unitex@rubbs.fidonet.org (unitex) (09/19/89)
SUDAN PEACE CONFERENCE NO ALTERNATIVE TO TALKS, DIPLOMATS SAY Posting Date: 09/18/89 Source: UNITEX Network, Hoboken, NJ, USA Host: (201) 795-0733 ISSN: 1043-7932 (Reuter Library Report, September 14, 517 words, DATELINE: KHARTOUM) A hastily-called conference in Khartoum is being publicised by Sudan's state media as the most serious attempt yet to end a ruinous war and decide how Africa's largest country should be governed. But diplomats say it offers no alternative to direct talks with rebels in the non-Moslem south. Negotiations collapsed last month over the touchstone issue of Sharia or Islamic law. Southern rebel leader John Garang is absent from the Khartoum debates. Diplomats say there is little chance his Sudan People's Liberation Army will fall in with any plan produced unless it is so vague that it leaves key issues to be settled by direct negotiation. "If the conference turns out to be a public relations exercise and direct talks resume, then the question of Sharia will inevitably become the main hurdle," says an Arab diplomat. Nor has the conference shed light on the intentions of the junta headed by General Omar Hassan al-Bashir who overthrew the elected government of Prime Minister Sadeq al-Mahdi on June 30. Sudanese and diplomatic sources say the 15-man junta is itself divided over Sharia. Islamic law was introduced by military ruler Jafaar Nimeiri six years ago. It has been largely dormant since 1985 but the issue blocked peace efforts during Mahdi's democratic interlude. Abolition of Sharia was one of the conditions listed by the SPLA when the junta invited Garang to the Khartoum debates. The junta rejected the demands and the SPLA, whose 40,000 guerrillas control large areas in the mainly animist and Christian south, called on Sudanese to boycott the conference. More than 100 public figures, politicians, academics and retired army officers are taking part in the month-long debates. The junta says participants represent all regions and political forces in Sudan, which stretches 2,000 km (1,200 miles) up the Nile from Egypt to the heart of Black Africa. State radio and television have been broadcasting lengthy coverage of the conference debates but the discussions have so far been vague and theoretical. Conference delegates, chosen by the junta, include several politicians associated with Mahdi's elected government. Sudanese and diplomatic sources say, however, that leftists and communists, many of whom sympathise with the SPLA, have been virtually excluded and a disproportionate number of those taking part subscribe to or tolerate militant Islamic ideology. Fighting, floods and famine killed some 250,000 southerners last year. At least three million have fled to neighbouring states or other parts of Sudan. State radio has for weeks been blaming the SPLA for failure to make peace, calling the guerrillas racists and separatists and ridiculing their declared aim of creating a new Sudan. Diplomats believe Sudan's broadcasting service has since the coup fallen under firm but discreet influence of Moslem fundamentalists. When General Bashir told Sudanese students in Belgrade that Sharia had been revoltingly implemented and tarnished the image of Islam, the faith of Sudan's majority, his remarks, received little attention from the state media. * Origin: UNITEX --> Toward a United Species (1:107/501) --- Patt Haring | United Nations | FAX: 212-787-1726 patth@sci.ccny.cuny.edu | Information | BBS: 201-795-0733 patth@ccnysci.BITNET | Transfer Exchange | (3/12/24/9600 Baud) -=- Every child smiles in the same language. -=-