DARFUR'S AGONY AND BASHIR'S PLAN

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KHARTOUM 002749

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR AF A/S FRAZER, AF S/E NATSIOS, AND AF/SPG
NSC FOR PITTMAN AND SHORTLEY

E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/27/2016
TAGS: PGOV PREL AU SU UN US
SUBJECT: DARFUR'S AGONY AND BASHIR'S PLAN


Classified By: CDA Cameron Hume, Reason: Sections 1.4 (b) and (d)


1. (C) Summary: Darfur's agony is not ending. The territory
is awash with weapons, including shipments of sniper rifles,
assault rifles, and machine guns. Traditional social
structures, already weakened, no longer keep the peace--even
within internally displaced persons (IDP) camps. The new
commander of the African Union (AU) peace-keeping force has
told us his urgent concern is force protection, not
protection of civilians, amid clear signs he does not welcome
any UN support for his mission. Both the UN and the AU
missions in Sudan are currently leaderless. It has taken two
months for the AU and UN to sign an agreement on the UN's
light support package for Darfur. The status of Kofi Annan's
phase-two heavy support package is uncertain, and President
Bashir has stated publicly, as recently as this week, that
Sudan will never accept a hybrid AU/UN mission as proposed by
the UN. President Bashir seems unperturbed by the chaos of
Darfur, and he is adamant that no outside force will bring it
under control. End Summary.

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SPREADING CHAOS
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2. (C) Although donor funding and work by international
humanitarian agencies have this year sustained Darfur's
people, a third of whom are trapped in IDP camps, the human
toll is mounting. More weapons in the hands of young men
have eroded the authority of traditional leaders and made
violence in the camps and against humanitarian workers more
common. A rash of carjackings in West Darfur has caused the
humanitarian workers in West Darfur to retreat to El Geneina
(the provincial capital) and to impose on themselves a 16:00
curfew. IDPs are losing any hope that they will recover
their lost landholdings. The picture that emerges from a
recent visit to North and West Darfur is one of spreading
chaos, uninhibited by the presence of African Union
peace-keepers and stoked by the policies of the government in
Khartoum.

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AMIS PRIORITY: FORCE PROTECTION
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3. (C) In a meeting on November 25, CDA Hume asked AMIS force
commander Major General Luke Aprezi what his main priorities
were and how he looked at cooperation with the United
Nations. Aprezi's answer was simple: his priority concern
was force protection. He needed shovels and sandbags most of
all. He refused to be drawn out on his views regarding
cooperation with UN plans for phase one and two, but he is
known to oppose any active UN role. Aprezi refused to
discuss his plans for deploying the two battalions he
requested urgently, even when CDA Hume assured him that the
USG had already promised the AU significant funding for this
purpose. (Note: So far the AU has had no/no discussion with
PAE regarding its plans for this expansion. End note.)


4. (C) AMIS troops are under-performing in most sectors,
reflecting their commanders' priorities. The main road
between Nyala and El Fasher is not secure. Patrolling around
IDP camps is sporadic. Protection for women on firewood
patrols is unreliable. However, when the troops are well
motivated and led, as is the case with the Senegalese
battalion along the border with Chad north of El Geneina,
they perform well. The civilian component of the mission is
weaker--the deputy head of mission in El Fasher stays at home
most days, and his staff of one is now on leave. Not much
outreach or civic action happens.

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AU AND UN LEADERLESS
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5. (C) The AU's mission in Khartoum is likewise in
transition. The Sudanese government has yet to agree to a
replacement for the former head of mission, who departed in
September. Sam Ibok, head of the Darfur Peace Agreement
(DPA) implementation office, is more often than not in Addis;
he has one capable deputy but no plan. The UNICEF officer
seconded to organize the Darfur-Darfur Dialogue and
Consultation (DDDC) has lately arrived, but he has yet to
head to the field. Lead AU mediator Salim Salim is visiting
Khartoum until December 7 to consult on how to address the
issue of DPA non-signatories. No one can expect these pieces
to come together in a coherent plan of action this year.


6. (C) Likewise the UN lacks leadership since Khartoum

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prevented UNSYG Special Representative Jan Pronk from
carrying on with his mission. While the UN here has
top-rated technocrats, it now has no leader. Worse,
President Bashir has shown, without suffering any negative
consequences, how little respect his government has for a
special representative of the UN Secretary General. Incoming
Secretary General Ban is forewarned. The current baseline

SIPDIS
for implanting UN plans to support the AU mission in Darfur
is as follows: two months after President Bashir agreed with
Annan's light package (approximately 100 personnel),30 have
arrived in Khartoum and none have deployed to Darfur.
Embassy Khartoum has no estimate how long it may take to
agree on, let alone implement, the "heavy" package of support
expected to follow in phase two.

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BASHIR'S PLAN
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7. (C) President Bashir's plan for Darfur shows little
concern for the dire condition of most people in Darfur, nor
with the haphazard performance of AU peacekeepers. The plan
he sent to UN SYG Annan on August 5 specified unilateral
military action as the best means to address Darfur's agony.
Since then, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) have deployed
additional brigades, distributed more weapons to auxiliary
Janjaweed forces, and launched several offensives. The
results have been mixed, and the SAF is no closer to victory
over the forces of the National Redemption Front (NRF). The
fighting has been confined to pockets in West and South
Darfur and in North Darfur to an axis that runs from north of
El Fasher to the border with Chad.


8. (C) Bashir's plan has a civilian component. The leader of
his implementation team is Magzhoub al-Khalifa, a physician
turned Islamist party operative. Although the Khartoum
government gives lip service to the need for the
international community to support a broad effort to get DPA
non-signatories to join the peace, when local commanders
gathered for a meeting encouraged by the international
partners, the SAF bombed the site. Al Khalifa explains the
path forward is to gather support from non-signatories
one-by-one, using money to change minds. In the context of
mounting insecurity, he prefers a divide and rule strategy.
The international aspect of this strategy involves some
accommodation to the desires of Eritrea and Libya to mediate,
keeping the broader international community far from the
action. Although President Bashir responded favorably to UN
SYG Annan,s request to appoint former FM Mustafa Osman
Ismail to deal with Darfur, Mustafa's writ seems limited to
speaking with foreign officials.


9. (C) Bashir's plan has no place for UN forces in Darfur.
He has announced his rejection of UN SYG Annan,s proposal
for &hybrid8 AU/UN forces, including a UN command
structure. Al Khalifa claims that UN Security Council
Resolution 1706 is now dead, replaced by the SAF's unilateral
plan for security, as observed by AU peace-keepers. In this
context, Bashir, who seems to fear a successful UN
peace-keeping mission more than the rising tide of anarchy in
Darfur, may consider the arming of the Darfur rabble as
another line of defense against a UN mission.


10. (C) Bashir wants any next steps by the international
community to be little and slow. As he has drawn out the
preliminaries before phase one of the UN plan, so he will
slow down implementation of phase two, most likely for
months. Bashir will lead the Sudanese delegation at the
upcoming AU Peace and Security Commission meeting in Abuja.
Although some officials assure us Sudan can be flexible on a
hybrid force, Bashir's own statements reject the hybrid force
specified for phase three, throwing into doubt the entire
package and any prospect of UN assessed financing for the
mission. Unlike the international community, he would be
quite pleased to confront the alternative of either a weak AU
peace-keeping mission threatened by lack of financing or a
failed AU mission. After all, he has his own plan.
HUME