On
Darfur,
As UNAMID Covers Up Killings by Sudan, ICC Reports Them
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
December 9 -- After the UN refused
to release what it knows
about the killing of civilians at Tabarat and the destruction of
Soro
and other villages in Darfur in September, the International Criminal
Court's report unveiled in the Security Council on December 9 names
13 other destroyed villages (with Soro transliterated as “Souroo”),
and has witness quotes what it calls the government sponsored killing
in Tabarat (which it calls Tabra).
After
ICC
prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo's presentation to the Security Council
on Thursday, Inner City Press on camera asked both him and Sudan's
Permanent Representative to the UN Dafallah Osman about the Tabra
killings and the destruction of villages.
Sudan's
Ambassador
said that the killings were “tribal,” involving
kidnapping and promises to pay blood money. He praised UNAMID and its
leader Ibrahim Gambari (calling him a “seasoned diplomat”).
Inner
City Press
asked if he thought UNAMID should release what it knows about the
Tabra killings. This, he did not answer, instead ranging from saying
that Ocampo's report shows NGOs were engaged in “espionage” to
claiming that Radio Dabanga was disseminating destabilizing and even
“genocidal” information.
Ocampo
had stood
several yards away, unlike with the previous Sudanese Ambassador
Abdalmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohamed, whom Ocampo stood right next to
during their final stare down. When Ocampo came to the microphone,
Inner City Press asked him if he thought UNAMID was in essence
covering up Sudan's and Bashir's acts by not reporting on them.
Ocampo
said that
UNAMID is under threat, that's why it doesn't report. This means
that UNAMID is not reporting, which is its job. What will Ban
Ki-moon, the Security Council and Obama administration do?
ICC's LMO close to Sudan's last Ambassador,
new backing away mirrored by UN- & US?
Earlier
on
Thursday, Mark Hanis of the Genocide Intervention Network / Save
Darfur Coalition on a press conference call said Obama, Hillary
Clinton and Joe Biden campaigned on (among other things) protecting
civilians in Darfur, and named Samantha Power and Susan Rice as
officials. Hanis called them “disappointing” so far. Inner City
Press asked what UNAMID should do. Report, Hanis said. But UNAMID
does not.
On
both December
8
and 9, Inner City Press asked UN spokesman Martin
Nesirky about
fighting and death in Darfur, including in Tabarat / Tabra:
Inner
City
Press: a request made to UNAMID [African Union-United Nations
Hybrid Operation in Darfur] for the report that they were supposed to
do on the Tabarat killings of 2 September, near Tawilla, the one that
the Secretary-General summoned Mr. [Ibrahim] Gambari to speak about.
Anyway, somebody that asked him was told that there is no report for
external dissemination available on it, and I just wonder, what is
the UN’s final finding? Did it do the right thing, in apparently
not getting out to the site despite the warning by relatives of those
killed? Are all such reports confidential, and in which case, how is
the Security Council or the international community to assess the
level of violence and killing in Darfur if these new reports never
come out?
Spokesperson
Nesirky:
Well, that’s a very long question.
Question:
This is the only time I’ll ask it, but if there is anything the UN
can say about those killings, I’d like to know.
Spokesperson:
Well, I hear your question, I think, and let’s look into what the
Mission tells us.
More
than a full
day later, UNAMID has said nothing. When Inner City Press asked
again about UNAMID on December 9, Nesirky claimed he had already
answered questions, including about attacks the Sudanese government
had just bragged about.
In
assuming
Presidency of the Security Council for December, Susan Rice told
Inner City Press that UNAMID (and UNMIS) are required to investigate
and report on attacks on civilians. Does that mean report to the
public, as the ICC does? What will Susan Rice and the US Mission do?
The
press had been
told that Susan Rice would speak at the stakeout, where Ocampo and
Sudan's Ambassador did. But she did not. A reporter given advance
notice that she would not come was told that “one country” had
blocked the elements to the press that she would have read. But she
could have spoken, especially after what Sudan's Ambassador said,
including denying things that the US Mission has previously said,
about the Council's interlocutors being harassed and Radio Dabanga's
Khartoum office being shut down.
Footnote:
Inner
City Press also asked Ocampo about Guinea -- he said he is
watching “national proceedings” -- and Kenya, where witnesses are
under threat. Ocampo answered by bragging that none of his witnesses
have been injured. But how about retaliated against, given what
Sudan's Ambassador said about the NGOs. Watch this site.
On
Sudan,
As US Says No Abyei Referendum Jan 9, UN Silent, on Darfur
Killings Too
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
December 8 -- On Abyei, the day after US State Department
spokesman PPJ Crowley told the Press “we have a recognition that
that referendum will not go forward on January 9th,” the UN on
December 8 declined to join in the recognition.
Inner
City Press
had asked Crowley about Sudan, including the referenda and bombings,
regarding which the SPML has asked for an investigation by the UN
Security Council, led this month by the US.
Crowley
did not
answer about the bombings, but called the South Sudan referendum
among the most important issues of the first half of 2011. He added
on “the situation on Abyei... we have a recognition that that
referendum will not go forward on January 9th, but we continue to
encourage the parties to work on a solution to Abyei.”
At
the UN's
December 8 noon briefing, Inner City Press asked Secretary General
Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky if the UN and its Mission in
Sudan UNMIS agree or disagree with the US assessment.
Nesirky
woodenly repeated that Abyei is important to the UN, just as he has
repeated platitudes
from the UN Mission in Darfur, UNAMID, about
looking into Khartoum's actions and statement, in order to speak with
the Bashir government behind the scene.
In
fact, the lone
Darfur rebel group which signed a deal with Bashir has now broken it
off and had its offices raided. UNAMID won't confirm this. Inner
City Press is informed that when asked for the results of its inquiry
into peacekeepers' inaction while civilians were killed in Tabarat
near Tawilla in early September, UNAMID said there is no report for
public dissemination.
Nesirky on
Wednesday called this a "long question" -- it has
been a long story, including a claim by Ban Ki-moon himself that he
was taking the killings and protection of civilians by UNAMID
seriously, ending in a whimper: no public report.
Also, the US
Mission has still not answered questions put to it last week and on
Tuesday about murder and bombings in Sudan, including a call by the
SPLM for a Security Council investigation...
US' Crowley, Abyei referendum not shown
Here
is the US'
transcript of December 7 Q&A with PJ Crowley on Sudan (and Yemen)