KHARTOUM, 11 November 2003 — The US Embassy here yesterday announced it would suspend operations for a week from Nov. 12 due to a “specific” threat against American interests in the Sudanese capital. The decision came after a housing compound was blown up Saturday night in Riyadh shortly after the US Embassy there announced it was closing all diplomatic missions in Saudi Arabia because of warnings of an imminent attack.
The US Embassy in Sudan said it “will suspend normal operations as of Nov. 12,” noting it would also be closed today for the Veterans’ Day holiday in the United States. “This action is the result of a credible and specific threat to US interests in Khartoum,” an embassy statement said, without elaborating.
The mission also advised US nationals to be cautious and avoid gatherings of foreigners. “We urge all US citizens in Sudan to exercise extra caution and to avoid gatherings of foreigners that may attract outside attention,” said the embassy’s statement, again without elaborating. “The embassy hopes to be able to resume normal operations next week,” it added, specifying that the Sudanese foreign ministry had been informed of its decision.
Meanwhile, the Arab League said yesterday it will for the first time send observers to the peace negotiations in Kenya aimed at ending Sudan’s 20-year civil war. An Arab League delegation will “participate in the next negotiating session in Kenya,” the league’s Sudan specialist Samir Hosni told reporters after the organization’s head Amr Moussa held talks with a delegation from the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army.
The SPLA’s No. 2 Salva Keer, who is heading the delegation, sent Moussa an invitation to the talks, Hosni said. Hosni said the Kenya-based mediators of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), which is hosting the peace talks, informed the league it could take part as an observer. Negotiations are set to resume on Nov. 30 in Kenya.
In another development, the United Nations said that Sudan’s government is hampering an adequate response to an escalating humanitarian crisis in the war-ravaged Darfur region by reneging on a pledge to process aid workers’ travel permits speedily.
“Some aid operations haven’t been able to start. Aid workers who are ready to go (to Darfur) are getting stuck,” because their permit applications have not been turned around within a promised 24-hour period, Ben Parker, the Nairobi-based spokesman for the UN’s Humanitarian Coordinator in Sudan, Mukesh Kapila, told AFP by phone.
Since February, Darfur, in western Sudan along the border with Chad, has been the theater of clashes between a rebel group, the Sudan Liberation Movement, and government forces backed by local militias. At least 3,000 people have been killed and hundreds of thousands displaced by the fighting.
“We understand the government has legitimate security concerns but we feel that there has to be a better way,” Parker added. “I have heard of cases pending for weeks,” he said. “We were assured in early October that things would be smoother in future,” he said. “In the case of Darfur we remain concerned because procedures as currently followed remain a hindrance,” he added.
“We are seeing dozens of villages being burned... the war is targeting civilians more than anybody else,” explained Parker. On Nov. 5, the government and the SLM agreed to extend a shaky ceasefire until the middle of the month.
At the weekend, local administrators in Darfur urged the government to rein in Arab militia groups who allegedly killed some 88 people last week and torched 32,000 acres (129 square kilometers) of farmland. In a statement released yesterday, Parker warned that the situation in Darfur “may emerge as the worst humanitarian crisis in the Sudan since 1998.
“Insecurity continues, causing the displacement of hundreds of thousands and hampering relief operations. Humanitarian access is in some cases nonexistent, and there are few aid workers in the area,” the statement said.
In the statement, Kapila called for guarantees of “unimpeded access to all vulnerable populations and for the protection of vulnerable civilians and humanitarian personnel” to be added to the ceasefire text. “So far, humanitarian assistance has been insufficient, especially the provision of non-food assistance, clean water supply and sanitation,” the statement lamented.
“Comprehensive needs assessments, nutrition surveys, and monitoring and evaluation programs cannot be carried out due to access and security constraints,” it added.
Meanwhile, armed abductors have freed one of four men snatched two days ago in North Darfur before driving off with the other three, one a local tribal chieftain, the state’s governor was reported as saying yesterday. The released driver was taken by his abductors from Kukul marketplace, north of the state capital Al-Fashir, to Umsidir, an area further north, the independent Al-Hayat daily quoted Osman Yousuf Kibir as saying. The kidnappers dropped him off at Umsidir, before driving off to an unknown location, the newspaper reported.
The four men were abducted Saturday by gunmen, Al-Hayat reported earlier. At the time, it quoted Kibir as accusing the SLM of involvement in the incident, but contacts with the SLM made him optimistic that the four would be freed. Khartoum and West Darfur rebels agreed Tuesday to extend a Chadian-brokered cease-fire agreed in September for another 10 days while they pursue negotiations in neighboring Chad.
The government and the SLM resumed talks at Abeche in eastern Chad on Oct. 26 in an attempt to stem a conflict that is estimated to have cost 3,000 lives and displaced hundreds of thousands of people, many of whom have streamed into Chad.
