-Caveat Lector-
Don't sue the US govt. Sue the devil who bombed you!!!!!!
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On Mon, 2 Jul 2001 14:28:12 -0300 Yardbird <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> -Caveat Lector-
>
> Increasingly, US stands alone on Sudan
>
> EU nations move towards engagement
>
> By Declan Walsh, Globe Correspondent, 7/1/2001
>
>
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/182/nation/Increasingly_US_stands_alone
_on_Sudan+.shtml
>
> HARTOUM, Sudan - There are few tourist traps in this city of
> blast-furnace
> temperatures, grinding poverty, and strict Muslim laws. But one
> unlikely
> attraction is to be found on the northern edge of town, where the
> ugly
> industrial zone trails off into the desert.
>
>
> A smiling guard welcomes visitors to El Shifa, the manufacturing
> plant
> destroyed by a deadly barrage of American cruise missiles in 1998.
> President Clinton, who ordered the attack, claimed the factory was a
> secret chemical weapons facility; Sudan said it manufactured
> life-saving
> medicines.
>
>
> Now the owner is bringing a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against the
> US
> government and, to prove his point, allows anyone who wishes to look
> around.
>
>
> ''We respect America, but she did something bad for us here,'' said
> Abdul
> el-Munign, a young man who guides the curious through the rubble.
>
>
> This stark skeleton of El Shifa is also a symbol of the persistent
> enmity
> between the United States and Sudan's Islamic regime. For the United
> States, Sudan is a pariah state in the same league as Iraq, North
> Korea,
> and Afghanistan. American companies are prohibited from doing
> business
> here, the US Embassy is officially closed, and the State Department
> still
> considers Khartoum to be a terrorist safe haven.
>
>
> But recently other nations, particularly in Europe, have started to
> reject
> America's policy of isolating Sudan. Since last year, Britain,
> France, the
> Netherlands, and other European Union countries have undertaken a
> policy
> of ''constructive engagement'' with President Omar el-Bashir's
> government.
> That has meant renewed contacts with government officials, funding
> for a
> program to combat the slave trade, and turning a blind eye to United
> Nations sanctions imposed in 1996.
>
>
> The move has sparked a quiet but heated war of words in the
> air-conditioned cool of Western diplomatic circles here. ''The
> Americans
> often give the impression that all they want to do is overthrow the
> government,'' grumbled one senior European diplomat. American
> officials
> retort that Europe is turning a blind eye to official brutality in
> the
> name of pragmatic politics.
>
>
> One prickly question lies at the heart of the debate: whether one of
> the
> world's most notorious ''rogue'' regimes is capable of reforming
> itself
> from within.
>
>
> The regime here, which came to power in a 1989 military coup, has
> done
> much to warrant its unenviable reputation. In its early years
> Khartoum was
> a city of fear, where opposition figures disappeared into notorious
> ''ghost houses,'' never to reemerge. Osama Bin Laden, the Islamic
> fundamentalist suspected of masterminding the 1998 bombings of US
> embassies in east Africa, used to reside here.
>
>
> More recently the government has been accused of terrible abuses in
> prosecuting the 18-year-old war against southern-based rebels:
> razing
> villages to clear the way for lucrative oil exploration, fueling the
> slave
> trade, and mercilessly bombing civilian and humanitarian targets in
> the
> rebel-held south.
>
>
> In Washington, an eclectic coalition of conservative Christians and
> black
> rights activists have turned Sudan into a political hot potato. The
> most
> influential campaigner is the Rev. Franklin Graham, the head of the
> evangelical charity Samaritan's Purse and a confidant of President
> Bush,
> who has advocated further military strikes against the Khartoum
> government, which he describes as ''pure evil.''
>
>
> That description infuriates Sudan's government.
>
>
> ''We are mistreated more than any other country in the world,'' said
> Mahdi
> Ibrahim, a presidential adviser recently appointed minister of
> information. Ibrahim also objected to frequent portrayal of the
> civil war
> as a religious one that pits northern Muslims against southern
> Christians.
>
>
> ''Two million southerners are living in Khartoum. Why would they
> come if
> we were persecuting them?'' he asked.
>
>
> One answer is that they had little choice. Most southerners fled to
> Khartoum to escape the fighting and have been forced to live in
> huge,
> squalid camps that ring the city and lack the most basic facilities.
> Many
> complain of being treated as second-class citizens.
>
>
> But religious intolerance appears to be waning. Islamic sharia law
> has
> been in force in northern Sudan since 1983 but is loosely enforced
> these
> days. A small number of women refuse to wear the veil in public, and
> alcohol is tolerated in private homes. The number of judicial
> amputations
> of convicted criminals has also fallen.
>
>
> Nevertheless, there are still reasons for mistrust. Last Easter a
> Christian celebration in central Khartoum was violently broken up by
> riot
> police. Alfred Taban, a southern journalist who edits the
> independent
> Khartoum Monitor newspaper, was there. ''The police threw grenades,
> one of
> which chopped off a medical student's hand. People were crushed, and
> many
> fainted,'' he said.
>
>
> Taban was arrested at the scene with 70 others; he was released six
> days
> later. Still, he supports the EU policy of engagement. ''The
> majority of
> northerners hate the government and are secularists,'' he said.
> ''There
> are some moderates in government, and they need encouragement.''
>
>
> European diplomats admit their policy has produced only modest
> results.
> Attacks on civilians and slave takings have continued, and there are
> few
> signs that the war is abating.
>
>
> The shadowy Islamic cleric Hassan el-Turabi, long seen as the leader
> of
> fundamentalists in the government, has been placed under house
> arrest, but
> hoped-for reforms did not follow.
>
>
> ''The situation now is worse than one year before,'' said Gerhart
> Baum,
> the UN special representative for human rights in Sudan, at a
> briefing
> last week.
>
>
> The Bush administration is weighing its options. There are signs
> that the
> president will take a more conciliatory line toward Sudan than his
> predecessor did.
>
>
> During a recent tour of Africa, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell
> avoided
> using inflammatory language concerning Sudan, and the reopening of
> the
> Khartoum embassy is under review.
>
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