Press Release/Commentary by ESPAC posted on February 15, 2001 at 15:16:25: EST (-5 GMT)
JOHN GARANG AND THE SUDAN PEOPLE'S LIBERATION ARMY: THE UNANSWERED QUESTIONS
The European-Sudanese Public Affairs Council
Date of Publication: February 2001
Question 1
What is the SPLA fighting for?
The political complexion of the Sudan People's Liberation Army has
varied from professedly Marxist - at one stage even fighting to keep
Ethiopia's Mengistu regime in power - to now politically identifying
with Bible-belt Christian fundamentalist American conservatives. Even on
such a central issue as to whether the SPLA is fighting for a separate
south or a united Sudan, there continues to be confusion. For what
objective are you ordering SPLA men, women and child soldiers to their
deaths on the battlefields of southern Sudan?
[See, 'Sudanese rebel leader wants "united" Sudan with "equality"', News
Article by Agence France Presse, 12 August 1999, at 08:12:59; 'SPLA
committed to Sudan unity', News Article by ArabicNews.com, 29 November
1997; 'Separatist leader wants Sudan to split into two', News Article by
BBC, 22 March 1999, at 18:21 GMT; 'Sudanese rebels accused of planning
separate state', News Article by Agence France Presse, 2 August 1999, at
11:49:08.]
Question 2
Why not support a UN-supervised referendum on southern Sudanese self-
determination?
In 1997, the Sudanese Government, in the Khartoum Peace Agreement, set
out the holding of a free and fair, internationally-supervised,
referendum in which the people of southern Sudan can, for the first time
ever, choose whether to remain as a part of Sudan or to become
independent. This offer has also been written into the new Constitution,
and repeated elsewhere. It has been acknowledged by the SPLA. Why do you
not accept this offer, rather than continuing to fight a no-win war?
[See, 'Sudan offers South secession', News Article by BBC, 22 February
1999 at 00:16:14 GMT; 'Southern secession better than more war: Sudan's
president', News Article by Agence France Presse, 22 February 1999, at
10:04:31; 'Referendum agreed at Sudan peace talks', News Article by BBC
World, 7 May 1998, at 11:06 GMT; 'Sudan Says Happy for South to secede',
News Article by Reuters, 7 May 1998; 'SPLA plays down deal on referendum
in southern Sudan', News Article by BBC, 7 May 1998, at 13:24 GMT.]
Question 3
Why did the 'New York Times' state that you were one of Sudan's "pre-
eminent war criminals"?
In December 1999, 'The New York Times', a vigorous critic of the
Sudanese government, described John Garang as one of Sudan's "pre-
eminent war criminals". This was in response to the Clinton
Administration's stated desire to provide direct food aid to the SPLA.
[See, 'Misguided Relief to Sudan', Editorial, 'The New York Times', 6
December, 1999.]
Question 4
How do you defend the SPLA's appalling human rights record?
'The New York Times' has stated that the SPLA "have behaved like an
occupying army, killing, raping and pillaging." In November 1999, eight
US-based humanitarian organisations working in Sudan, including CARE,
World Vision, Church World Service, Save the Children and the American
Refugee Committee, no friends of the Sudanese government, publicly
stated that the SPLA has: "engaged for years in the most serious human
rights abuses, including extrajudicial killings, beatings, arbitrary
detention, slavery, etc". In its 279-page study entitled 'Civilian
Devastation: Abuses by all Parties in the War in Southern Sudan', Human
Rights Watch/Africa devoted 169 pages to "SPLA Violations of the Rules
of War". Human Rights Watch/Africa reported that the SPLA was guilty of,
amongst other things, summary executions, indiscriminate attacks on
civilians, the deliberate starvation of civilians, abducting civilians,
mainly women and children, torture, forced recruitment and forced
labour, theft of civilian animals, food and grain, and the holding of
long-term political prisoners in prolonged arbitrary detention. The SPLA
has also admitted the shooting down of civilian airliners within Sudan,
incidents involving considerable loss of civilian life.
[See, for example, See, 'Misguided Relief to Sudan', Editorial, The New
York Times, 6 December 1999; 'Humanitarian Organizations Oppose Plan
Providing Food to Sudanese Rebels', Press Release by InterAction, the
American Council for Voluntary International Action, Washington-DC, 30
November, 1999; Civilian Devastation: Abuses by all Parties in the War
in Southern Sudan, Human Rights Watch/Africa, New York, 1994; Denying
"The Honor of Living": Sudan A Human Rights Disaster, Africa Watch,
1989; Peter Nyaba, 'The Politics of Liberation in South Sudan: An
Insider's View', Fountain Publishers, Kampala, 1997; John Prendergast,
'Crisis Response: Humanitarian Band-Aids in Sudan and Somalia', Pluto
Press, London, 1997; United States State Department 'Sudan Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices'; Amnesty International Reports.]
Question 5
Is the United States Militarily and Politically Supporting the SPLA?
The former United States President Jimmy Carter has stated that American
government policy is the "biggest obstacle" to peace in Sudan. He has
also said that "instead of working for peace in Sudan, the US government
has basically promoted a continuation of the war" and that "I think
Garang now feels he doesn't need to negotiate because he anticipates a
victory brought about by increasing support from...the United States and
indirectly from other countries". To what extent has the SPLA become an
instrument in the American government's hostile policy towards Sudan?
How much American military assistance, training and equipment has the
SPLA received? How viable would the SPLA be without the extensive
military support it receives from the American and Ugandan governments?
[See, 'Carter, Others Say US Has Faltered in Africa', The Boston Globe,
8 December 1999 and 'Ex-President Opposes Policy of Aiding Khartoum's
Foes', 'The Washington Times', 25 September 1997; 'Sudan's American-
aided guerillas', The Economist, 25 January 1997; 'Sudan Accuses US of
Supplying Rebels with Mines', News Article by Xinhua, 21 January 1999,
at 12:53:58; 'US flies in howitzers to subdue Sudan', 'Africa Analysis'
, No 290, 6 February 1998; 'Albright Meets Sudan Rebels, Pledges US
Support', News Article by Reuters, 10 December 1997, at 09:05 EST; 'U.S.
said to promise aid to Sudanese rebel areas', News Article by Reuters, 2
June 1998, at 11:37:57.]
Question 6
When will the SPLA stop its ethnic cleansing in southern Sudan?
There are repeated allegations that the largely Dinka SPLA has been
engaged in savage ethnic cleansing of non-Dinka African communities in
southern Sudan. The 'Economist' has described the SPLA as "at its
worst...little more than an armed gang of Dinkas...killing, looting and
raping". The UN Special Rapporteur has stated that the SPLA "was
behaving as an occupying army in Eastern Equatoria" and that thousands
of local Didinga people had been displaced. The BBC have independently
reported that the SPLA is seen as "an army of occupation" by Equatorian
tribes such as the Didinga. Even SPLA leaders such as Peter Nyaba have
admitted SPLA inter-tribal violence aimed at the Shilluk, Mandari,
Taposa, Murle and Nuer communities. Amnesty International has recorded
tribally-motivated attacks by the Dinka SPLA on Nuer villages. In its
1994 report, for example, Amnesty stated that in April 1993, your
largely Dinka forces "massacred about 200 Nuer villagers, many of them
children, in villages around the town of Ayod. Some of the victims were
shut in huts and burnt to death. Others were shot." Why is the SPLA
ethnically cleansing parts of southern Sudan?
[See, 'Situation of Human Rights in the Sudan', United Nations General
Assembly, A/55/37a, New York, 11 September 2000, 'Growing friction in
rebel-held southern Sudan', News Article by BBC, 9 June 1999, at 16:36
GMT; 'Denying "The Honor of Living": Sudan A Human Rights Disaster',
Africa Watch, 1989, p.154; 'Food and Power in Sudan' , African Rights,
London, 1997, p.276; Amnesty International Report 1994, Amnesty
International, London 1994, p.275; Peter Nyaba, 'The Politics of
Liberation in South Sudan: An Insider's View', Fountain Publishers,
Kampala, 1997, pp. 24, 26; John Prendergast, 'Crisis Response:
Humanitarian Band-Aids in Sudan and Somalia' , Pluto Press, London,
1997, pp. 28, 53, 56, 57.]
Question 7
Where are the children abducted by the SPLA?
Human rights groups such as Human Rights Watch have stated that 15,000
Sudanese boys, some as young as five years of age, have been forcibly
abducted in the course of the civil war in Sudan by the SPLA. Thousands
of these children have died in combat or from neglect. The SPLA is said
to still hold several thousand remaining boys in circumstances that
constitute slavery. What has happened to these children and is it true
that the SPLA continues to this day to forcibly abduct young Sudanese
children for use as under-age recruits?
[See materials such as, 'Sudan: Garang recruits 20,000 children', News
Article by UPI, 17 August 1999, at 15:46:27; 'Denying "The Honor of
Living": Sudan A Human Rights Disaster' , Africa Watch, 1989, p.162;
United States State Department Sudan Country Reports on Human Rights
Practices for 1991, Washington-DC, 1992, p.391; 'Civilian Devastation,
Abuses by All Parties in the War in Southern Sudan', Human Rights
Watch/Africa, New York, 1994, pp. 174, 189, 192, 195-224; 'Children of
Sudan, Slaves, Street Children and Child Soldiers' , Human Rights
Watch/Africa, New York, 1995, p.75; 'Where are the Children: John
Garang, The SPLA and Sudan's Missing Children', Sudan Foundation, 1998.]
Question 8
Why the murder of Red Cross and relief workers?
In early 1999 the SPLA kidnapped and murdered four Sudanese civilians
who were working with the Red Cross in Sudan. How does the SPLA justify
the murder of these relief workers? Why did the SPLA murder three UN
World Food Programme and Red Cross relief workers in the Nuba mountains
in June 1998? Have those responsible been made accountable?
[See, 'Red Cross workers kidnapped in Sudan', News Article by BBC, 5
March 1999, at 21:49 GMT; 'Sudan Says Rebels Kidnap Seven Red Cross
Workers', News Article by Associated Press, 5 March 1999, at 18:45:02;
'Sudan aid workers executed', News Article by BBC World, 3 April 1999,
at 03:25 GMT; 'Three relief workers killed in Sudan's Nuba mountains',
News Article by Agence France Presse, 10 June 1998, at 21:03:38.]
Question 9
Does the SPLA continue to steal food aid?
In July 1998, the Roman Catholic Church in southern Sudan publicly
stated that the SPLA was stealing 65 percent of the food aid going into
rebel-controlled areas of southern Sudan, food aid aimed at the most
famine-affected Dinka communities in Bahr al-Ghazal. Does the theft of
food aid by the SPLA continue on this scale?
[See, 'Aid for Sudan ending up with SPLA: relief workers', Agence France
Presse, 21 July 1998; 'Theft hampers Sudan aid efforts', News Article by
BBC, 22 July 1998, at 23:45 GMT.]
Question 10
Is the SPLA deceiving journalists on allegations of "slavery" in Sudan?
The American journalist, Richard Miniter, in his July 1999 article in
the American journal 'The Atlantic Monthly' on allegations of slavery
in Sudan, clearly reveals that the SPLA is intimately involved in scams
involving attempts to present ordinary villagers as supposed slaves in
an attempt to deceive western visitors into "paying" for redeemed
"slaves". William Finnegan has expressed similar concerns in 'The New
Yorker' magazine. Is the SPLA actively collaborating in perpetuating
allegations of slavery in Sudan for financial or propaganda advantage?
[See, Richard Miniter, 'The False Promise of Slave Redemption', 'The
Atlantic Monthly', New York, July and August 1999; William Finnegan,
'The Invisible War, 'The New Yorker', 25 January 1999, p.63.]
Question 11
Can the SPLA win the war?
Does the SPLA really believe that it can win the Sudanese civil war? If
not, why does it continue to wage war given the concessions with regard
to federalism, autonomy and even separation offered to southern Sudan?
Question 12
Why no peace in Sudan?
Why has the SPLA rejected the Egyptian-Libyan peace plan for a
comprehensive settlement of the Sudanese conflict, while dragging its
feet in the IGAD talks? Why has the SPLA repeatedly shunned peace
initiatives such as Khartoum's August 1999 declaration of a
comprehensive cease-fire throughout Sudan?
[See, 'Sudanese government declares ceasefire', News Article by BBC
World, 5 August 1999, at 16:24 GMT, at 11:58:37; 'Sudanese government
declares comprehensive cease-fire', News Article by Associated Press, 5
August 1999, at 17:36:10; 'EU Welcomes Cease-Fire in Sudan', News
Article by Xinhua, 20 August 1999, at 10:36:48; 'Annan welcomes
ceasefire', News Article by UN Integrated Regional Information Network,
11 August 1999; 'Annan hails Sudan cease-fire allowing aid to flow',
News Article by Reuters, 6 August 1999, at 17:07:39; 'Annan calls on
Sudan's SPLM leader to sign ceasefire', News Article by Agence France
Presse, 7 August 1999, at 02:37:52; 'Sudanese rebels reject peace plan',
News Article by BBC World, 30 August 1999, at 14:33 GMT; 'Sudanese
Rebels Reject Government Cease-Fire', News Article by Reuters, 5 August
1999, at 12:03:55.]