EL GENEINA, Sudan: Sudanese President Omar Bashir, indicted for genocide and war crimes in Darfur, vowed yesterday to work for peace in the vast desert region and the return of hundreds of thousands of people forced by attacks to flee their homes.
Bashir was speaking at an outdoor rally attended by several thousand supporters in the town of El Geneina in the far western part of Darfur.
An international prosecutor is seeking an arrest warrant for Bashir after indicting him on July 14 on charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. It will be months before a panel of judges at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, the Netherlands, rules on the request.
Bashir, meanwhile, has been casting himself as a peacemaker, arriving in Darfur Wednesday on his first visit to the region since the indictment, the first against a sitting head of state by the court.
The United Nations says some 300,000 people have died in Darfur and another 2.5 million have been made homeless since ethnic African rebels took up arms against Bashir’s regime, accusing it of discrimination and demanding a larger share of state funds and services.
Bashir’s speech yesterday was feisty, but largely restrained. Like he did at a rally in Darfur’s capital of El Fasher on Wednesday, he treated supporters in El Geneina to a little jig he performed as traditional Sudanese music blared from loudspeakers.
His short address was peppered with verses from the Qur’an and the sayings of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh).
“We don’t need anyone to show us how to make peace,” he told the cheering crowd. “Because we know better... We are with you until we achieve peace and the refugees return to their homes.”
Bashir did not visit any of the refugee camps in Darfur, where anti-government sentiment is known to run high. “We must work together to remove the reasons that displaced them, impose security and restore the prestige of the state,” he told the crowd in El Geneina.
In a thinly veiled reference to the sharp criticism that has been directed by the international community against his regime’s handling of the Darfur conflict, he said: “Peace is key to solving all these issues they talk about.”
Separately, the country’s justice minister said Khartoum had invited international experts to inspect its legal system to see whether it is capable of holding trials for war crimes committed in Darfur.
Justice Minister Abdel Basit Sabderat said Sudan would revive its own trials for those accused of war crimes in Darfur, although he gave no date.
He said experts from the United Nations, African Union and Arab League had been invited. “We invited them to come and see the judicial system in Sudan themselves,” he said, adding that Bashir had suggested this to Arab League head Amr Moussa during his visit this week.
The Arab League says Sudan has agreed to try those it thought responsible for crimes in Darfur under Arab and African observation. Both the African Union and Arab League want any indictment for Bashir to be put on hold.
