Behind the Chad-Sudan conflicts

A flare-up in tensions between Chad and Sudan during the week of May 4 has exposed the continuing efforts of French and U.S. imperialism to dominate the political and economic future of North and Central Africa. An effort by Chad rebels to attack the capital N’Djamena and overturn the Idriss Deby Itno regime was reportedly defeated May 7 after air power halted the rebel advance.

Chad’s government, backed by France, immediately blamed Sudan for providing rear-base and material support for the Union of Resistance Forces (UFR), which claimed responsibility for the attacks inside the country. The UFR is an alliance of Chadian opposition groups led by Timan Erdimi.

A French military source based in Chad, where over 1,000 French troops protect the government, claims that the rebels were defeated decisively. “The Chadian army showed itself to be very organized, it was worthy of a modern army,” the French military spokesperson stated. (South African Mercury, May 11) The Chadian government claims that 226 rebels and 22 government soldiers were killed in the recent fighting.

The UFR, however, has stated, “We are regrouping, we are taking care of the wounded. The situation is calm, but you will see, it will pick up again.” (Mercury)

Sudan’s government dismissed accusations that it was behind the attacks. In turn, it accused the Chadian regime of supporting the Justice and Equality Movement, one of the rebel groups fighting in Sudan’s Darfur region against President Omar Hassan al-Bashir’s governmental forces.

According to the Sudanese News Agency, “National Defense Minister Abdel Rahim Mohamed Hussein has affirmed the readiness of the armed forces to repel any aggression on Sudanese lands, pointing to the movements of JEM on the northwestern border with support from the Chadian government.” (May 10)

Hussein made these remarks from El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur.

The defense minister was in the region to monitor developments in the fighting between the supporters of Minni Arcua Minnawi—a former rebel leader in Darfur who signed a peace agreement with the central government in 2006—and forces within the JEM.

Minnawi heads a breakaway faction of the Sudan Liberation Army and was appointed as a presidential assistant after the peace deal with the government in Khartoum in 2006.

This fighting in Darfur comes on the heels of an agreement signed between the governments in Chad and Sudan the week before in Doha. The two states had resumed diplomatic ties in November 2008 after an earlier rupture the preceding May.

France behind Security Council session

Chad made a special request for a United Nations Security Council session on May 8 to discuss purported Sudanese aggression. During the session, allies of Sudan defeated attempts by France to pass a resolution “seeking accountability of Sudan for recent incidents in Chad, alleging that the Chadian opposition that led the offensive against Deby’s regime came from Sudan.” (Sudan Vision, May 10)

The Sudanese ambassador to the United Nations, Abdel Halim Abdelmahmoud, disputed the charges made by Chad that Khartoum is backing the UFR rebels and that the problems in Chad are internal. In the same source he said, “We have nothing to do with that. This is a Chadian problem. It should be dealt with inside Chad by the Chadians.”

The Sudanese ambassador accused the former Chadian colonizer France of being the author of the N’djamena request for an emergency session of the Security Council. Nonetheless, the Security Council on May 8 issued a statement that condemned “renewed military excursions” by “Chadian armed groups coming from outside.”

U.S., Israel, oil and the ICC

Since the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants against Sudan President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, the U.S. has taken a two-pronged approach. The Barack Obama administration has appointed Special Envoy J. Scott Gration to engage Khartoum in diplomatic efforts. At the same time, the U.S. corporate media has escalated its attacks against Sudan’s government, accusing the leadership of genocide in the Darfur region.

Both Secretary of State Hilary Clinton and President Obama called Sudan’s expulsion of some Western-based aid agencies unacceptable in light of the humanitarian situation in the western region of the country. Khartoum has said that it will accept material assistance from the affected agencies but that any aid must be turned over to the Sudanese state for distribution.

Though the U.S.-based Save Darfur campaign has accused the Sudanese government of genocide to justify its demand for greater Western military intervention in the region, various international bodies have not made this claim. A May 4 Los Angeles Times article by Edmund Sanders points out that there is no evidence that genocide is the official policy of the government in Khartoum.

Sanders writes: “In the United States, many see the six-year war in Darfur as a bloody campaign by a Sudanese Arab-dominated government against rebellious ‘African’ tribes in western Sudan. Two consecutive American presidents and several activist groups have defined it as genocide.

“But others, while acknowledging the severity of the violence, question whether it meets the legal definition of genocide. The United Nations determined in 2005 that the Sudanese government wasn’t committing genocide in Darfur. Human Rights Watch and Doctors Without Borders avoid the G-word too.

“The International Criminal Court renewed the debate in March when it issued an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir. Judges said his counterinsurgency tactics in Darfur may amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity, but that there was no evidence of genocide.”

Nevertheless, the U.S. has used the ICC campaign against the Sudanese leader in an attempt to further destabilize his government. Both Sudan and Chad are oil-producing states that also contain other strategic minerals that are important in the Western capitalist system.

With a population of 11.1 million, Chad became a major player in the global oil industry when a $4 billion pipeline linking its oilfields to terminals on the Atlantic coast opened up in 2003. The mostly semi-arid country also produces gold and uranium.

Sudan, with a population of 40 million, is also major supplier of oil in the international market. The People’s Republic of China and some Middle Eastern and Asian states manage the concessions for oil exploration. Oil production was projected to reach approximately one million barrels per day by the end of 2008. The estimated natural oil reserves has been estimated to total at least five billion barrels.

French imperialism, which has some drilling rights in Sudan, is very much interested in gaining greater access. The U.S. has been excluded from Sudan’s oil concessions. As a result, diplomatic relations between the two states have become strained over the last few years as Washington targeted the Khartoum government.

In recent months there have been allegations of Sudanese involvement in the shipment of arms from Iran to the Hamas government in Gaza, including a report in the Israeli Haaretz newspaper on April 27 that asserts that “an Iranian vessel laden with weapons bound for the Gaza Strip was torpedoed off the coast of Sudan last week, allegedly by Israeli or American forces operating in the area.” (For background, see April 9 article by this writer at www.workers.org.)

Consequently, the recent conflicts and strained diplomatic relations between Sudan and Chad must be viewed within this broader context. Both the U.S. and France are seeking to enhance their influence in the region.

Anti-imperialists in the United States must recognize the material and political sources of these conflicts and uphold the right of self-determination for both the people of Sudan and Chad. Imperialist intervention in these geopolitical areas will only further the oppression of the people in the region.