Bashir Rejects SPLM Initiative To Mediate Over Darfur

19 July 2010 - (Khartoum) – President Omar al-Bashir has rejected an initiative by the SPLM to mediate in the Darfur talks.

Last week the SPLM said that its party was asked by the AU-UN joint mediator Djibril Bassole to mediate in an attempt to convince the two major Darfur anti-government groups, JEM and SLM al-Nur’s faction to join the talks.

Speaking to SRS on Monday, the advisor to the minister of information in the National government and NCP senior member Doctor Rabie Abdullaati said that SPLM is part of the government and cannot be mediators in the Darfur talks.

[Doctor Rabie Abdullaati]: “The president of the republic does not reject the participation of the SPLM in Darfur talks, because the SPLM is already part of the government. But it is better for the SPLM to say they want to participate in Darfur talks rather than saying they want to mediate because mediation cannot come from a party which is part of the government itself. So I think that if the SPLM want to contribute in the talks, the door is open for them to participate but through the government’s platform. Therefore, I say the word “mediation” is inaccurate.”

However, SPLM has responded by stressing that they will continue in their initiative for the sake of realizing sustainable peace in Darfur.

The SPLM deputy secretary-general northern sector Yasir Arman spoke to SRS from Khartoum on Monday.

[Yasir Arman]: “This is very weird from the NCP, all the Sudanese political forces are supposed to help in finding solutions to the conflict in Darfur, not only the NCP. Now only the NCP who is taking over the negotiations alone and it does not represent the whole government. The government including the SPLM has not been consulted about the strategy of the negotiations in the Darfur issue; the NCP is determining the negotiation strategies all by itself. Therefore Djibril Bassole has appealed to the first Vice President Salva Kiir and our communications with the Darfur groups will continue for the sake of sustainable, comprehensive and justified peace in Darfur.”

The antigovernment group, the Justice and Equality Movement, welcomed the SPLM initiative and criticized President Bashir’s rejection of the intervention saying that Bashir has negative intentions for the region.

JEM senior member Mansour Arbab Younis spoke to SRS from Cairo on Monday.

[Mansour Arbab Younis]: “It is clear that the intervention of al-Bashir in this issue signals bad and negative intentions. This move could lead to a continuous war in the country, if there is no imminent solution. He (al-Bashir) intervenes here and there, in Darfur and in southern Sudan as well to create chaos in the country, in order to divert attention from the ICC charges against him.”

That was the JEM senior member Mansour Arbab Younis, speaking to SRS from Cairo.