dinka. 
Its precise areas of control are debatable, but certainly cover much of Upper Nile, parts of northern and western Bahr al-Ghazal, Bahr al-Jabal and much of Eastern Equatoria. "What can be said with confidence is that claims made by the SPLM/A and its supporters to hold sway over 80 percent of southern Sudan and to surround all of the government towns in the region are clearly false," says the report. 
Thirdly, the SSDF provides strategic security around the oilfields of western and eastern Upper Nile and many of the garrison towns in the south. Lastly, it contains a substantial number of Nuer, who had a series of clashes with the Dinka-dominated SPLM/A in the 1990s that led to tens of thousands of deaths. 
"Given the SSDF's size, strategic location, and propensity to fight and resist whatever the odds, a viable and sustainable peace process that does not have its support (and that of a large majority of the Nuer in particular) is hard to imagine," says ISS. 
The SSDF, which comprises about 25 militias, was formed in 1997 following the signing of the Khartoum Peace Agreement between the Sudanese government, Riek Machar's South Sudan Independence Movement (SSIM) and five other southern factions. The agreement committed the government to a vote on self-determination for the south after an interim period of unspecified length, while the militias agreed to a tactical alliance with Khartoum. 
The biggest concentration of SSDF members are based in oil-rich Western Upper Nile where they have been used to depopulate and gain control of the oilfields. They are usually based close to garrison towns - from which they are supported logistically and supplied with arms - recruited locally, and are personality- and ethnicity-driven.  Despite their significance, however, they have been almost entirely left out of the peace process. 
According to the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) mediators it would have been impossible to negotiate with all of Sudan's different armed goups at the same time. "There was not a single militia included because they are either represented by the government or the SPLM/A. So they were indirectly included," Lazarus Sumbeiywo, IGAD's chief mediator told IRIN. 
Samson Kwaje, the SPLM/A spokesman told IRIN that all of the militias had either been absorbed into the SPLM/A or the Sudanese army. "There is no threat, they have been absolved into the army. So actually they don't exist now." 
In January 2004, Khartoum reportedly appointed some 60 SSDF commanders to senior ranks. 
But ISS says that Khartoum, the SPLM/A and the international community - including the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development mediators - have all wrongly assumed that the SPLM/A and the government are in control of Sudan's destiny. 
"The first shock to the holders of this myopic view was the rapidly escalating war and humanitarian crisis in Darfur. The second shock could well be a demonstration of the inability of either the government or the SPLM/A to control and pacify the disparate elements of the SSDF." 

Peace negotiations 

The SSDF did manage to send a delegation of 17 officials to Kenya for discussions between the government and the SPLM/A on security arrangements during the interim period, and appointed an SSDF member, Martin Kenyi of the Equatoria Defence Forces (EDF), to the government negotiating team. 
But the protocol on security arrangements reached on 25 September 2003 repeatedly acknowledges only two military players in Sudan: the government forces and the SPLM/A. Moreover, it makes clear that "no armed group allied to either party shall be allowed to operate outside the two forces". Instead, the unacknowledged groups in the south will be absorbed into the army, prisons, police and wildlife services, it says. 
By contrast, the Khartoum agreement signed in 1997 identified the SSDF as the only southern agent charged with providing security in southern Sudan. 
Nevertheless, the protocol on security arrangements was originally welcomed by SSDF members, who accepted that the SPLM/A was negotiating in their best interests, according to ISS. But since then much of the goodwill has dissipated, while violence in southern Sudan is on the increase. 
"Positions have hardened, and clearly there are sections of the government, SPLM/A and the SSDF now actively opposed to reconciliation between the SPLM/A and the SSDF," says the report. 
The protocol on wealth-sharing signed in January 2004 exacerbated the differences even further by agreeing to provide only 2 percent of the oil wealth to oil-producing states, as against 40 percent allotted by the Khartoum agreement. The response of many Nuer was one of "extreme anger", said ISS. 

Violations of ceasefire 

Since the beginning of 2004, and despite an ongoing cessation of hostilities between the government and the SPLM/A - which governs allies of both the government and the SPLM/A - a number of conflicts in the south have intensified. 
From January to March 2004 areas in the oil-rich western Upper Nile region were torn apart by militia in-fighting, leading to dozens of deaths and injuries, looting, abductions and the displacement of thousands of people, as well as the destruction of schools and hospitals. 
In the Shilluk Kingdom of northern Upper Nile, an undetermined number have been killed this year, and tens of thousands displaced by forces formerly loyal to Lam Akol - who defected to the SPLM/A in October 2003 - which were allegedly accompanied by government forces. See: <a
href="http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=40986&SelectRegion=East_ Africa&SelectCountry=SUDAN">Displaced in Shilluk Kingdom in urgent need of aid, says rebel leader</a> 
"The government supported one faction and brought in other groups from the SSDF, who were in turn divided, and for the first time in many months government forces became engaged in the conflict," ISS reported.  Lam Akol warned last month that the attacks had stopped for now, but that fighting could flare up again, threatening the entire Sudanese peace process. "It is not a tribal conflict. It is a conflict between the government and the SPLM/A," he repeated. 
Key to the clashes in Shilluk was the vacume created by Akol's defection and a struggle to take over his area of control - which is in southern Sudan - with both the SPLM/A and government-allied forces laying claim to it. 

New and old allegiances

For the last two years, the SPLM/A has been striving to realign itself with the southern militias - many of which originally belonged to the rebel movement. A number of successes have been notable including defections to it by Riek Machar (Sudan People's Democratic Forces), Lam Akol (SPLM/A-United), Tito Biel and James Leah (leaders of SSIM) and Dr Theophilus Lotti (EDF). 
But territorial control and rivalry, ethnic tensions, competition for the spoils of war, and distrust of the Dinka-dominated SPLM/A mean that many forces, or individuals within forces, are unwilling to realign themselves. The result is a large number of armed men who control large areas of land and have shifting and opportunistic allegiances to different factions and leaders, say regional analysts. 
Furthermore,  the SPLM/A is not supporting a "genuine reconciliation", according to ISS. During a high-level SPLM/A visit to Khartoum in December 2003, it did not meet either its major military foe, the SSDF, or government-backed southern politicians belonging to the Southern States Coordination Council. 
A regional analyst told IRIN that those in the SSDF with a political agenda would most likely realign themselves with the SPLM/A in the near future, in a pragmatic attempt to carve out a niche for themselves in the new Sudan. 
Muhammad Ahmad Dirdeiry, the Sudanese deputy ambassador in Nairobi, told IRIN the militias did not pose a threat to the peace process if commitments made to them were followed through during the interim period. 
But Sudan watchers say "the warlords" may well continue to cause trouble. 
Given Sudan's recent history, many observers agree that southern Sudanese have as much to fear from south-south strife as from north-south strife. 
"If the peace process does not pay more attention to these local factors, it could easily break apart even if a national-level agreement were to be signed under the auspices of IGAD," according to ICG. 
For further information on Sudan's militias go to ICG report entitled "Sudan's Oilfields Burn Again: Brinkmanship Endangers The Peace Process" available at 
http://www.crisisweb.org/home/index.cfm?id=1807&l=1
[This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

A high-level donor meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, on Thursday appealed for at least US $236 million to help an estimated 2.2 million victims of war and "forced ethnic displacement" in western Sudan's Darfur region, the United Nations reported. In total, about $126 million has been pledged for 2004, leaving a deficit of $110 million, it added. 
Representatives of 36 states  and institutions, including donor governments, Sudan, the Arab League, the African Union (AU) and NGOs, were present at the conference. 
Addressing journalists midway through the meeting, UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland said this was the most important conference in recent history as the world's biggest humanitarian crisis was unfolding in Darfur. 
Even with humanitarian aid, many lives would be lost, he said. "We are late in responding and the Janjawid [militia] attacks [are] so harsh that even under the best of circumstances [in terms of donor response] it will still be a humanitarian crisis." 
A joint statement issued by the UN, US and EU added that hundreds of thousands of lives were at risk in Darfur "unless immediate protection and relief are provided". 
Donors aim to feed, shelter up to a million IDPs in three months 
Egeland said the conference participants had agreed to try to meet a series of key targets in Darfur over the next 90 days. These included: 
- feeding up to one million people across the region; - drilling new boreholes, and providing water pumps and tanks for camps for displaced people and host communities; - providing basic drugs and health care for 90 percent of the displaced; - providing basic materials to help displaced people and refugees construct temporary shelters; - providing seeds and tools to 78,000 families; and - deploying human rights and protection staff to the area. 
Unanimous concern was expressed at the conference about the continuing attacks being perpetrated by the government-allied Janjawid militia. 
Despite a ceasefire agreement signed by Khartoum and Darfur's two rebel groups in the Chadian capital, N'djamena, on 8 April, the Janjawid were still very active, with reports from the region indicating an increase in attacks and human rights violations, said Egeland. 
He added that the rainy season would render roads impassable within just a few weeks, making the delivery of aid "a race against the clock". 
New restrictions to access deplored 
Andrew Natsios, the head of the US Agency for International Development, said too few NGOs were operating in Darfur to deliver sufficient quantities of aid. Coupled with this was the fact that whereas the Sudanese government had removed permit requirements for NGOs, it had imposed new restrictions on vehicles and air transport, thereby effectively limiting the movement of NGOs to and within Darfur. 
James Morris, the executive director of the World Food Programme, commented that the government needed to remove administrative roadblocks like visas, permits and laborious checks on basic necessities such as medical supplies. 
Bertrand Ramcharan, the UN acting high commissioner for human rights, raised the issue of protection. "Let me say it again: More than one million people are utterly vulnerable, living in a state of fear and without any means of protection... We know all this, we have no excuse for not knowing it: now is the time not to assess but to act," Ramcharan said in a statement. 
He stressed that the humanitarian crisis was the direct consequence of a human rights crisis. "It is not impersonal, unswayable elements that are behind this tragedy: this tragedy is entirely man-made." It was the government's responsibility to resolve the crisis in line with its legal obligations, he added. 
No rights mechanisms protect Darfurians - HCHR 
A key concern was that there were "no human rights or protection mechanisms currently in place" to help Dafurians, he continued. He had requested his office to dispatch six human rights officers as soon as possible to Darfur to provide support to UN counterparts on monitoring ceasefire violations and protecting civilians, he said. The officers would also work closely with the AU mission to be sent to Darfur. 
An "advance team" of 10 AU staff members had been deployed to Khartoum on Wednesday to prepare the logistics for a team of 90 ceasefire monitors, 60 of whom would be soldiers, an AU spokesman, Desmond Orjiako, told IRIN. The rest of the observer mission would go to Darfur as soon as "conditions" were ready, he added. 
Amnesty International noted this week that nearly two months after the 8 April ceasefire, the monitors were not yet in place in Darfur. "It is not clear how effective 90 monitors - 60 military and 30 civilians - will be in an area the size of France where daily killings and rapes are still being reported," Amnesty said in a statement. 
The Sudanese News Agency reported, however, that during meetings held on Wednesday and Thursday between the Sudanese government and the AU mission, the two sides had expressed "their confidence on achievement of a peaceful solution for Darfur". 
Government expresses commitment to ceasefire 
The Sudanese External Relations Ministry also issued a statement this week, affirming "the government's deep resolve" to abide by the N'djamena ceasefire accord, and stating that the government was keen to provide "more security, tranquillity and trust". 
But ceasefire violations are being frequently reported. On 28 May, an Antonov aircraft and two helicopter gunships bombed a crowded market, killing at least 12 people in a village near Al-Fashir, Northern Darfur, Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported. "There have also been numerous credible reports of continuing attacks on civilians in displaced camps and settlements under government control," it added. 
On 22 May, Janjawid killed at least 40 villagers and burned five villages, including Tabaldiyah and Abqarjeh, both south of Nyala, Southern Darfur, AI reported. They had reportedly arrived - some in army uniform - on horses and camels. "The government is not addressing the impunity of the Janjawid; it is integrating them into the army," HRW added. 
The government has denied the attacks and accused the Darfur rebels of violating the ceasefire. 

Millions of lives are at risk in the western region of Sudan and urgent help is needed from the international community: this is the appeal launched by the WHO (World Health Organisation) on the eve of today’s meeting of donor countries in Geneva aimed at trying to raise the funds needed to support the aid workers engaged in tackling the crisis caused by the conflict in the region. Sixteen months of fighting have left roughly 30,000 people dead (according to the latest United Nations figures) and generated 130,000 refugees (all in neighbouring Chad) and over one million internally displaced people. “The most dramatic race against time in the world is underway right now in Darfur,” the UN co-ordinator for humanitarian affairs, Jan Egeland, said yesterday. “A significant increase in the number of dead and of disease is inevitable without external assistance,” echoes the statement from WHO. Violence, lack of food, contaminated water, poor sanitation and inadequate medical assistance are fuelling “a dangerous spiral of death” which, according to some estimates, will directly threaten the lives of at least 300,000 people over the next few months. In February 2003 two rebel groups – SLA-M (Sudan’s Liberation Army-Movement) and JEM (Justice and Equality Movement) – formally took up arms against the Islamic government of Khartoum, which they accuse of neglecting the region as it is inhabited mainly buy black people, and of financing the militias of Arab predators (known as Janjaweed), who have caused death and destruction in the area for years. Some sources, including local UN representatives, have claimed hat a “new genocide” in underway in Darfur

The final phase of the Sudanese peace process is expected to be launched in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, on Saturday by President Mwai Kibaki, according to a press statement issued by the Kenyan foreign ministry. 
It follows the signing on 26 May by the Sudanese government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) of three key protocols on wealth-sharing and the contested areas of Abyei, the Nuba mountains and southern Blue Nile, paving the way for a comprehensive peace agreement. 
Six protocols have been signed to date, which, together with two annexes, will make up a comprehensive peace agreement. Technical committees are expected to start work on the annexes governing the implementation of the protocols, plus comprehensive ceasefire arrangements and guarantees, and to finish their work within two months. 
The statement said "the peace process for the Sudan has entered the final crucial phase, which will look into the implementation modalities of the agreements, mechanisms for monitoring [the] ceasefire, and other arrangements necessary to secure and consolidate the peace". 
To build on the momentum so far achieved and to lay a firm foundation "for this meaningful engagement", Sudanese Vice-President Ali Uthman Muhammad Taha, the leader of the government delegation, and SPLM/A Chairman John Garang "have decided to reconvene in Naivasha on 3 and 4 June 2004 for the purpose of preparing the formal launch of the final phase in Nairobi", it added.

Just over a week after the government of Sudan said it would allow aid workers into the western region of Darfur within 48 hours, humanitarian access was "fairly smooth," according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Khartoum.
OCHA had managed to deploy seven field staff members since 20 May, several of whom had been waiting for up to two months for a travel permit, said Ramesh Rajasingham, the head of OCHA Sudan. In one or two cases, visas were still being delayed, but these were being followed up, he said, noting that in Southern Darfur it appeared that the message had not filtered down to local authorities by last Saturday. 
At the same time, however, some relief assistance, equipment and vehicles essential to the delivery of aid were still being delayed, said Rajasingham. 
Khartoum recently announced that with effect from 24 May it would issue visas within 48 hours and waive the requirement for travel permits to Darfur, which had been causing huge delays in delivering aid.
Staff already in Darfur still had to give the local humanitarian aid commissioners 24-hour notice when they were traveling outside the three main towns of Nyala, Al-Junaynah and Al-Fashir, but the procedures seemed to be working in general and travel was being undertaken "fairly freely", Rajasingham added.
A more serious impediment to the delivery of aid was the reported "requirement" by Khartoum that agencies only use local NGOs to deliver aid, he told IRIN. 
The new policy had "hampered effective distribution of assistance, including food", the UN reported last week, stating that the existing local NGOs were limited in number and lacked the necessary capacity. 
Rajasingham confirmed that capacity building of local NGOs was a priority but, but added: "This is an emergency and we have to use the best and most reliable capacity on the ground. We have to rely on partners who can deliver rapidly and reliably, whoever they are," he said.
The advocacy group Refugees International (RI) said last week that Khartoum was continuing to place "obstacles" in the way of agencies seeking to respond to the Darfur crisis by requiring relief supplies to be transported on Sudanese trucks and distributed by Sudanese agencies. 
The World Food Programme (WFP) confirmed that it had only been able to deliver three quarters of the food it planned to distribute in May, due to a combination of insecurity, bureaucratic and logistical problems. "We are not reaching as many people as we ought to and we don't have much time left," commented WFP spokeswoman, Laura Melo.
MSF warned last month that the entire population of Darfur, numbering several million, was "teetering on the verge of mass starvation" as a direct result of the conflict.
A further problem was Khartoum's insistence that all medical supplies being shipped into Sudan needed to be tested before they were used, RI added. 
"The only plausible explanation of these regulations is that the government of Sudan, despite its repeated pledges to the contrary, simply does not want a large-scale presence of international agencies in Darfur," said RI.
A 20 May statement from the Sudanese foreign and humanitarian affairs ministries said Khartoum had an "open-ended vision to guarantee and facilitate humanitarian efforts" in Darfur. "In fulfillment of its responsibilities and obligations toward its citizens and to ensure their wellbeing", Khartoum "recognises the crucial need for immediate humanitarian assistance in the region and is determined to alleviate the suffering that has resulted as a by-product of the war". 
But the US Agency for International Development (USAID) reported last week that Khartoum was "interfering" in humanitarian aid efforts. Government officials had questioned relief workers on their reporting of human rights abuses, told agencies not to carry out protection activities, and threatened to expel organisations failing to comply with restrictions, it said. 
In May an OCHA official was expelled and NGOs were accused of supporting the rebellion in Darfur. 
Khartoum also required 72-hour advance notification for passengers travelling on UN flights to Darfur, which was "an impediment to the rapid deployment of emergency staff and equipment," USAID added.
Meanwhile, no UN agencies were delivering aid to rebel-held areas because of a mixture of insecurity and a lack of permission from Khartoum to access the areas, according to OCHA.
USAID said that armed Janjawid militia were continuing to attack civilians in all three states of Darfur and that killings, rapes, beatings, looting and burning of homes were still being reported. In Northern Darfur State, attacks on villages had only decreased because "a significant number" of villages had already been destroyed, while attacks on camps for internally displaced persons were continuing, it said.
On 28 May, the parties to the conflict agreed to the deployment of African Union (AU) ceasefire monitors in Darfur. Desmond Orjiako, an AU spokesman, told IRIN that the first 10 monitors, comprising seven military observers and three support staff, would be deployed on Wednesday. A further 90, including 60 soldiers, would be deployed as soon as conditions were ready and vehicles and accommodation had been organised.
The ceasefire monitors would be based in al-Fashir, northern Darfur, but would travel within the three states, he told IRIN. 
The status of the 45-day renewable ceasefire, which has been broken numerous times, has remained unclear since it expired on 26 May. The UN said it had received no information regarding a renewal or further peace talks.
On Friday, the political director of the Darfur rebel group, the Sudan Liberation Army, Abu al-Qasim told IRIN the SLA was continuing to respect it, "so as to let the organisations provide aid for people in the region", but that nothing formal had been arranged. 

On Wednesday evening, the Sudanese government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) signed three key protocols on wealth-sharing and the contested areas of Abyei, the Nuba mountains and southern Blue Nile, paving the way for a comprehensive peace agreement. 
Six protocols have been signed to date, which, together with two annexes, will make up a comprehensive peace agreement. Technical committees are expected to start work in three weeks on the annexes governing the implementation of the protocols, plus comprehensive ceasefire arrangements and guarantees, and to finish their work within two months. 
The earlier protocols are: the Machakos protocol governing a referendum on secession for the south after a six-year interim period following the signing of a comprehensive peace deal; a protocol on security arrangements during the interim period; and on wealth-sharing during the interim. 

Key details of the agreements signed this week are outlined below: 

Protocol on power-sharing 

*  There will be a National Government and a separate Government of Southern Sudan. The National Government is to be decentralised with "significant devolution of powers" awarded to each state. *  A bicameral National Legislature will be established consisting of a National Assembly and a Council of States, the latter comprising two representatives from each state. *  The Interim National Constitution will be the supreme law of the land, while the Southern Sudan Constitution and state constitutions will comply with it. *  The National Congress Party will fill 52 percent of seats in the National Assembly; the SPLM will have 28 percent; other northern political forces will have 14 percent; other southern forces 6 percent. *  There will be one president, and two vice-presidents (to be appointed by the president) in Sudan. Umar Hasan al-Bashir will remain president until national elections are held. Dr John Garang will be first vice-president of the National Government and president of the Government of Southern Sudan. *  A population census will be held by the second year of the interim period, and general elections by the end of the third year. *  Khartoum will remain the capital of the Republic of Sudan. Non-Muslims will not be subject to shari'ah law in the capital. *  The rights of non-Muslims are to be protected by a special commission appointed by the President. *  The National Government is to implement an "information campaign" throughout Sudan in all national languages to "popularise" the peace agreement and foster national unity and reconciliation. *  The National Civil Service will award between 20 and 30 percent of jobs, to be confirmed by the census, to southerners. Not less than 20 percent of middle- and upper-level positions will be given to southerners. *  Arabic and English are to be the official working languages of the National Government. *  Sudanese will be given a number of guarantees, including: the right to life, liberty and security of person; the abolition of slavery; the abolition of torture; a fair trial; freedom of thought, conscience, religion and expression; freedom of assembly; the right to vote; equality before the law; freedom from discrimination; and women are to be treated equally to men. 

Protocol on the resolution of Abeyi conflict

*  Abyei is defined as the area of the nine Ngok Dinka chiefdoms transferred to Kordofan in 1905. *  The Misariyah and other nomadic peoples will retain their right to graze cattle and move across the territory of Abyei. *  Residents of Abyei (the Ngok and other residents) will be awarded a "special administrative status" during the interim period and will remain citizens of both Western Kordofan in northern Sudan and Bahr al-Ghazal in southern Sudan with representation in the legislatures of both states. *  Abyei will be administered by a local Executive Council, to be elected by its residents, during the interim period. *  Simultaneous with the referendum on secession for southern Sudan after the interim period, residents of Abyei will have a separate referendum to decide whether to remain part of northern or southern Sudan. *  Oil revenue from Abyei will be divided six ways during the interim period: between the National Government (50 percent); the Government of Southern Sudan (42 percent); Bahr al-Ghazal (2 percent); Western Kordofan (2 percent); the Ngok Dinka (2 percent); and the Misariyah (2 percent). *  The National Government will appeal to the donor community to facilitate the return of residents from Abyei, many of whom were displaced by the war. 

Protocol on the resolution of conflict Southern Kordofan/Nuba Mountains and Blue Nile state

*  Residents of the two areas will have a "popular consultation" on the comprehensive peace agreement to be signed by the SPLM/A and the government. *  Each state will establish a Parliamentary Assessment and Evaluation Commission and a separate Independent Commission to evaluate the implementation of the peace agreement. If the agreement is endorsed by the legislature in each state, it will become "the final settlement" of the political conflict there. *  If the agreement is not being fully implemented, negotiations will be held with the National Government to rectify the shortcomings. *  A state executive will consist of a state governor, a state council of ministers and local government in each state. A state legislature will prepare and adopt a constitution in each, and may relieve the governor of the state of his/her functions. Both institutions will be represented 55 percent by the National Congress Party, and 45 percent by the SPLM. The governorship will rotate in each state between both sides. *  The two states will have significant autonomy over key areas, including: state police; local government; media; social welfare; civil service at state level; state judiciary; internal and external borrowing of money; the provision of health care; regulation of business; enforcement of state laws; provision of education; town planning; state statistics and surveys; state referenda; state budget and taxation. *  The National and State governments will have concurrent powers over some areas, including: economic and social development; tertiary education; health policy; urban development; delivery of public services; disaster preparedness; electricity generation; water and waste management; gender policy and women's empowerment. *  Seventy-five percent of the total National Reconstruction and Development Fund will be allocated for war-affected areas, particularly to the Nuba mountains, southern Blue Nile and Abyei. *  The two states will be represented in national institutions in proportion with their population size

(IRIN, Nairobi, May 28, 2004) -- Aid efforts in southern Sudan are being hampered by restrictions on work permits and ad hoc taxes imposed by the emerging government and local authorities, according to humanitarian sources. 
NGOs in southern Sudan were being asked to pay a growing number of taxes or "fees", humanitarian sources told IRIN. Such tariffs included off-loading fees at airports; airport taxes (in addition to landing fees paid by aviation companies); a 10-percent tax on staff salaries; road licence fees; work permit fees; fees for boreholes in an NGO compound; three-month visas for foreign staff; and separate taxes for the use of email, short-range radios, long-range radios and satellite phones. 
Whereas some of the taxes have been established for some time, others are being introduced on an ad hoc basis. One aid worker said that last week the NGO he was working for had been asked to pay 2,500 Kenyan shillings (US $31) in tax for latrines in its compound. On top of this, the NGO allowed aid workers to stay in the compound on a strict cost-sharing basis, for which it had to pay a 10-percent tax. 
Aid workers say they are finding it increasingly difficult to explain the growing expenses to donors, who want to know exactly what their money is being spent on. "Our budget is from individual church-backed donors, who want to see all of the money going to the beneficiaries," said Jürgen Prieske, the regional representative of Diakonie Emergency Aid. 
Due to disasters and emergencies in other parts of the world, for the last two years it had become difficult for NGOs like Diakonie to raise the necessary funds for Sudan, he added. 
Ahead of a peace agreement with the Sudanese government, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) is faced with the daunting task of transforming itself from a fragmented rebel movement which has been fighting a war for 38 years since independence, into a legitimised government. 
A source from one aid agency told IRIN it was now paying 3 percent of its total budget to the Sudanese authorities in taxes and fees. "It makes it easier to pay taxes if you see what the money is being spent on," he commented. 
A second contentious issue for aid workers in southern Sudan is that of work permits. Since 2003, the Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Commission (SRRC), the SPLM/A's humanitarian wing, has introduced a new system of permits for all expatriates in an effort to create jobs for Sudanese. 
A letter sent to an NGO by Aloisio Emor Ojetuk, the chairman of the Work Permit Panel, states that expatriate cooks, drivers, mechanics, logisticians, camp managers, administrators and field coordinators, who all occupied "support" positions, would be routinely denied work permits and asked to leave Sudan immediately. 
Whereas some of the skills necessary to undertake these jobs are available in southern Sudan, others are impossible to find, say aid workers. Making matters worse, many of those who have been denied permits were also directly involved in training local Sudanese. 
Ian Sinkinson of Tearfund told IRIN that two programme managers, four logisticians, and one vehicle technician had all been refused work permits, and had been given until 30 June to leave Sudan. "We are trying to recruit Sudanese logisticians to work alongside our staff and then take over. But there isn't enough time to train up the local people," he said. 
Diakonie staff were receiving on-the-job training, especially in village health services, but also in skills such as carpentry, metalwork and masonry, which were essential to the smooth running of the primary health care programme, Prieske told IRIN. If the expatriate staff were not there to train them, then the Sudanese would also have to be let go, he said. 
The Diakonie health-care programme in Rumbek and Cheibet counties had already trained several hundred Sudanese village health workers, while an exit strategy had been agreed on with the SPLM health secretariat after three years, he said. "Not only in Sudan but worldwide it is our basic policy to integrate, and hand over programmes as soon as possible to the local structures." 
Elijah Malok, the head of the SRRC, told IRIN that there was no question of southern Sudanese lacking the necessary skills to fill in for the expatriates no longer being allowed to work in Sudan. "That is a lie. Let them come and prove it. They do not want to give jobs to the southerners," he said. 
But others say the SRRC is overestimating the levels of education in southern Sudan. "The skills and education are simply not available," commented one source. "They hugely overestimate their own skills." 
Meanwhile, humanitarian workers agree that the current problems are affecting both the timeliness and quality of aid being offered to southern Sudanese. "Humanitarian assistance is for the people of Sudan. We expect the de facto authorities to help us to help their own people," commented one Western donor

The Sudanese government and the main rebel group, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), signed three key protocols in the Kenyan town of Naivasha on Wednesday evening, bringing them one step closer to a comprehensive peace agreement. 
The deals, which cover power-sharing arrangements and the administration of three contested areas during a six-year interim period, bring to an end direct political negotiations between Sudanese First Vice-President Ali Uthman Muhammad Taha and SPLM/A Chairman John Garang. The bilateral negotiations have been in progress on and off for nine months. 
After a three-week break, technical committees are expected to resume talks to work out methods of implementing the six protocols signed to date and agree on a formula for a permanent ceasefire by mid-July, after which a comprehensive peace agreement will be signed. 
The breakthrough, which came late on Wednesday after 101 days of continuous talks and a nine-hour delay in opening the signing ceremony, was widely welcomed by both northern and southern Sudanese, diplomats, ministers and friends. 
But watchdogs like Human Rights Watch (HRW) are urging caution. HRW pointed out that a civil war continued to rage in the Darfur region of western Sudan, where over one million people have been displaced by government-allied militias. The signing of the peace protocols must not deflect criticism of the ongoing campaign of "ethnic cleansing" there, said HRW on Wednesday. 
Similarly, in the Shilluk Kingdom of Upper Nile, militias have displaced between 50,000 and 150,000 people since February in clashes over territory and resources. 
The protocols outlined the formation of a decentralised government of national unity, and devolution of power to Sudan's individual states, Kenyan Foreign Minister Kalonzo Musyoka said during the ceremony. The south would have its own government constitution, which would conform with the interim national constitution, he added. 
Garang will be the first vice-president of the government of national unity, and president of the government of southern Sudan. 
Administrations for the contested Nuba mountains and southern Blue Nile have also been agreed upon, while Abyei will be administered by the institution of the national unity presidency for the interim period and then allowed to hold a referendum on secession. 
Amid a chorus of ululating and singing women, Garang announced that both sides had "reached the crest of the last hill in our tortuous ascent to heights of peace... There are no more hills ahead of us: I believe [that what is] the remaining is flat ground." 
Taha said it was a day for development, peace and stability in Sudan. "It is our duty in Sudan... to really put life in the protocols signed today and put them into action," he said. "With the same degree of determination, sincerity and patience, we are resolved to really put those words into action." 
Garang added that the deals had laid down "the foundations for the pillars of inviolate and enduring peace" for three reasons: firstly, both sides had addressed issues of fair power-sharing after 38 years of war since independence; secondly, they had mapped out political solutions that could serve as models for other marginalised areas, such as war-torn Darfur; and thirdly, they had opened Sudan's political space "widely to accommodate everybody". 
"It is a paradigm shift of historical proportions," he said. "Things will not and cannot be the same in Sudan." 
The agreements already signed are the Machakos protocol governing a referendum on secession for the south after a six-year interim period; a protocol on security arrangements during the interim; and another on wealth-sharing. 
The most important tasks ahead were reconciliation and development, said Garang, in a country where over 50 percent of the population was illiterate, only one out of every 50 children attending school finished primary education, and women had a one-in-nine chance of dying in childbirth. Vowing to fight corruption, he said: "Our duty is first and foremost to dedicate ourselves to ensuring that our people's vital and basic needs are satisfied... That is the only way to consolidate peace." 
HRW reported on Wednesday that optimism over Sudan's future must not be hasty. As recently as Tuesday, Arab militias had attacked five villages 15 km south of Nyala in Southern Darfur, killing 46 civilians and wounding at least nine others, it said. The militias, known as the Janjawid, had been accompanied by government soldiers in three Land Cruisers armed with antiaircraft artillery, it said. 
The government has repeatedly denied allegations of ethnic cleansing, and the involvement of its soldiers in attacks on civilians in Darfur. 
The UN reported this week that due to continuing attacks and burning of villages 30 km to 40 km south of Nyala, the influx of internally displaced persons into a camp outside the town had also continued unabated. This was in addition to the influx generated by an attack last week on the village of Kossolongo, some 16 km from Nyala and its surrounding villages. 
"The government's campaign of ethnic cleansing in Darfur raises real questions about whether Khartoum is really willing to comply with today's peace accord in the south," said HRW. 
The HRW statement also condemned the UN Security Council for failing, in its presidential statement issued this week, to identify those responsible for the attacks in Darfur. 

“It is a decisive step forward, but on terrain that is mined and full of pitfalls,” said monsignor Cesare Mazzolari, a Comboni father and bishop of the diocese of Rumbek, in response to the accord signed in Kenya between the Islamic government of Khartoum and the secessionists of southern Sudan on Wednesday. “It is a very fragile and delicate accord, which nonetheless opens a breach towards peace”. The prelate, who served as a missionary in the country for over 20 years before becoming bishop, does not hide a degree of scepticism regarding the accord – welcomed unanimously by the international community – that should pave the way to a definitive peace after over 20 years of conflict. “This ‘peace’ has thrown a veil over the south and north of the country, but to my eyes it looks like nothing more than a ‘divide et impera’ that does not resolve the real causes of the war,” monsignor Mazzolari told MISNA. “I do not understand why the international community was in such a hurry for the sides to sign an accord which, among other things, does nothing to resolve the question of Darfur.” Though not involved in the war in the south, Darfur (western Sudan) has been the scene of a conflict between two local armed groups and government troops – backed by Arab militias - for over a year. “The long war between north and south has fuelled hatred towards the regime of Khartoum, but also between the tribes themselves,” adds the bishop of Rumbek. “In my diocese 21 conflicts are currently underway between the Denka, who do not accept the new political and civilian administrators appointed by the rebels of SPLA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army)”, namely the armed movement in the south that signed the accord with the government on Wednesday. The prelate recalls that in the south of the country “over 96,000 SPLA combatants are active: now who is going to disarm them?” It is calculated that over 20 years of war have claimed over two million lives, mostly through disease and hunger. “I fear that this peace has been imposed by the international mediators. It seems to me that my people are not yet ready and now risk undergoing new suffering due to the traumas experienced in these years of conflict, which have still not been resolved.” According to the bishop of Rumbek, the signing of a protocol agreement is not enough: “Now the international community will have to accompany us: not just by delivering aid, but guaranteeing the reconstruction of roads and infrastructures, building health centres and wells. We need medicines in particular, but for now aid cannot be transported overland,” adds the prelate, who comes from the northern Italian province of Brescia. “The Church is now faced with an important task: to tell the people that peace has arrived, to explain their civil rights and responsibilities. We will need courageous people to uphold these rights in society, especially since society has been completely excluded from the peace negotiations,” he continued. The talks began in Kenya in September 2002 and in the last nine months involved the deputy president of Sudan, Ali Osman Taha, and the SPLA leader, John Garang (of the Denka tribe). “I would like to turn to the international community,” concludes Monsignor Mazzolari. “I beg you not to abandon us now, after this called-for accord; this would only pave the way for illegal groups. Help us also to build mutual trust between north and south, which does not come about by simply signing a document.”

Five dead and 20 infected: this is the toll of the new outbreak of Ebola registered recently in South Sudan. The news was confirmed to MISNA by Dick Thompson, WHO (World Health Organisation) spokesman, underlining that the situation appears under control and the spreading of the haemorrhagic fever halted. Thompson explained that a team of the MSF (Doctors Without Borders) has been sent to the zone of Hay Cuba, in the Yambio county (South Sudan), individuated as the hotbed, to curtain the spread. WHO referred that a mission will also be sent in the next days to verify the needs of the population and the doctors studying the epidemic. Thompson also denied to MISNA reports of some international newspapers of a new strain of Ebola, which gets its name from the river of the Democratic Republic of Congo where it emerged for the first time in 1976. The Ebola virus is one of two members of a family of RNA viruses called the Filoviridae. There are four identified subtypes of Ebola virus. Three of the four have caused disease in humans: Ebola-Zaire, Ebola-Sudan, and Ebola-Ivory Coast. The fourth, Ebola-Reston, has caused disease in nonhuman primates, but not in humans. The incubation period for Ebola HF ranges from 2 to 21 days. The onset of illness is abrupt and is characterized by fever, headache, joint and muscle aches, sore throat, and weakness, followed by diarrhoea, vomiting, and stomach pain. A rash, red eyes, hiccups and internal and external bleeding may be seen in some patients. Death can occur around 72 hours after the appearance of the first symptoms. For the moment there is no cure nor vaccine, though scientists and researchers are working on developing additional diagnostic tools to assist in early diagnosis of Ebola HF and conducting ecological investigations of Ebola virus and its possible reservoir. The mortality rate can reach up to 90% of cases.

You both will need to sell your agreement to the Sudanese people and mobilise your support,” Hilde Farfjord, Norway’s development minister and mediator in the peace negotiations for southern Sudan, told the two signatories of yesterday’s agreement paving the way to a definitive solution to the conflict underway in the south of the country for over 20 years. The deputy president Ali Osman Taha and the leader of SPLA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army) John Garang now have the task of convincing the most extreme fringes of their respective sides and of working out the details of the peace accord, now that all the questions that have fuelled the conflict between the south (black, animist and Christian) and the north (white, Arab and Muslim) have been resolved. This morning the state radio announced that Taha would probably return to Khartoum today to explain in detail the documents signed in Kenya yesterday evening. Instead, following yesterday’s ceremony Garang said that “nine months is what God has prescribed as a full term (referring to the direct talks between himself and Taha, which began in September 2003, ed.). We hope we have delivered to you a healthy baby – but then of course a child needs to be nurtured.” Some commentators have pointed up the fact that, despite the agreements between the two sides, there are elements that could still represent a threat to peace. These include the conflict in the remote western region of Sudan, which has been underway for just over a year with terrible consequences for the local population (one million internally displaced people, 130,000 refugees and thousands of dead), and the fact that many components of the southern opposition (civil society and at least 30 small armed groups, according to international press sources) have been left out of the peace accord signed in Naivasha. “We commend both sides for their commitment to peace and urge them to move quickly to work out details of a formal ceasefire and related security arrangements,” United States Secretary of State Colin Powell said in a statement yesterday. The chief mediator, the Kenyan Lazarus Sumbeiywo, has announced that if everything goes according to plan the ‘global peace agreement’ should be signed between the end of June and the beginning of July. 

Last night’s agreement between the government of Sudan and the rebels of SPLA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army) on the division of power and the status of three contested areas signalled an end to the negotiations that got underway in Kenya in June 2002, paving the way for an end to the longest-running conflict on the African continent, in the south of the country, where two decades of fighting have claimed over two million lives. Now that all the issues pending between north and south have been resolved, all that remains is for the two sides to decide how to apply the agreement before a formal and definitive peace agreement can be signed. However, despite pressure to the contrary, yesterday’s agreement - signed in front of diplomats and mediators from all over the world - makes no mention of the other conflict underway in Africa’s largest country, which started in the remote western region of Darfur in February 2003. The international community has nonetheless greeted the accord with a deep sigh of relief, after the ceremony, originally scheduled for 13.00 local time, was delayed by ten hours; the Sudanese vice president Ali Osman Mohamad Taha and SPLA leader John Garang finally signed the protocols in question in the luxury hotel in Naivasha (roughly 70 kilometres from the capital Nairobi) at 23.00 local time. This accord, together with earlier agreements signed over the last few months, outlines the structure of the country during the transition: a government of national unity for six and a half years, followed by a referendum in the south on possible independence; the application of Islamic law (Sharia) only in the north (and not in the city of Khartoum, which will remain the capital during the period of national unity, and where the parliamentary and government offices will be located); an agreement on the distribution of oil revenues and on the deployment of military forces (which will not be unified, or will be unified only in part) in the various parts of the country. South Sudan has been the scene of a civil war since 1983, combining oil interests and the requests of the black, Christian and animist population for greater autonomy from the Arab, white and Muslim north. Armed clashes and famine caused by the war have left at least two million people dead, while hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced from their homes. Whether the developments in the south will have a positive effect on the conflict in Darfur remains to be seen. “Any accord that excludes us will never lead to real peace,” Abdel Wahed Mohammad Ahmad Nour, the leader of SLA-M (Sudan’s Liberation Army-Movement), the main rebel group in Darfur, told the Sudanese newspaper ‘al-Hayat’ just a few days ago. His statement did not go unnoticed by the United Nations chief, Kofi Annan; in a statement released a short while ago he expressed his “satisfaction over the accord reached between Khartoum and SPLA” but called on the protagonists of the conflict in Darfur to resolve the crisis in the region as soon as possible.

The government of Sudan and the rebels of SPLA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army) have signed an important agreement that effectively ends the long process of negotiations and paves the way for a definitive agreement to end the 20-year conflict in the south of the country. The document, which was signed in Kenya last night, sanctions the division of power in the post-war period and the status of three regions, Abyei, South Blue Nile and Nuba Mountains, which are contested by both sides as they are located in the north of the country but are historically linked to the south

The United Nations Security Council has condemned attacks on civilians in Sudan's western region of Darfur, and called on the government to disarm the Janjawid militia, which has largely been blamed for the violence.
UN News on Wednesday quoted a statement read out by the current president of the Council, Ambassador Munir Akram of Pakistan, as saying thousands of people had been killed in Darfur, while hundreds of thousands were at risk of dying in the coming months, due to the deteriorating humanitarian situation. 
"The Council also expresses its deep concern at the continuing reports of large-scale violations of human rights and of international humanitarian law in Darfur, including indiscriminate attacks on civilians, sexual violence, forced displacement and acts of violence, especially those with an ethnic dimension, and demands that those responsible be held accountable," Akram said.
The Council, while strongly condemning these actions, stressed that all parties to the humanitarian ceasefire agreement signed (on the 8th of) last month in the Chadian capital, N'djamena "committed themselves to refraining from any act of violence or any other abuse against civilian populations, in particular women and children, and that the government of Sudan also committed itself to neutralising the armed Janjawid militias".
The Council also called on opposition groups and the government to facilitate the immediate deployment of monitors in Darfur, and to ensure their free movement in the area. 
It expressed serious concern about continuing logistical impediments prohibiting a rapid response in the face of a "stark and mounting" crisis, and called on the government to fulfil its announced commitment to cooperate fully and expeditiously with relief efforts ahead of the approaching rainy season. In this respect, the Council called on all the parties to the Darfur conflict to allow "full, unimpeded access by humanitarian personnel" to the affected population.

The signing of the peace agreement between the Sudanese government and the rebels of SPLA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army), which should mark the end of a 20-year conflict in the south of the country, is slow to arrive. Diplomats from all over the world, mediators and African figures are gathered in Naivasha, Kenya, for the historic accord, which was originally scheduled for 13.00 local time. However, unspecified difficulties led the organisers to delay the signing until 17.00. MISNA sources contacted in Kenya then confirmed that there was still no news of the agreement at 18.30. Supposedly imminent for months, the signing of a definitive agreement between SPLA and Khartoum has been delayed repeatedly since the end of last year: new problems would arise periodically just as the mediators said that an accord had almost been reached. However, yesterday a Kenyan foreign ministry spokesman announced that a series of protocols had been signed. The war, which began in 1983, has seen the Arab and Muslim north pitted against the black, predominantly Christian and animist populations in the south, although in reality ethnicity and religion are just two elements in a complex conflict, which is also and especially motivated by the fight over Sudan’s abundant oil resources. The current peace talks got underway in June 2002 under strong international pressure; the government of President Omar el Bashir and SPLA led by John Garang have already reached a first accord concerning the division of the oil revenue, the non application of the Sharia (Islamic law) in the south and the possibility for the south of holding an independence referendum in six years. Sudan currently produces 300,000 barrels of crude a day, which translate into two billion dollars for the state coffers; however, the population still lives in extreme poverty, especially in the south of the country

The international community has a last chance to prevent hundreds of thousands of people from dying in a man-made catastrophe in Sudan's western region of Darfur, the International Crisis Group (ICG) think-tank warned on Sunday.
"Urgent action is required on several fronts if Darfur 2004 is not to join Rwanda 1994 as shorthand for international shame," said ICG in a new report entitled: "Sudan: Now or never in Darfur". The humanitarian situation was likely to get much worse before it got better, ICG warned. 
While it was "too late to prevent substantial ethnic cleansing" in Darfur, provided the UN Security Council acted decisively, there was "just enough" time to save hundreds of thousands of lives now directly threatened by Sudanese troops and militias, as well as by looming famine and disease,  said ICG.
The Sudanese government has repeatedly rejected allegations by a number of rights groups and the UN that it is implementing a policy of ethnic cleansing against non-Arabs in Darfur. Government-allied militias, known as the Janjawid, and troops are said to be implicated in the ongoing attacks on civilians. 
The one million-plus internally displaced persons (IDPs) who have been driven off their farmlands into urban centres are now facing imminent famine, say human rights groups. 
Addressing a rally in Southern Darfur State last week, President Umar Hasan al-Bashir said the government, the armed forces, the police forces and the justice and executive organs were ready to help Darfur "come out of its current crisis". 
He reiterated that the government wanted the displaced people and refugees to return to their home areas before the rainy season begins this month. 
According to the UN, there are numerous reports of local authorities trying to coerce the IDPs to return to their farms. But the IDPs say they cannot return until the Janjawid have been disarmed and held to account for their atrocities.
Kutum town, in Northern Darfur State, is a typical example: Roughly 124,000 IDPs from surrounding areas were reportedly there in mid-May, relying on a 20,000-strong host population. One of the largest Janjawid camps in Northern Darfur is also near Kutum, and serves as a base for ongoing attacks.
According to ICG, the international response to the Darfur conflict has been "slow and ineffectual". The renewable 45-day ceasefire signed on 8 April between Khartoum and Darfur's two rebel groups was not working in either military or humanitarian terms, while the political process the ceasefire was supposed to facilitate was "still-born", it said. 
The ceasefire negotiations had been poorly handled by all sides, while the inexperienced rebels were pushed into signing an agreement by the Chadian mediators, said ICG. "The final version [of the ceasefire agreement] did not include a number of points previously agreed to, including several [rebel] Sudan Liberation Army/Justice and Equality Movement amendments. When the parties brought this to [Chadian] President [Idriss] Deby's attention, he reassured them the draft would be fixed after the signing ceremony, but pleaded with them to sign immediately because the media was waiting," it said.
ICG added that the draft was not changed, and serious discrepancies remained between the signed English and Arabic versions. The English version stated that the "Sudanese government shall commit itself to neutralise the armed militias", while the Arabic version had an additional precondition attached to it, ICG noted: "Forces of the opposition shall be cantoned in locations that shall be identified. The Sudanese government shall commit itself to neutralise the armed militias." 
According to ICG, Khartoum's strategy for "neutralising the militias" has been to incorporate them into its formal police and security structures. 
Compounding matters, the African Union (AU) international monitoring commission - to be set up under the terms of the ceasefire agreement - has yet to be deployed, six weeks after the signing of the agreement.
An AU spokesman, Desmond Orjiako, told IRIN on Monday that a decision on when the mission would be deployed would be taken "soon", but could not specify exactly when.
According to ICG, the UN Security Council should immediately authorise planning for a military intervention in Darfur, focusing on the creation of half a dozen internationally protected concentrations of IDPs, the means of delivering assistance to them and the means of protecting the deliveries.
The report is available at: http://www.crisisweb.org/home/index.cfm?l=1&id=2765

The advance party of a mission to monitor the respect of the ceasefire agreement signed by the actors in the conflict underway in the remote western region of Darfur on 8 April will reach the area over “the next few days”, the newly created Peace and Security Council (PSC) of the African Union (AU) said today during its first meeting in Addis Ababa. Said Djinnit, the AU peace and security commissioner, told reporters that the mission would comprise approximately 100 people, including around 60 soldiers, and an armed escort of between 100 and 300 soldiers. The two rebel groups fighting against the government, the Khartoum executive and AU, European Union and United States representatives will have equal representation in the delegation. The first port of call will be the city of El Fasher in the state of North Darfur which, together with West and East Darfur, makes up the Darfur region. The PSC urged “the sides to fully and scrupulously apply the signed truce”, which the two sides claim has so far remained dead letter. “We remind the Sudanese government of its pledge to control and disarm the militias present in Darfur,” said Djinnit. In February 2003, two rebel groups – SLA-M (Sudan’s Liberation Army-Movement) and JEM (Justice and Equality Movement) - took up arms against Khartoum, which they accuse of neglecting Darfur as it is populated mainly by black people, and of financing militias of Arab predators known as Janjaweed which have long tormented the population in this part of Sudan, where some sources including local United Nations representatives say that a “new genocide” is underway. The fighting has created a million of internally displaced people, 130,000 refugees (all in neighbouring Chad) and 10,000 dead according to the most reliable estimates

The Islamic government of Khartoum and rebels of the SPLA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army) have reached an agreement that paves the way toward a final accord to end the longest conflict underway in the African continent, begun in 1983. A spokesman of the Foreign ministry of Kenya, which is hosting the peace talks in the location of Naivasha, around 90km from the capital Nairobi, announced that the sides will sign a series of protocols tomorrow. The accord does not regard the conflict in Darfur, remote region of West Sudan, according to the United Nations theatre to an extremely serious humanitarian emergency provoked by over a year of fighting between local rebel groups and government troops, which support the Arab ‘Janjaweed’ paramilitary militias, accused of conducting an ethnic cleansing against the black population of the region. The accord reached today in Kenya resolves the dispute over three areas - Abyei, south Blue Nile and Nuba Mountains, geographically in the north but always linked to the South – and the sharing of powers in the post-war period. Tomorrow’s signing should lead to the successive definition of a cease-fire and global accord – repeatedly delayed – to definitively end a conflict that in 21 years claimed over 2-million lives, for the most part civilians that died of famine and disease, also forcing millions of people to flee from South Sudan. The war began in 1983 between the Arab Muslim North and the black populations of the South, prevalently Animist and Christian; the ethnic-religious factor is in reality only one aspect of the complex conflict, also and above all motivated by the battle for the division of oil proceeds of Sudan, which with two and a half million squared kilometres is the largest nation of Africa, counting around 30-million inhabitants. The current peace talks began in June 2002 under strong international pressure; the government of President Omar al Bashir and the SPLA headed by John Garang already reached a first accord on the division of oil proceeds, the non-applicability of Sharia (Islamic law) in the South, the reorganisation of armed forces (though it will not exactly be a joint military) and the possibility for the South to hold a referendum for its independence within 6 years. Sudan currently produces around 300,000 barrels of oil per day, guaranteeing earnings of $2-billion, but the population continues living in exreme poverty, particularly in the South

More than 100 Sudanese refugee women clad in brightly coloured flowing dresses queue patiently to draw water from the yellow plastic blister by a borehole at Kounoungo refugee camp in eastern Chad. But each of the 9,000 refugees in this city of brown tents and makeshift shelters of wooden boughs is only allowed seven litres per day  - half the normal ration.
Kounoungo, like the six other camps for refugees from Sudan's troubled western region of Darfur, is less than six months old, but already it is overcrowded, and more refugees keep on crossing the border.
"I am happy to be safe here, but water and food are scarce. We therefore have to beg in the village," said Muhammad Alawi, who arrived at Konoungo with his family 10 days earlier, but, like hundreds of other refugees, was still waiting for registration.

Water supplies a major issue 

The scarcity of water is a major issue in the flat semi-desert of eastern Chad, whose sandy wastes are dotted with dry bushes and acacia trees. In fact, availability of water is one of the main factors deciding the location of the refugee camps built so far and a further three that are still planned.
"There are problems with water," said Natien Sioueye, the water manager at Kounoungo camp. "The Sphere standard ration is 15 litres per person per day, but we can only provide seven." Sphere is a set of minimum standards of human welfare which major relief agencies seek to achieve when conducting relief operations.

Impending rains threaten food availability 

Relief workers are also worried that they do not have enough food in place to feed a refugee population now twice as high as they had expected a few months ago when contingency plans were drawn up and appeals were made to donors. They warn that the situation could reach crisis proportions once the five-month rainy season starts in June, turning the dirt roads of eastern Chad into quagmires of mud virtually impossible for heavily laden trucks to negotiate.
"During the rainy season, delivery takes two or three weeks instead of two or three days, and items risk coming late," said Jean Charles Dei, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) head of operations in Abeche, the main town in eastern Chad. "We are fighting to position our stocks and cover refugees before the rainy season," he added.
WFP appealed earlier this year for US $19.4 million to feed an expected 100,000 refugees from Darfur. But nearly double that number have arrived in Chad already, and more keep flooding across the border, fleeing the Janjawid Arab militias, who systematically kill their menfolk and burn and pillage their villages. However, to date WFP has only received $12.7 million for the Darfur refugees.

Overcrowding in refugee camps set to worsen

Alphonse Malanda, the head of the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Chad, told IRIN that as of 21 May, 74,446 registered refugees had been admitted to the seven official camps in eastern Chad. However, about 105,000 others were waiting in makeshift shelters along the 600-km border with Sudan for the UNHCR's white-painted trucks to come and pick them up, he added. 
Other NGOs are now working with similarly increasing numbers. The Washington-based Refugees International (RI) recently estimated that there were already 200,000 Sudanese refugees in Chad, while the Catholic relief agency Caritas uses a working figure of 180,000.
Although UNHCR is already planning the construction of three more refugee camps, Malanda warned that more might be needed. "If the influx continues during or after the rainy season, we will have to increase the number of camps," he told IRIN.
Relief workers are now talking seriously about the need for an expensive 900-km airlift from the Chadian capital, N'djamena, to keep the camps adequately supplied during the five-month rainy season which is about to start. RI has suggested that French military transport planes and helicopters based in N'djamena could be used for this purpose.
One WFP official said his organisation was also examining the feasibility of trucking food across the Sahara desert from Libya. The distance from the Libyan Mediterranean port of Benghazi to Abeche is nearly 3,000 km, but only half that distance is served by proper roads. The second half of the journey would have to be made along poorly marked desert tracks.

Malnutrition increasing

Meanwhile, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) has launched a campaign asserting that malnutrition rates are often worse inside the refugee camps than outside them. 
"The problem in the camps is that food is only distributed to people that have been registered," Michel Francoys, the head of MSF-Belgium in Chad, told IRIN. "Strangely enough, malnutrition is higher in the camps than among those who have stayed along the border," he added. "In Konoungo, for instance, there are more and more malnutrition cases. In Iridimi and Toloum, there are more and more diarrhoea cases, which, when combined with moderate malnutrition, cause severe malnutrition. In the Iriba therapeutic feeding centre, we are treating 70 children under five. It is serious," he stressed.
Asked to elucidate, Malanda said MSF's comments only applied to new arrivals in the camps and were not based on a properly conducted survey. "MSF has not undertaken a proper investigation, it has only conducted superficial screening," he told IRIN.
Kounoungo, with its neat rows of tents, each sheltering family groups of seven or eight people, was originally built to house 6,000 refugees, but UNHCR said 9,000 had already crowded in, of whom 1,000 had been registered in the past two weeks. 
Hundreds more, like Alawi and his family, have congregated in makeshift shelters made from branches ripped of trees in a shanty town on the edge of the camp, waiting to be registered and admitted. The lucky ones have managed to bring a few cows or donkeys with them, but there is virtually nothing left in the surrounding area for these animals to eat, so they nibble at the growing piles of rubbish and the branches used to construct the shelters. 
The isolated camp is four hours' drive from Abeche, reachable only on sandy roads through an arid empty plain, where the only sign of life is the occasional cow or camel. 
At nearby Touloum refugee camp, overcrowding is even worse. Originally built to house 6,000 people, it already accommodates 17,000, and new arrivals keep on coming. "Every day, new people are coming on foot, on donkeys, in convoys," said Alfred Demotibaye, who manages the camp on behalf of Secours catholique pour le développement, the Chadian branch of Caritas.
Chad is a poor, landlocked and largely desert country three times the size of France, with virtually no tarred roads or other infrastructure. Kris Kanowski, the UNHCR spokesman in Geneva, recently described it as "one of the most inhospitable terrains in which we have ever had to operate".

Impending transport problems

Dei of the WFP office is worried that the private Chadian truck owners whom he relies on to keep the camps supplied with food, may become unwilling to hire out their vehicles during the rainy season, thereby presenting him with a transport crisis. "We rely on private trucks, which are not always in a decent shape, and the owners do not always want to let them go to faraway places where they will get stuck during the rains," he told IRIN.
Nor was the government keen to see the truckers churn up the roads in the wet season, he noted. "The authorities do not always want trucks to ply roads that they will then have to repair," Dei said.
Relief workers believe that some camps, such as Goz Amer and Esterena near the southern section of the 600-km border with Sudan, will become completely cut off once the rains start. Such places will then only be reachable by helicopters or airdrops.
Operating in eastern Chad is not only difficult and expensive because of the distances involved and the lack of decent roads: relief workers say virtually everything they need, be it supplies or trained staff, has to be brought in from other countries because Chad itself has so little to offer. 
"It is very difficult to find qualified medical personnel, even just to assist," Carla Martinez, MSF-Holland's head of mission, told IRIN. "The solution is to have more expatriates, but this requires even more funds," she added.

Funding shortfall

And it is not just MSF that is short of funding. Virtually all relief agencies operating in eastern Chad complain that they have less money than they need to prevent an emergency degenerating into a full-scale humanitarian crisis.
UNHCR's Janowski told reporters in Geneva: "Of the nearly US $21 million we have asked for from donors, only $13 million have been contributed so far this year. We have now fully spent it and we are using the funds we have borrowed from our operational reserve funds to pay for the programme."
While shortages of water and food are the main problems facing relief workers at present, health issues will start to loom much larger once the rains start in June. Relief workers fear that many people will drink contaminated surface water lying in pools and normally dry wadis and that diseases which are already decimating the local livestock population will grow worse.
"During the rainy season, numerous animal carcasses will contaminate the wadis, seriously endangering people's lives," Francoys of MSF Belgium said.
"An awful lot of animals have died since the arrival of the refugees on Chadian soil and we do not know why," said Sonia Perrassol, an MSF coordinator based in Abeche. "It is true there is not enough food, but there might have been epidemics, and this is what the Chadian Ministry of Agriculture is trying to find out."
"It is difficult to tell how the situation will evolve," said Francoys of MSF Belgium. "The issue of the Janjawid attacks has not been solved yet. Let us hope that a solution will be found for the population stuck in the Darfur region, and that they will get the assistance needed, otherwise we [in Chad] will be faced with a catastrophic situation."

Around fifty people were killed in the remote western Sudanese region of Darfur in an attack against a village by the ‘Janjaweed’, militias of Arab thugs allied with the Khartoum government in the conflict underway for over a year in this zone of Sudan. The news was reported by international press sources, citing declarations issued by the main rebel movement active in Darfur, the SLA-M (Sudan Liberation Army-Movement). According to Muhamed Mirsal dello Sla-m, 56 people (45 according to other sources) were killed by the Janjaweed in the small village of Abquarajel (also called Abqa Rajil), a few dozens of kilometres south of Nyala, main city of the State of South Darfur, which together with North and West Darfur make up the region of Darfur. MISNA sources contacted this morning in the zone were not for the moment able to confirm the events, though underlining that the area has for weeks been considered high risk. While news was emerging last night of the attack, the African Union referred that the meeting of the Commission for the monitoring of the cease-fire undersigned between the protagonists of the Darfur conflict has been postponed to May 26 and 27. The creation of the Commission, which was supposed to convene over the weekend, was foreseen by the truce signed by the rebels and government on April 8, though so far it only exists on paper. The objective of the commission is to constitute an observation mission of around a hundred men to be deployed in Darfur to verify eventual cease-fire violations, which both sides accused each other of violating already 48 hours from the signing. Diplomatic sources contacted by MISNA in Khartoum explained that there are growing concerns in the Sudanese capital over the events in Darfur. Based on reports, police searches and checkpoints have in fact increased significantly over the past days, particularly during the night. Since February 2003 the SLA-M and JEM officially rose in arms against Khartoum, accused of neglecting Darfur because inhabited prevalently by blacks and of financing the Janjaweed that have for years been causing death and destruction in Darfur, where according to some sources, including local United Nations representatives, a “new genocide” is underway. In a little over 12 months of combat the Darfur conflict has already resulted in a million internally displaced, 130,000 refugees (all in neighbouring Chad) and thousands of victims, 10,000 based on the most reliable estimates.

The Commission in charge of monitoring the cease-fire undersigned between the protagonists of the conflict underway in the remote West Sudan region of Darfur will convene for the first time over the weekend in Addis Ababa, in Ethiopia. The news was referred by officials of the African Union, the continental organisation that directs the commission, specifying that the meeting should be attended by all the parts involved in the conflict: the central Islamic government of Khartoum and representatives of the SLA-M (Sudan Liberation Army-Movement) and the JEM (Justice and Equality Movement), the two groups that since February 2003 rose against the Sudanese administration. The meeting will be mediated by the African Union, European Union and the United States. The creation of the commission for the monitoring the cease-fire was foreseen in the truce signed by the rebels and government last April 8, though its existence had so far remained a mere formality. The objective of the commission is to constitute an observation mission of around a hundred men to be deployed in Darfur to verify any eventual truce violations, which both sides accuse each other of violating already 48 hours after the signing. According to a representative of the African Union interviewed by the AFP, if some divergences should be overcome on the composition of the observation team and its security, the mission could already be deployed in Darfur in the next days. Meanwhile, the Sudanese government referred to have reopened access to Darfur for humanitarian workers, that for the next three months will be able to enter the region with visas issued by their respective nations of origin, without any longer need to request special government permits. This decision should consent the international NGO’s (Non-Governmental Organisations) and UN agencies, for time emphasising the impossibility to move around freely in Darfur, to take prompt action to bring assistance to the around a million internally displaced in a little over a year of conflict. Since February 2003 the SLA-M and JEM rose against the Khartoum government, accusing it of neglecting Darfur, because prevalently inhabited by blacks and of financing the militias of Arab thugs (known as Janjaweed) that have been causing death and destruction for years in this part of Sudan, where according to various sources including local UN representatives, a “new genocide” is underway. In a little over 12 months of combat the Darfur war has already resulted in 1-million internally displaced, 130,000 refugees (all in neighbouring Chad) and tens of thousands of deaths, 10,000 based on the most reliable estimates.

In an effort to speed up the humanitarian response to the Darfur crisis, the government of Sudan said on Thursday it would issue visas within 48 hours and waive the requirement for travel permits to the region.
The government said that with effect from 24 May it would grant aid workers from the UN, NGOs, and the International Committee of the Red Cross "direct entry visas" from abroad within 48 hours of application, and that the visas would be valid for three months. 
Aid workers were only required to hold a visa and provide the Ministry for Humanitarian Affairs with their names and itineraries, said a joint communique from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Humanitarian Affairs in Khartoum.
Delays in granting both visas and travel permits to Darfur have to date significantly hampered aid delivery to the region. The UN in Khartoum said on Thursday there were at least 116 humanitarian workers awaiting either entry visas or travel permits. The earliest application pending dated from 3 April, and the most recent from 18 May.
The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs added that it had received one travel permit on Thursday, while other permits that had been promised had not yet materialised.
On 18 May, the US government called on Sudan to allow aid workers into Darfur more easily. "The government has continued to play games with travel permits while the humanitarian situation in Darfur has deteriorated," said the State Department spokesman, Richard Boucher. Three-day permits had been issued to some US aid workers, but only after the three days of their validity had expired, he added.
On Thursday, in response to the relaxed rules, Boucher, said: "We're reserving judgment until we see this new policy implemented, but we hope that these policy decisions will be implemented because that would change at least some of the problems we've had to date." 
He added that it was unclear how soon aid workers already waiting in Khartoum, who have been granted visas but not travel permits, would be able to go to Darfur. 
It also remains unclear how aid workers would be able to work around the travel permits required to leave regional capitals to visit project sites. 
Despite a renewable 45-day humanitarian ceasefire signed by Khartoum and the region's two rebel groups on 8 April, clashes have continued with ongoing attacks against civilians by government-allied militias known as Janjawid. An African Union ceasefire commission was established as part of the agreement, but has yet to meet or deploy observers. 
With thousands of Janjawid militias on the loose - Human Rights Watch estimates 20,000 - the displaced have said they cannot go home to their farms, and are currently missing the planting season. "Security is reported by the IDPs [internally displaced persons] as the top priority for assistance, before food, shelter and medicine," the UN reported on Thursday.
But the government said it could disarm the Janjawid while the rebels were still active. Foreign Minister Mustafa Uthman Isma'il reportedly said last week that "those who want us to interrupt the actions of the militias now must understand that this is not possible... They forget that there is a rebellion going on and [the rebels] carry arms and threaten the tribes."
Meanwhile, an increasing number of reports are being received of attempts to coerce IDPs in Darfur to return to their homes and farms ahead of the rainy season. The UN reported that "government pressure for involuntary relocation and return resonates throughout field reports".

The UN and aid agencies have underestimated the numbers of refugees from Sudan's Darfur region who have crossed into Chad, and must urgently revise their appeals to donors for more funding, according to the advocacy group, Refugees International (RI).
In a statement released this week, RI said a combined revised appeal from UN agencies in Chad needed to take into account "the new realities" on the ground. These included almost doubling the numbers of refugees used by agencies as statistics for planning purposes, and the fact that the refugees would be in Chad for at least another year.
"After completing a two-week assessment mission to eastern Chad, RI has concluded that the real number of Darfur refugees there is around 200,000, not the 110,000 planning figure that has been used by the United Nations and aid agencies," said RI. Donors would also need to respond with urgency to the appeal, it added.
A spokeswoman for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Kitty McKinsey, told IRIN that UNHCR was currently working with the figure of 125,000 refugees. "We are aware that the actual figure may be higher," she said. "We are working urgently with our Chadian partners to put together more accurate figures."
The "fluid population" was extremely difficult to count, she said, because the refugees were constantly on the move.
Laura Melo, a spokeswoman for the World Food Programme (WFP), said the organisation was "currently revising its appeal and its working figures" to address the increasing needs in Chad. "The budget revision that is prepared targets a number close to the one referred to by RI," she said, adding that the document was not finalised yet. 
The challenges involved in assisting refugees in eastern Chad, who are scattered along a 600-km stretch of border between the two countries, are enormous. The area is extremely hostile and arid, water is extremely scarce and expensive to find, and the infrastructure needed to transport aid is extremely poor. 
To move supplies from the Cameroonian port of Douala to eastern Chad took between two and three weeks, RI reported. As a result, malnutrition rates in refugee camps were on the rise, it said, as well as reports of deaths among refugees, especially the elderly.
In recent weeks the international community has been heavily criticised for its lack of response to the refugees' plight. Funding for the crisis has been slow and inadequate. 
According to Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), malnutrition inside the refugee camps is actually worse than outside because they are so overcrowded. Sanitation facilities in most of  the camps were also "totally inadequate", said the agency last week. 
In one camp there was one latrine per 400 refugees. "This is 20 times greater than the international standard of a maximum of 20 people per latrine. It's absolutely unacceptable." 
Although UNHCR and international NGOs had had teams on the ground in Chad for months, progress had been "painfully slow" as the crisis escalated, said MSF, noting that sufficient shelter, food and water had not been organised, and that some of the camps were filled to double their capacity. 
Ron Redmond, UNHCR's chief spokesman in Geneva, told IRIN that the camps were overcrowded because water was so difficult to find, which hampered UNHCR's ability to build more of them. "There are so many people and so few suitable sites," he said. 
Meanwhile the tens of thousands of refugees - over 58,000 have been transferred to camps with a further 10,000 moving spontaneously - who are not in the camps continue to be under threat from Janjawid militia incursions along the Chadian border, says UNHCR. 
Rains, which will begin in earnest in June, are also about to largely cut them off from aid. Within a month, the numerous river beds or wadis in the area will fill up, slicing the area into small pieces and making the settlements of scattered refugees unreachable by land, according to RI.
Returning to Sudan is out of the question. Interviewees reported to RI that they would not consider returning to Sudan unless the Janjawid militias were disarmed, and they were given strong security guarantees, possibly in the form of a multinational UN military presence. 
A number said they wanted to be transferred to camps in Tine Chad, but were being prevented from leaving Bahai (in the north of western Darfur straddling the border) by local authorities who felt they were providing the town with economic support, Fidele Lumeya of RI told IRIN.

Urgent steps needed 

WFP was currently feeding 64,000 refugees in the camps and was pre-positioning food for 150,000, Melo told IRIN. It was also "exploring a corridor" through the Chadian desert along which it could transport food during the rainy season, and was in the process of organising a fleet of nine trucks to transport food from Abeche to eastern Chad.
Pre-positioning food for the southern area along the border was a priority, she said, as it would be cut off first by the rains. In addition to supplying food in the camps, food for 22,000 refugees would also be distributed in the southern area of Pizi.
McKinsey said the six refugee camps that had been set up would rise to nine within two weeks. Meanwhile, UNHCR was continuing to search for water and new sites to build more camps, and would continue to transport the refugees during the rainy season. 
But according to MSF and RI, further steps need to be taken urgently to assist the refugees to survive. "More supplies, more aid staff on the ground, greater efficiency by UNHCR and international NGOs, whatever it takes," said Donatella Massai, who is responsible for MSF's operations in Chad. 
The UN needed to establish a more effective aid coordination structure in Abeche; the governments of Chad and Cameroon needed to designate an agency to expedite the handling of relief supplies; and UN agencies and donors needed to approach the French army in Chad to use its equipment and expertise, said RI.
"One option would be the use of French military planes and helicopters, which are based in Chad, to move shipments to what will become mostly stranded camps during the rainy season," suggested RI. 
UNHCR could also use French expertise and hydrological equipment, "as time is of the essence", it said.

Ten cases of a haemorrhagic fever, similar to Ebola, were confirmed on Thursday in Western Equatoria, southern Sudan, the World Health Organisation (WHO) reported.
Health authorities in Yambio county had reported 15 cases of the fever, including four deaths, WHO reported. Laboratory testing performed by the Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI) and by the Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention (CDC) USA had confirmed "an Ebola-like infection" in 10 of the 15 cases.
Dr Abdullahi Ahmed, head of office in WHO southern Sudan, told IRIN the viral fever appeared to belong to the "Ebola family", in which there were a number of different strains, and that tests would reveal its precise nature within 48 hours.
No new cases have been reported for the last three days, while the most recent case had begun on 15 May, said a WHO press release. Two patients were being cared for in the isolation ward of Yambio hospital, while 102 contacts were being followed up by surveillance teams in a crisis committee that has been established in Yambio. 
"Close contacts of people who have been ill with the disease are followed for a period of 21 days from the date of last contact. Contacts who develop symptoms during this period can then rapidly be transferred to hospital, where they can be cared for safely, to prevent further transmission to others," WHO reported.
Abdullahi said that while there was no treatment for the highly contagious disease, by isolating patients and following up on people who had contact with patients, it could be contained. The disease, which causes bloody vomiting and diarrhoea, is passed on through body fluids.
Through support and care, said Abdullahi, about 50 percent of sufferers had survived similar viral diseases in southern Sudan in the past.
"Our biggest message is not to wash dead bodies," he added, advising relatives and friends of victims to immediately call local health authorities who would dispose of the bodies in special body bags, while respecting local burial rites. 
The disease, which has also occurred in neighbouring Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, may originally have been passed on to humans by animals, said Abdullahi.

For the past year, the poor rural population of eastern Chad has been voluntarily providing food and hospitality to a growing influx of refugees from Sudan's troubled Darfur region. But this has put a severe strain on their own meagre resources and could eventually leave them as destitute as their Sudanese guests. 
"It is war which brought the Sudanese here, and it is our duty to help them," said Isaac Suliman, a 40-year-old farmer from Amadina, a village near the Konoungo refugee camp. "They often stop by and ask for food. We give them what we have," he told IRIN on his way back from the local market. 
But grain prices have rocketed, and the trees that dot the flat semi-desert of eastern Chad have had their branches lopped off for firewood and poles to make crude shelters. In many places, the carcases of cattle and donkeys show that over-grazing has stripped the land of its meagre pasture, and that uncontrolled disease is taking its toll on livestock. 
Chadian government officials are already starting to ring the alarm bells. 
"Refugees are slowly being moved to refugee camps. But the local population, for its part, is only left with starvation. We fear what will happen when the rains come, since food items will become scarce and famine could follow," Moussa Abderamane Yodi, the government administrator of Chadian Tine, told IRIN. 
A dry river bed or wadi separates Chadian Tine from its Sudanese counterpart, which was once occupied by the Darfur rebels, but was recaptured by Sudanese government forces at the end of January. 
Before the Darfur rebellion erupted in February last year, Chadian Tine had a population of between 8,000 and 10,000. This, however, has been swollen by the influx of Sudanese refugees, bringing further pressure to bear on the meagre resources of the town and its surrounding countryside. 
"Tine has seen its population double or even triple over the last months, reaching 30,000 people at given periods," Yodi told IRIN. "If the refugees stay here longer, a major ecological catastrophe could arise," he added. 
Relief workers complain that inadequate sanitation facilities are forcing Tine's swollen population to defecate anywhere they can. The aid workers worry that this will cause health problems, particularly once the rains come in June, and wash the human excrement into wells and pools used for drinking water. 
On the outskirts of Tine, thousands of destitute women, children and old people huddle under makeshift shelters waiting for trucks from the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to pick them up and transport them to official refugee camps well away from the troubled frontier. 
Food prices in Tine market have gone through the roof as a result of this influx of hungry people. One local woman, who identified herself only as Aïcha, complained that a bag of millet, which cost 10,000 CFA ($18) a year ago, had more than doubled in price to 25,000 CFA. 
The town's inhabitants have been the indirect beneficiaries of an emergency health post set up by Medecins Sans Frontieres-Belgium (MSF-B) to treat Sudanese refugees. It now also treats local people free of charge and is able to perform minor surgery, which is beyond the capability of Tine's government-run health centre. 
However, the arrival of MSF-B has also had the undesired effect of putting this poorly resourced government-run clinic virtually out of business. 
Paul Annys, MSF-B's coordinator in Tine, acknowledged the problem, but said: "There was no choice but set our own operation if we were to save lives. What we did to remedy the situation was to collaborate with the Chadian Ministry of Health so that they can carry out activities when we phase out." 
Yodi would like the relief agencies flooding into eastern Chad to help the refugees, to devote some of their time and money to helping the local Chadian population, which, he says, did so much to help the refugees before assistance began arriving from abroad. 
"Compensatory projects should be implemented for the local population," he told IRIN, warning that water supplies in Tine were running short, while the big trucks of the aid agencies were churning up the district's fragile dirt roads. 
The hospitality shown by the population of eastern Chad to the officially estimated 120,000 Sudanese refugees who have already crossed the border, is easily explained. The refugees are mostly members of the Zaghawah, Fur and Masalit ethnic groups, which straddle the border and have traditionally moved freely across it. Before the war in Darfur broke out, it was not unusual for men in Tine to have two wives, one on the Sudanese side of the town and the other on the Chadian. 
Indeed, relief workers say that many of the Sudanese refugees crossing into Chad today are actually Chadians who fled to Sudan during a succession of civil wars in Chad in the 1970s and 1980s, and their descendents. 
Most of the refugees are old men and women with children. The younger men have mostly stayed behind to look after whatever possessions the family might have left, or to fight on the side of the two rebel movements battling the Sudanese armed forces and their Janjawid militia allies. Many of them also perished at the hands of the Janjawid, who, according to the refugees, make a special point of hunting down and killing young men of fighting age. 
The Janjawid are Arabic-speaking nomads. Diplomats and relief workers say they have been armed by Khartoum to help Sudan's regular armed forces fight the rebels. But the Sudanese government denies arming the Janjawid to terrorise the local people. 
President Umar al-Bashir, on a visit to Nyala in Southern Darfur State this week, warned fighters in the region, saying those who carried arms to undermine Sudan's peace and stability would be regarded as "outlaws", Sudan Radio reported on Thursday. 
The Janjawid ride across the arid landscape mounted on horses and camels, looting and burning villages, chasing out their inhabitants and seizing their livestock. Chadian officials also accuse them of frequently raiding across the border into Chad. 
"The Janjawid are violating the Chadian territory, taking refugees and Chadian cattle, killing the herdsmen. Sometimes, they burn villages. They come in groups of 200 to 300," said Lt-Col Hamat Bong Aware, the military commander of the Ouaddai and Biltine regions; Tine is in Biltine. 
"There are confrontations between these militias and local herdsmen all the time. The herdsmen resist and there are numerous deaths and injuries," he added. 
In Tine itself, three people died and 15 were injured on 29 January when a Sudanese air force plane attacking rebel positions in the Sudanese side of the town dropped stray bombs on the Chadian side of the border. And local people complain that several Janjawid cross-border incursions in the district have taken place since then. 
The refugees arriving from Darfur are in a pitiful condition. Many have been stripped of all their possessions and have walked for several days in order to reach the border. 
"I left Karnoi [about 220 km northeast of Al-Junaynah, the capital of Western Darfur State] with my family after the Janjawid attacked and burnt the village," said Hasan Sulayman, a 43-year-old farmer from Darfur, who had finally made it to the Kounoungo refugee camp, deliberately built well away from the frontier, about 70 km southwest of Tine. 
"On the way to Chad, our cattle was stolen, leaving us with nothing," Sulayman added as he and dozens of other refugees who had spontaneously trekked to the UNHCR-run camp waited to be formally registered. "We had to beg to survive, but the people in Chad helped us a lot," he said. 
At Sulayman's side, his two wives sat chatting quietly on a mat in the shade of a tree. They were surrounded by children in ragged clothes trying to attract the attention of passers-by. All the family's meagre possessions hung in plastic bags from the tree's branches, remnants of a forgotten conflict.

Tensions are high between displaced cattle-owning Dinka and their host community in Mundri and Maridi counties of Equatoria, southern Sudan, over access to grazing land and water, according to humanitarian sources. 
Between 10,000 to 15,000 Dinka internally displaced persons (IDPs) from Bor County, Upper Nile, were currently living in a number of camps in Mundri and Maridi, with an estimated 200,000 head of cattle, according to Daniel Kiptugen, peace-building coordinator with Oxfam in southern Sudan. 
Tensions had arisen between the Dinka and the local Moru communities, because the cattle - a manifestation of Dinka wealth - were destroying local crops and fields, a task force mandated to investigate the conflict, said in a draft report. "The main problems in Mundri are between cattle and crops, not people. It is because the cattle destroyed the crops of the indigenous people, and that is what they depend upon for their survival," a local council of elders reported to the task force. 
Originally, the Dinka, who were displaced to the area in 1999 by Sudan's civil war, were welcomed by the Moru chiefs, church leaders, elders and authorities, and were given areas to settle there. But as the numbers of their cattle increased, they started moving about in search of grass and water, thereby becoming unpopular with the Moru. 
Finally, both communities agreed that the Dinka should return home with their cattle by April 2004, but "no progress" had been made so far, Kiptugen told IRIN. When they will return remains unclear. 
The exodus had already been delayed from 2003, because the Dinka claimed there was not enough water and grass en route to sustain their cattle. 
"The IDPs are asking for security from the [rebel] SPLA [Sudan People's Liberation Army] to go back. They have also asked for support to move, [requesting] local NGOs for drugs and plastic sheeting," said Kiptugen. He added that it was unclear whether people would be prepared to move without the requested support. 
Meanwhile, local farmers whose fields have been destroyed say the Dinka must move, and that they have identified routes for them to make the 150-km journey. 
A local cattle evacuation committee was formed in 2002, headed by the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) secretary in Bor, to assist the IDPs to return. In May 2002, Salva Kiir, the second-in-command of the SPLM/A, ordered that all cattle camps in the two counties be moved to Bor immediately. That month, three IDPs were killed by locals, aggravating the tensions between the two communities. 
Since then, some Dinka from Yirol had moved home, said Kiptugen, but the IDPs from Bor had stayed put. A local chief, Sosten Makako, commented: "It is unfortunate that we are talking about cattle movement over and over again. We have held several meetings and workshops in regard to the repatriation of the Bor cattle, to no good results. Orders were given and trodden underfoot." 
Some local people believed that the cattle camps belonged to prominent SPLA commanders who did not wish their cattle to be returned to Bor, humanitarian sources told IRIN. 
The community task force investigating the conflict reported that in mid-April tensions were high after the killing of an IDP in Ladinwa. In a reprisal attack, a group of IDPs had invaded a local village, looting properties, raping women, beating people and "committing all kinds of atrocities", it said. Over 35 head of local cattle and 100 goats were reportedly stolen. 
The task force reported that eight murders related to the conflict had taken place since 2001, which had not been investigated by local authorities. Girls have also reportedly been abducted, while looting and stealing of cattle is commonplace. 
Too many arms were available in the camps, the task force reported. Armed forces, or soldiers who had left the SPLA, were also present in the cattle camps, which was adding to the tensions. "The presence of the armed forces in the cattle camps escalated the whole problem. It would have been better to keep them in the nearest garrison," said the draft report. 
"The law is loose in the county; whenever a crime is committed, there is no serious action and law enforcement agents in the county are under threat from cattle owners, who are better armed than the police," said the council of elders. 
"It was a mistake from the beginning not to integrate the two communities under the administration of the two counties," commented an SPLA commander in Yei, Ayuen Alier.

The threat of famine is looming in the Darfur region of western Sudan as the whole population is "teetering on the verge of mass starvation", according to Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF). 
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