Arrest Is Sought of Sudan Leader in Genocide Case

[The Smoking Man]

What???

They couldn't muster one for Mugabe at the same time???

Arrest Is Sought of Sudan Leader in Genocide Case
By MARLISE SIMONS, LYDIA POLGREEN and JEFFREY GETTLEMAN

PARIS — The prosecutor at the International Criminal Court formally requested an arrest warrant on Monday for Sudan’s president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, on charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the past five years of bloodshed in the Darfur region of his country.

The prosecutor’s pursuit of Mr. Bashir introduced new volatility to the already chaotic situation in Darfur. While some diplomats and analysts worried that the move would undermine efforts to negotiate peace and provide aid to the millions displaced by violence, others said it offered new leverage to pressure the Sudanese government to end the conflict in Darfur.

Bracing for reprisals, United Nations peacekeepers and aid workers stepped up security in Darfur and pulled out all but the most essential civilians. Sudan promised not to vent its outrage on them, but said it would unleash a “diplomatic war” to try to scuttle the case.

It was the first time the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court had brought genocide charges against anyone. It was also the first time the prosecutor had brought charges against a sitting head of state since the court opened its doors in 2002. Two other presidents, Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia and Charles Taylor of Liberia, were charged by other international war crimes courts, also while they were in office.

Darfur has been a shifting, many-sided conflict, with rebels fighting rebels, government-backed Arab militias killing civilians and one another, freelance bandits attacking aid workers and atrocities committed by all the armed groups.

In announcing the request, the prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, said Mr. Bashir had “masterminded and implemented” a plan to destroy three main ethnic groups in Darfur, the Fur, the Masalit and the Zaghawa. Using government soldiers and Arab militias, the president “purposefully targeted civilians” belonging to these groups, killing 35,000 people “outright” in attacks on towns and villages, he said.

“His motives were largely political,” the prosecutor said. “His alibi was a ‘counterinsurgency.’ His intent was genocide.”

Mr. Moreno-Ocampo, of Argentina, said that the Sudanese president had turned against civilians after failing to defeat a rebellion, and that the genocide consisted of more than direct killing. “Al-Bashir organized the destitution, insecurity and harassment of the survivors,” he said. “He did not need bullets. He used other weapons: rapes, hunger and fear.”

At a news conference at the court in The Hague, Mr. Moreno-Ocampo said he had handed his evidence to the three judges who will decide whether to issue the arrest warrant. An answer is expected in the fall, lawyers at the court said.

If the past is any guide, the judges may well sign the warrant. They have signed all 11 warrants the prosecutor has requested since he took office five years ago.

Genocide charges are the gravest any court can bring, and the prosecutor is expected to implicate others at the top of the Sudanese government.

But the request for a warrant against Mr. Bashir seemed unlikely to lead to his arrest soon. Mr. Bashir has scoffed at two arrest warrants the court has already issued against two other Sudanese figures, even promoting one of them to minister of humanitarian affairs.

“We will resist this,” said Rabie A. Atti, a Sudanese government spokesman. “Everybody in Sudan — the government, the people, even the opposition parties — are against this.”

He contended that Mr. Bashir was innocent and that the international court was “a stooge” for Sudan’s enemies. But he made it clear that the government would not retaliate against the thousands of United Nations and African Union peacekeepers in Sudan or against aid workers.

“Nothing will happen to the U.N. because of this,” he said.

An important question is whether the United Nations Security Council will intervene in the case. The Council asked the court in 2005 to investigate the Darfur crisis, but it has the authority to suspend an investigation or prosecution for at least a year. Since the prosecutor notified the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, last week of his plan, Council members have met privately, with China and Russia warning that a direct move against the Sudanese president would jeopardize any future peace talks.

The joint African Union-United Nations peacekeeping mission in Darfur said Monday that it would continue operating in the region, but other aid organizations have temporarily evacuated some of their workers from Darfur to the capital, Khartoum.

Senior diplomats in Washington and London, along with United Nations officials, were working Monday to decide how to respond to the announcement. But in Darfur, the Justice and Equality Movement, the most formidable rebel group in the region, ruled out negotiations with the government in light of the genocide charges.

“We will not negotiate with a war criminal,” Tahir el-Faki, the movement’s legislative commander, said in a satellite telephone interview from Darfur, where the group’s commanders have gathered to plan a new assault. If Mr. Bashir does not turn himself in, he said, “all the commanders and young fighters here with me are willing to go to Khartoum and remove him by force.”

Still, several analysts contended that the prosecutor’s action would provide a new opening to restart blocked peace talks.

“The peace process is dead,” said John Prendergast, a former Clinton administration official who is a co-founder of Enough, a group that seeks to end genocide. “Suddenly, a new variable has entered the equation in the form of the request for an arrest warrant. While the I.C.C. judges consider this request over the next two months, there is a new point of major leverage over Bashir.”

Nick Grono, deputy president of the International Crisis Group, a nonprofit organization, said that with an arrest warrant looming, Mr. Bashir might feel compelled to show “credible moves towards peace” in the hope of persuading the Security Council to suspend court action.

“It may force the regime to realize that its options are diminishing,” Mr. Grono said.

Before making his announcement, the prosecutor said he knew that some diplomats wanted him to delay, contending peace was more important than justice. But he seemed undeterred.

“Some people have said that for me to intervene at this point is shocking,” he said in a recent interview. “I say what is going on now is shocking. Genocide is going on now, and it is endangering the lives of many more people.”

At first, the prosecutor said, the government attacked from the air, and used Arab militia, called the janjaweed, on the ground to destroy villages. “They kill men, children, elderly, women; they subject women and girls to massive rapes,” the prosecution’s summary says. “They burn and loot the villages.”

Such violence has displaced “almost the entire population” of the ethnic groups under attack, the prosecution contends. “Now the attacks are on the refugee camps,” Mr. Moreno-Ocampo said in the interview. “And the government is hindering humanitarian aid as part of its plan.”

In the 10-page summary provided Monday, the prosecution drew a tough portrait of Mr. Bashir’s actions, saying it had tracked all the known attacks from 2003 to 2008 and shown the government’s genocidal strategy to attack civilian towns and villages.

The prosecutor’s charges include three counts of genocide in the killings of people in the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa ethnic groups; five counts of crimes against humanity involving murder, extermination, forcible transfer, torture and rape; and two counts of war crimes involving attacks on civilian populations in Darfur and the pillaging of towns and villages. The United Nations estimates that 300,000 people have died and 2.7 million have been displaced in the conflict.

Mr. Moreno-Ocampo said he had “very strong evidence that al-Bashir controlled everything: the generals, the intelligence, the ministers, the media.”

“The janjaweed militia called him directly for instructions,” the prosecutor said.

Lawyers close to the court said Western governments may have assisted with the investigation, providing intelligence like aerial surveys and electronic eavesdropping. “It is obvious that something must be done,” a European diplomat said. “The peace process has stalled and the humanitarian disaster only keeps growing.”

Peacekeepers in the region, part of a hybrid United Nations and African Union force, are particularly vulnerable to government retaliation, diplomats and analysts say. Seven peacekeepers were killed in an ambush last week, and the force has been struggling just to protect itself.

Marlise Simons reported from Paris; Lydia Polgreen from Dakar, Senegal; and Jeffrey Gettleman from Nairobi, Kenya.

[The Smoking Man]

So are the critics implying that a person in a position of power and who uses the power to break the law is somehow immune to those laws thus giving him free reign to compound those laws???

Do we wait for a robber to put down the gun before we shoot him now?

A SWAT team would shoot a murderer if he still had the gun in his hands.

UN prepares to pull staff from Darfur

by Jennie Matthew
Tue Jul 15, 3:37 AM ET

The United Nations prepared on Tuesday to fly non-essential staff from Darfur as supporters of Sudan President Omar al-Beshir planned protests in Khartoum to denounce the world court prosecutor's call for him to be arrested for alleged war crimes.

On Monday, the chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Court asked for an arrest warrant against Beshir , accusing him of 10 counts of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in Darfur .

The African Union-United Nations peacekeeping mission announced the staff "relocations" as Sudan promised it would do its utmost to protect peacekeepers and humanitarian workers, but said there could be no security guarantee.

Sudanese and Western officials have widely predicted that the ICC move -- seen by many in Sudan as an assault on national sovereignty -- could spark violent relatiation against Western embassies and UN peacekeepers.

"It's not an evacuation. We're temporarily relocating staff, some non-essential staff. This will probably begin today," said Josephine Guerrero, spokeswoman in Darfur for the UN-led peacekeeping mission.

"UNAMID is not pulling out. All the forces are going to be on the ground and humanitarian operations are continuing," she added, referring to the joint UN-African Union force.

A UN official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the move, ordered by UNAMID force commander Martin Agwai, affected only about 1,800 police and 1,000 civilians who are to leave the country temporarily in coming days.

A UNAMID statement linked the move to an ambush by heavily armed militia last Tuesday in which seven peacekeepers were killed and 22 others wounded.

The Sudanese capital was bracing for angry protests against the ICC move, after Beshir's National Congress Party announced on Monday it would organise a demonstration starting at 1:00 pm (1000 GMT).

Organisers said the protest would begin at Khartoum University, go past the UNDP office, the British embassy and the UN headquarters in Khartoum.

ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo told journalists in The Hague on Monday that the Sudanese head of state had "personally instructed" his forces to annihilate three ethnic groups in the western Sudanese region.

"His motives were largely political. His alibi was a counter-insurgency.' His intent was genocide," he said.

It was the first time the ICC prosecutor has sought an arrest warrant for a sitting head of state and the first time it has levelled accusations of genocide.

Sudan does not recognise the ICC and refuses to hand over two other Sudanese -- including a current cabinet minister -- who face outstanding arrest warrants for alleged crimes in Darfur and said Monday's move damaged peace efforts.

In his first public appearance after the accusations were levelled, Beshir danced, punched the air in delight with his trademark walking stick and shouted 'God is Great' at an elaborate ceremony to ink the new Sudanese electoral law.

Sitting on a podium in the giant Chinese-built Friendship Hall in Khartoum before more than 500 supporters and Sudan's most senior leaders, Beshir was given roars of support as he stood to sign the landmark legislation.

The law paves the way for national elections due next year as part of a 2005 north-south peace deal in a move towards democratic transformation.

Vice President Ali Osman Taha said Sudan was in contact with the permanent members of the UN Security Council in a bid to block a formal arrest warrant. The council has the power to intervene to defer any prosecution for a year.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said in an interview with French newspaper Le Figaro that he was "very worried" by the possible fallout of any indictment of Beshir.

His office called on Khartoum to "continue to cooperate fully with the United Nations in Sudan, while fulfilling its obligation to ensure the safety and security of all United Nations personnel and property".

Darfur has been wracked by conflict since 2003. The United Nations says up to 300,000 people have died and displaced some 2.5 million from their villages.

The African Union warned the indictment of Beshir would create a power vacuum that risked "military coups and widespread anarchy".

Tanzanian Foreign Minister Bernard Membe, speaking on behalf of AU chair President Jakaya Kikwete, urged the ICC to defer bringing charges "because there is a risk of anarchy in a proportion we have not seen in this continent."

The Arab League and the Organization of the Islamic Conference have also voiced concern that Ocampo's action could undermine peace efforts in Sudan, and the United States called on all parties to stay calm.

The US government said it was bolstering security for its staff in Sudan and press secretary Dana Perino said President George W. Bush is "gravely concerned" by increasing violence in Darfur.

[The Smoking Man]

Just the way the Chinese do it...

The guy who gives the order gets off and the guy who carries it out stands trial.

Like the Americans in Abu Ghraib too ...

Sudan's Bashir could escape war crimes indictment
By Louis Charbonneau Reuters - 1 hour 28 minutes ago

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Sudan's president, accused of masterminding genocide in Darfur, might escape war crimes charges if he brings to justice two men suspected of mass killings, Western envoys said on Wednesday.

The International Criminal Court's chief prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, asked the ICC on Monday to issue an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir on suspicion of crimes against humanity.

Moreno-Ocampo accused Bashir of a campaign of genocide that killed 35,000 people outright, at least another 100,000 through a "slow death" and forced 2.5 million to flee their homes in Sudan's western Darfur region.

Sudan, China and South Africa have expressed concern that a formal indictment of Bashir could damage the stalled peace process aimed at ending the 5-year-old conflict in Darfur.

"The search for justice should not jeopardize the other priorities in Sudan," South Africa's U.N. Ambassador Dumisani Kumalo told reporters ahead of a Security Council meeting.

U.N. peacekeeping officials and national diplomats say privately they fear an arrest warrant against Bashir could provoke a wave of violence against the joint U.N.-African Union peacekeeping force (UNAMID) or even prompt Khartoum to order all international peacekeepers in Sudan out of the country.

There are around 9,500 UNAMID troops and police in Darfur and another 10,000 U.N. peacekeepers in other parts of Sudan.

Sudan's U.N. envoy Abdalmahmoud Abdalhaleem said he was in talks with the Russians and Chinese to find a way for the Security Council to use its power to freeze any ICC moves.

Western diplomats say it is too early to discuss a council suspension of any ICC indictment but added that Moreno-Ocampo made it clear a messy situation can be avoided if Khartoum were to change its behaviour on earlier ICC charges.

They say Bashir could escape indictment if he ended what they see as impunity for two men the ICC charged last year over Darfur. Khartoum has not handed them to the court or started legal proceedings in Sudan to investigate the allegations.

ICC judges are not expected to issue a ruling on Moreno-Ocampo's recommendation until October or November.

'NO IMPUNITY'

One senior diplomat said on condition of anonymity that Moreno-Ocampo's "mounting frustration was because of a complete lack of engagement or any response to the indictments."

The main allegation against Bashir was one of "command responsibility," he said.

"His refusal to cooperate in bringing to justice those that the ICC thought were responsible for the actual killings on the ground adds force, adds evidence to the allegation of command responsibility for those killings," the diplomat said.

"Now, were the situation to change, the prosecutor's attitude might change."

Other Western envoys privately confirmed this view.

French Ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert said it was "not too late for the Sudanese authorities to cooperate" with the ICC over the indictment of Humanitarian Affairs Minister Ahmed Haroun and former Janjaweed militia commander Ali Kushayb.

British Ambassador John Sawers echoed Ripert's remarks.

But Ripert, Sawers and other diplomats said they have no intention of interfering with the ICC process, which is independent and should be free of political pressure.

The U.S. special envoy for Sudan, Richard Williamson, told Reuters "there can be no impunity" for crimes in Darfur.

Bashir and his envoy Abdalhaleem say that Khartoum has no intention of cooperating with the ICC because Sudan, like the United States and Russia, is not a party to the court.

COUNCIL CONDEMNS ATTACK

The Security Council unanimously condemned last week's attack against UNAMID, in which well-organized militia men killed seven peacekeepers and wounded more than 20, calling it an "unacceptable act of violence."

One U.N. official said on condition of anonymity that the attackers used sophisticated weaponry not yet seen in Darfur, including recoilless rifles, which are lightweight weapons that can fire heavier projectiles than normal light arms.

Several diplomats said they suspected the attackers were linked to the Sudanese government but Abdalhaleem denied it.

Britain circulated a draft resolution among the 15 council members that would extend UNAMID's mandate for another 12 months once it expires on July 31. The council is expected to vote on the draft before the end of the month.

The draft also calls for the rapid and full deployment of UNAMID, which at 9,500 people in Sudan is well below its planned full strength of 26,000.

Western states blame Khartoum for the slow deployment, saying it has been blocking non-African forces and has insisted on picking their nationalities. Khartoum accuses the West of exaggerating the scale of the humanitarian crisis in Darfur.

(Editing by John O'Callaghan)