By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, January 5 -- Sudan will be the issue most frequently discussed by the UN Security Council in January, but the deteriorating situation in Darfur is becoming an afterthought with very little follow-up.
The month's program of work was confirmed Wednesday by Council president Ivan Barbalic of Bosnia, with three days of briefings about Sudan, beginning January 6 with a briefing by Benjamin Mkapa and the UN's Haile Menkerios, who on New Years Eve praised Omar al Bashir for his “courage” and leadership.
That Bashir is under indictment for genocide and war crimes in Darfur did not seem to be of concern to Menkerios or the UN Secretariat, whose spokesman Martin Nesirky on Wednesday spoke of the release of a kidnapped UN peacekeeper in Darfur “courtesy” of Bashir's government.
Nesirky also belatedly answered a question Inner City Press had been asking since last month, about two reported rapes by Bashir's forces in Tawila, near UN peacekeepers under Ibrahim Gambari's command. Nesirky issued a long read out, concluding that one rape was been verified -- but not two! We will have more on this.
Inner City Press asked Barbalic about Bashir's arrest of three people who met with the Security Council delegation to Darfur in October 2010, of which Barbalic was a part. While Barbalic paused to say how moved the visit had made him -- he said “we can only cry aloud permanently” -- he claimed that the arrests have somehow “been addressed.” Video here. That is not the case.
We will follow all three Sudan briefings at the Council -- but will Darfur remain just an afterthought? Barbalic said that Southern Sudan and Darfur are connected. Most recently, Salva Kiir of the SPLM has reportedly agreed to push all Darfur rebels -- and refugees? -- out of South Sudan. Watch this site.
