Sudanese government already abridging peace agreement signed Tuesday

The Sudanese government signed an agreement for peace on Tuesday, with great fanfair that stimulated hopeful reports in the world press. As has been the pattern, within days the government made clear that it did not intend to abide by it.

The first key element of the agreement was that humanitarian aid workers be allowed unfettered access in Darfur. Yet humanitarian access remains so limited that on Thursday it was announced that the UN is pulling out humanitarian staff in protest.

The second key element, and one that was hotly debated and ultimately watered down to favor the government, was that the Sudanese military stop "hostile" military bombing and strafing attacks on Darfurian villages.

Yet a high level Sudanese government spokesman today asserted that the government of Sudan's understanding of the agreemnt is that it allows the government to carry out "self defense" attacks if necesssary, and does not ban military flights.

The following is from Al Jazeera:

Sudan’s senior negotiator insisted that the new African Union-brokered security deal did not forbid military flights or ban the right of self-defense in the western region of Darfur.

Agriculture Minister Majzoub al-Khalifa Ahmed said that demands for a "no-fly zone" over the war-torn region like those imposed over northern and southern Iraq under Saddam Hussein’s regime had been excluded from the final deal signed in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, on Tuesday.

"What was mentioned was cessation by all parties of military operations on land and by air, and of any act that may jeopardize the ceasefire," Ahmed said after he returned from Abuja.

"Our brothers in the (rebel) movements demanded cessation of military flights and civil flights for military purposes and we told them that this was unacceptable to a sovereign state.

"Then they demanded a ban on military flights only and again we told them that this was also unacceptable."

Ahmed also said that his fellow delegates have merely pledged to refrain from launching any assaults by land or air on condition that the rebels ceased fire. He added that the right of self-defense for government forces had been defined in "a written explanation" from African Union mediators. 

Recall that the small group of African Union troops already in Darfur are forbidden to defend civilians in the camps, and have already had to stand by while the military in recent days raided camps, beat and tear-gassed already starving women and children, flattened their shelters, and forceably moved them to other camps.

According to the government, "self-defense" only applies to the Sudanese army, and not to their victims, to the UN and the AU, and certainly not to the rebels.

What is the most effective action we can take, as activists here in the United States? Here is one idea:

Ask Kofi Annan to resign as Secretary General of the UN.  The UN has failed the people of Darfur.  Whatever happens now, the killing and trauma that has already been inflicted on thousands of children, women and men by the government of Sudan is immeasureable.  The responsibility lies firmly on Annan's shoulders.  He has actively encouraged and appeased the Sudanese government, all the while talking tough to western audiences.  He has consistently declined to ruffle feathers or take more than the most limited political initiative or risk, even when he has received thoughtful and concrete suggestions for how to use his "bully pulpit" to bring action for Darfur.