UNAMID issued a strange denial yesterday of rumors claiming it had transported armed combatants from one place in Darfur to another. The denial was true, but barely – the combatants weren’t armed at the time they were transferred - and the incident illustrates the continued dominance of a military ethic over a civilian one within UNAMID which marginalizes civil society relative to armed groups in Darfur.
During the fighting in Muhajeriya in South Darfur earlier this month (in was has become a familiar seen in Congo, the Balkans and elsewhere) hundreds of civilians crowded around the UN base seeking protection from the cross-fire of battling JEM and SLA/M (Minni Minnawi) ground troops and later, GoS air bombardment.
The public details are fuzzy, but at some point GoS forces, having realized that the government-affiliated SLA/M troops would be defeated, intervened to forcibly disarm the group before JEM could acquire their weapons. Hundreds of disarmed and vulnerable ex-combatants (SLA/M) then arrived at the UNAMID compound seeking protection and were inexplicably given entry by the commanding officers of the base.
Despite the questionable legality of this move, once the men were inside, the mission was forced to care for them. The fighters were eventually transported by UNAMID helicopter with their consent to more friendly territory in Darfur.
There may have been some rationale behind the decision to admit the disarmed troops and not the civilians – 1) the combatants seeking protection were a smaller group than the civilian population and 2) the SLA/M combatants would more likely have been targeted by victorious JEM rebels - But the incident was clearly a violation of the fundamental principles of humanitarian law prioritizing the sanctity of civilian life in combat.
The series of decisions made during this crisis reveal the prioritization of military concerns over civilian ones within the Mission which has potentially contributed to militarization of the conflict.
The African Union mediated Darfur peace talks in Abuja in 2005 were widely criticized for giving armed factions a much larger seat at the negotiating table than unarmed civil society groups. Since these talks there has been an effort to include civil society in various peace initiatives, but partiality towards armed groups continues on the ground.
UNAMID civilian staff are limited to permanent deployment in the three Darfur capitals while UNAMID military are deployed widely at team sites across the states. The UNAMID military staff on the ground often forge stronger relations with the armed combatants within their area of responsibility, than the civilians. UNAMID commanders develop relationships with rebel and army commanding officers, and rely on each other for information, protection, and logistical arrangements
When an incident of note occurs, civilian staff may conduct 1, 2 or 3 day field mission to the team sites where they interact with a wide variety of civilians. But without being on the ground permanently, UNAMID civilian staff are unable to build lasting relationships with teachers, doctors, artisans, police, local leaders and others.
The majority of information received and disseminated by UNAMID is skewed towards armed groups and filtered through the relations of armed actors on the ground. When calls for more peacekeepers are made in the international press, it must be noted that these “peacekeepers” are not experts in humanitarian law, and their presence on the ground may actually elevate military over civilian actors in the conflict.
More troops may not be the answer – but rather a new focus on building functioning and lasting relations with a cross-section of Darfur society and the deployment of civilian staff more widely.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Visiting a Sick Person
A delegation of IDP leadership in El Fasher approached UNAMID in December to warn that January would be a violent period. They felt exposed to retaliation by government-affiliated militia if a warrant was issued by the ICC for President Bashir, and claimed that both rebels and government would be consolidating their positions in the lead up to a political upheaval that would reconfigure the peace process.
Fearing for their own well-being and for the safety of UNAMID, the delegation asked what UNAMID troops intended to do if security deteriorated during the month. Senior mission officials assured the IDP delegation that UNAMID would continue regular patrols to provide safety for civilians throughout Darfur.
One Omda summed up his theory of UNAMID patrols’ contribution to safety in the camps with the comment “You know, we (camp residents) are not opposed to UNAMID patrols - as ineffective as they may be - but the patrols are a bit like sending a friend to visit a sick person in the hospital. The show of solidarity is nice, but it won’t heal the problem.”
Fearing for their own well-being and for the safety of UNAMID, the delegation asked what UNAMID troops intended to do if security deteriorated during the month. Senior mission officials assured the IDP delegation that UNAMID would continue regular patrols to provide safety for civilians throughout Darfur.
One Omda summed up his theory of UNAMID patrols’ contribution to safety in the camps with the comment “You know, we (camp residents) are not opposed to UNAMID patrols - as ineffective as they may be - but the patrols are a bit like sending a friend to visit a sick person in the hospital. The show of solidarity is nice, but it won’t heal the problem.”
Friday, January 30, 2009
Returing to a New Darfur
I recently landed in El Fasher after three weeks of vacation aboard the last flight to slip in to Darfur before a series of rebel movements and GoS bombing in the area shut down the airport.
Dropping my bags off at home, the ceiling fan and glasses were rattling from the nearby bombardment and I decided not to unpack quite yet. UNAMID still seems to have one foot in Darfur and one foot out - never quite deciding if they will run at the first instance of attack or stay throughout.
The Darfuris can sense this equivocation and the first question residents of one displaced persons camp asked me was why UNAMID had stropped patrolling since the bombing began. When I asked the police commander I was assured that the patrols were continuing from strategic vantage points within the town. Given the topography of El Fasher, I eventually learned this meant climbing trees and observing the camps with binoculars. Residents were needless to say not assured by this, but also not too worried. It appears the bombing was concentrated on JEM positions and there were few civilian casualties.
Most of the projects I was working on before I left are now largely irrelevant. The fast-pace of military and political change in Darfur often means a new start and new analysis every time you come back from leave.
In the office my boss assured me to continue planning activities as normal and that there would be no evacuation in the near future. But arriving home that night, I found my house mate (who works in supply chain) packing for Entebbe, Uganda where he would be coordinating the foreseen evacuation.
Most people blame this schizophrenic direction on the dual political commands received by the mission from its African Union and United Nations bosses (particularly in regards to support for or criticism of the ICC indictment). But I see a fundamental disagreement between the humanitarian side (political affaires, human rights, etc) and the administrative/logistic side of the mission. Humanitarians seem to operate under the assumption that the UN and its member states are willing to risk lives for the ideals of the Geneva conventions and civilian protection during war time.
It remains to be seen which direction one will win out…but the Mission’s upper management did collectively agree that if we do evacuate it will not in fact be called an evacuation (because that sounds too much like we are abandoning the people of Darfur) but rather a "relocation."
Dropping my bags off at home, the ceiling fan and glasses were rattling from the nearby bombardment and I decided not to unpack quite yet. UNAMID still seems to have one foot in Darfur and one foot out - never quite deciding if they will run at the first instance of attack or stay throughout.
The Darfuris can sense this equivocation and the first question residents of one displaced persons camp asked me was why UNAMID had stropped patrolling since the bombing began. When I asked the police commander I was assured that the patrols were continuing from strategic vantage points within the town. Given the topography of El Fasher, I eventually learned this meant climbing trees and observing the camps with binoculars. Residents were needless to say not assured by this, but also not too worried. It appears the bombing was concentrated on JEM positions and there were few civilian casualties.
Most of the projects I was working on before I left are now largely irrelevant. The fast-pace of military and political change in Darfur often means a new start and new analysis every time you come back from leave.
In the office my boss assured me to continue planning activities as normal and that there would be no evacuation in the near future. But arriving home that night, I found my house mate (who works in supply chain) packing for Entebbe, Uganda where he would be coordinating the foreseen evacuation.
Most people blame this schizophrenic direction on the dual political commands received by the mission from its African Union and United Nations bosses (particularly in regards to support for or criticism of the ICC indictment). But I see a fundamental disagreement between the humanitarian side (political affaires, human rights, etc) and the administrative/logistic side of the mission. Humanitarians seem to operate under the assumption that the UN and its member states are willing to risk lives for the ideals of the Geneva conventions and civilian protection during war time.
It remains to be seen which direction one will win out…but the Mission’s upper management did collectively agree that if we do evacuate it will not in fact be called an evacuation (because that sounds too much like we are abandoning the people of Darfur) but rather a "relocation."
Saturday, December 27, 2008
The Shoe and the Truth
The Shoe/Bush incident is the talk of the town. The Sudanese I spoke to let out an involuntary peal of laughter the first time they saw or heard, but quickly assumed disapproving expressions. The Sudanese, they claim, are quieter, more restrained, particularly in the face of authority. You would never see a Sudanese throw a shoe at anyone, they tell me.
(But when I ask why it is bad or good to throw shoes I get answers like ‘its bad because then the authority will be angry and it will make your life more difficult.’ It seems when life is already of a certain degree of difficulty, morality falls away and all that’s left are practical concerns.)
To me the footage is only meaningful with the sound on. The visual image is just an angry man. But the audio of Bush being cut off in mid-sentence – proclaiming friendship and ‘parting gifts to the Iraqi people’ - with a loud thud lends an ‘emperor’s new clothes’ side to the story. A lone man standing up for truth.
Its one thing for leaders to make foreign policy mistakes or at least to watch major unintended consequences of their actions unravel. But its another thing to pretend its not happening.
The Bush incident was embarrassing to many Iraqis (and Sudanese). But not nearly as embarrassing as Bush’s State of the Middle East Speech a week earlier was to me. I keep telling my Sudanese friends that Americans are more honest than that, more down-to-earth. That you would never see a true American stand before a wounded country and say things not remotely connected to reality.
(But when I ask why it is bad or good to throw shoes I get answers like ‘its bad because then the authority will be angry and it will make your life more difficult.’ It seems when life is already of a certain degree of difficulty, morality falls away and all that’s left are practical concerns.)
To me the footage is only meaningful with the sound on. The visual image is just an angry man. But the audio of Bush being cut off in mid-sentence – proclaiming friendship and ‘parting gifts to the Iraqi people’ - with a loud thud lends an ‘emperor’s new clothes’ side to the story. A lone man standing up for truth.
Its one thing for leaders to make foreign policy mistakes or at least to watch major unintended consequences of their actions unravel. But its another thing to pretend its not happening.
The Bush incident was embarrassing to many Iraqis (and Sudanese). But not nearly as embarrassing as Bush’s State of the Middle East Speech a week earlier was to me. I keep telling my Sudanese friends that Americans are more honest than that, more down-to-earth. That you would never see a true American stand before a wounded country and say things not remotely connected to reality.
Lessons from the Peace Corps
I was a Peace Corps volunteer before joining the UN. In training, a few weeks into your stay in a new country, they make you do an exercise called “community mapping” to learn the two most essential skills of community intervention.
The trainers drive you out to a small village, assemble the villagers, give you a pen and paper and tell you to sketch out a map of the existing village structures and services and identify needs for new ones.
Half the battle is explaining to a group of unsuspecting villagers who you are and what it is you are doing standing in the dirt in front of them with a pen and paper. The rest of the battle is learning how to listen. Vast differences between you and them soon become apparent – perhaps you don’t know what a gari mill is, and they definitely have no idea how to conceive of a map. Somehow you have to meet in the middle.
The point of this story is that UNAMID needs to get better at 1) explaining what it is and why it is there, and 2) relaying messages back from the community about what their needs are. This two-way communication is supposed to happen on daily “confidence building patrols” which consist of a few cars of police and military personnel driving around camps and villages and stopping to talk to people. These patrols constitute the vast majority of UNAMID’s billion-dollar-a-year contact with its constituency - rural Darfuris affected by the conflict.
But very little has been invested in developing these essential skills in police and military and in the translators through which their interactions are channeled. Going along on patrol you can’t help but notice some camp residents give blank stares in response to questions – they don’t know why UNAMID people are there and what they expect to offer. Others say everything is fine, having long ago given up hope that anyone is actually listening to what they say..
If you can’t communicate, you’re just someone with a pen and paper in the dirt.
The trainers drive you out to a small village, assemble the villagers, give you a pen and paper and tell you to sketch out a map of the existing village structures and services and identify needs for new ones.
Half the battle is explaining to a group of unsuspecting villagers who you are and what it is you are doing standing in the dirt in front of them with a pen and paper. The rest of the battle is learning how to listen. Vast differences between you and them soon become apparent – perhaps you don’t know what a gari mill is, and they definitely have no idea how to conceive of a map. Somehow you have to meet in the middle.
The point of this story is that UNAMID needs to get better at 1) explaining what it is and why it is there, and 2) relaying messages back from the community about what their needs are. This two-way communication is supposed to happen on daily “confidence building patrols” which consist of a few cars of police and military personnel driving around camps and villages and stopping to talk to people. These patrols constitute the vast majority of UNAMID’s billion-dollar-a-year contact with its constituency - rural Darfuris affected by the conflict.
But very little has been invested in developing these essential skills in police and military and in the translators through which their interactions are channeled. Going along on patrol you can’t help but notice some camp residents give blank stares in response to questions – they don’t know why UNAMID people are there and what they expect to offer. Others say everything is fine, having long ago given up hope that anyone is actually listening to what they say..
If you can’t communicate, you’re just someone with a pen and paper in the dirt.
The ICC and the US
I keep seeing editorials in respectable newspapers exhorting the US government to act to ensure that justice is not delayed in Darfur through a Security Council deferral of the arrest warrant for President Bashir.
A group of prominent Darfur experts wrote an open letter to Barrack Obama claiming that since Briton and France were negotiating with Sudan over the charges – trying to leverage major concessions in exchange for a deferral - the US must step into the moral vacuum and ensure that justice prevails, presumably in order to prevent dictators around the world from thinking they are immune to war cirmes charges.
Which would all sound a lot better if the US had not shied away from ratifying the Rome Statue creating the ICC for fear that its people would not be immune from war crimes charges.
Condilezza Rice has just outlined an expensive step by step plan for strengthening international justice mechanisms. But the single most meaningful gesture the US could carry out to strengthen the legitimacy of the charges against President Bashir and to raise the stakes of continued defiance of the law by the Sudanese government is to ratify the court's documents.
A group of prominent Darfur experts wrote an open letter to Barrack Obama claiming that since Briton and France were negotiating with Sudan over the charges – trying to leverage major concessions in exchange for a deferral - the US must step into the moral vacuum and ensure that justice prevails, presumably in order to prevent dictators around the world from thinking they are immune to war cirmes charges.
Which would all sound a lot better if the US had not shied away from ratifying the Rome Statue creating the ICC for fear that its people would not be immune from war crimes charges.
Condilezza Rice has just outlined an expensive step by step plan for strengthening international justice mechanisms. But the single most meaningful gesture the US could carry out to strengthen the legitimacy of the charges against President Bashir and to raise the stakes of continued defiance of the law by the Sudanese government is to ratify the court's documents.
End of a Long Silence
I haven’t written in a long time, I apologize – I’ve been traveling a lot and I lost my USB drive with all my rambling writings somewhere in the sand. Its Christmas time now, and things have settled down a bit. Most people are on holiday.
President Bashir came to El Fasher yesterday. The weeks leading up were filled with frantic preparation – painting the curbs black and white, hanging Sudanese flags along the road, rushing to finish construction on the new mosque, military hospital, and ministry buildings. The frenzy of activity built up until the night before when hundreds of workers were still putting up power lines, sweeping the streets, and hammering – I half expected to wake up the next day in a reformed city, with shiny cars, nice buildings, and people singing in the streets.
Bashir’s arrival after all the preparation was anticlimactic, despite the significantly increased amount of armed men careening about town in pick-up trucks. He gave a speech promising peace and a new road to Khartoum, but my Sudanese colleagues were unimpressed.
The most drama occurred when residents of the displaced persons’ camp refused to allow Bashir’s convoy to pass by the camp on its way to the “model village” he was opening and inviting them to live in - so he had to travel the two kilometers by helicopter.
President Bashir came to El Fasher yesterday. The weeks leading up were filled with frantic preparation – painting the curbs black and white, hanging Sudanese flags along the road, rushing to finish construction on the new mosque, military hospital, and ministry buildings. The frenzy of activity built up until the night before when hundreds of workers were still putting up power lines, sweeping the streets, and hammering – I half expected to wake up the next day in a reformed city, with shiny cars, nice buildings, and people singing in the streets.
Bashir’s arrival after all the preparation was anticlimactic, despite the significantly increased amount of armed men careening about town in pick-up trucks. He gave a speech promising peace and a new road to Khartoum, but my Sudanese colleagues were unimpressed.
The most drama occurred when residents of the displaced persons’ camp refused to allow Bashir’s convoy to pass by the camp on its way to the “model village” he was opening and inviting them to live in - so he had to travel the two kilometers by helicopter.
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