Sudan's Perfect War

Randolph Martin

From Foreign Affairs, March/April 2002

Summary:  After years as a pariah, Khartoum has now deftly managed to end its political isolation. The success of its new alliances and the completion of an oil pipeline, however, mean that northern Sudan could indefinitely continue its bloody civil war against the south. Only the United States has the power and prestige to help end the violence and push for a peace that would be in everyone's interests.

Randolph Martin is Senior Director of Operations at the International Rescue Committee. He has travelled extensively throughout Sudan over the last 20 years and lived there from 1985 to 1989.

IN FROM THE COLD

Al-Bashir has proven to be far more resilient than anyone expected. Slowly, his government has worked itself out of its pariah status and back from the brink of economic collapse. Visiting Khartoum today, one finds a remarkably improved environment. Telephones work, the roads have been patched up, and the long fuel lines of a decade ago have disappeared -- an impressive feat, considering that many more people now own cars. It is no longer illegal to hold foreign currencies, and the dinar has stabilized, with its official value now nearly on par with its rate on the greatly diminished black market. Import and export rules have been simplified. The streets are once again alive with activity late into the evening, and the harassment of refugees and minorities has declined.

Al-Bashir has also begun wooing back from exile the north's political elite. Among them are Numayri, who was himself deposed by coup in 1985, and al-Mahdi, who has returned to resume the leadership of his popular Umma Party. Similarly, Ahmad al-Mirghani, a senior leader of the equally popular Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), has recently returned from 12 years in exile, leading to speculation that his brother, Usman al-Mirghani -- chairman of both the DUP and the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), a consortium of resistance parties -- may soon follow. At the same time that the regime has been welcoming back moderate political leaders, it has started moving against the radicals. Last March, for example, al-Turabi -- the reactionary head of the NIF, Sudan's most prominent fundamentalist, and once a pillar of al-Bashir's power -- was arrested for treason after signing a memorandum of understanding with his erstwhile archenemy, the SPLM.

Khartoum has matched this domestic turnaround with an international charm offensive -- thus managing to end its isolation and further reduce the impetus to make peace in the south. Former detractors and enemies have become partners and collaborators. Once estranged even from its immediate neighbors, Sudan is now building positive diplomatic and trade links across its borders. Ethiopia -- eager to rebuild after its bitter war with Eritrea -- has concluded a number of agreements with Sudan, including deals for the sale of electricity and plans to build rail links and an oil pipeline. Eritrea, even more desperately in need of trading partners in the region, has also forged closer ties. Although Eritrea still hosts Sudan's antigovernment NDA -- and Sudan has reciprocated by supporting Eritrean rebels -- both countries seem of late to have decided to improve their relationship.

In late 1999, Sudan and Uganda signed an agreement to stop supporting each other's rebels: Uganda would curtail its backing of the SPLM and Sudan would step away from Uganda's notorious Lord's Resistance Army (LRA). Although relations between the two countries are still bumpy, al-Bashir attended Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni's inauguration to a new term in the spring of 2001 -- a clear sign of the improved cooperation. This reconciliation has been brokered, in part, by another neighbor eager to improve his international standing: Libya's Muammar al-Qaddafi.

Even Sudan's relations with its former colonial master, Egypt, seem to be on the mend. Having collaborated on a 1995 attempt to assassinate Egypt's Prime Minister Hosni Mubarak in Addis Ababa, it will not be easy for Khartoum to repair relations. But the two countries have already signed a number of commercial agreements, and tensions have eased in the Hala`ib triangle, a region claimed by both nations. And Egypt offered no protest last October when the U.N. Security Council lifted the sanctions it had placed on Sudan in 1996 for its role in the assassination attempt.

Finally, last October, Khartoum also hosted peace talks for its southeastern neighbor, the Central African Republic -- further evidence of Sudan's interest in playing a stabilizing role in the region.

Outside of Africa, a number of other nations -- ranging across Europe and Asia -- are also expressing new interest in Sudan. The United Kingdom's high commission in Khartoum is once again fully operational, having shut down for two years in sympathy with the U.S. policy. Virtually all other nations of consequence -- with the notable exception of the United States -- now enjoy full diplomatic relations with Khartoum. Sudan's substantial oil deposits have enticed a number of countries to forge new economic ties. Dutch, French, German, Malaysian, and Japanese business delegations have all come calling in recent months.

Sudan even seems intent on ending its reputation as a sponsor of terrorism. In 1996, Washington closed its Khartoum embassy and implemented sanctions (as did the U.N. Security Council) to protest Sudan's involvement in the attempt on Mubarak's life. Two years later, after the bombings of U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, Washington fired cruise missiles at a pharmaceutical plant on the outskirts of Khartoum, alleging that the facility was engaged in the production of chemical weapons (evidence for this claim remains dubious, however).

In 1996, at American urging, Sudan expelled bin Laden from the country. Reportedly, the al-Bashir government even attempted to hand him over to the United States -- but was turned down by the Clinton administration for lack of indictable evidence. Sudan has now signed the 1997 International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings and the 1999 International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism. Furthermore, Khartoum was also quick to condemn the September 11 terrorist attacks and, by most accounts, has cooperated with Washington since then, providing information about terrorist groups and finances and expelling or detaining terrorist notables.