Five largely related stories from the past day that update, most recently, the previous batch:
By Jonathan Steele of the UK's "Guardian" (possibly Web-only)...
Sudanese troops used force in an effort to relocate hundreds of homeless Darfur families, loading their possessions on to lorries and surrounding them with machine guns mounted on pick-up trucks late on Sunday evening, UN humanitarian officials said yesterday [Monday].
The incident, on the outskirts of Otash camp for displaced people near Nyala, affected an estimated 2,000 people, many of whom are still missing.
They were camping in the open after fleeing another camp, Kalma, a few days after their houses were burnt down and up to 17 people were killed by members of a tribe opposed to the Darfur peace talks in Libya. The Guardian spoke to some of the families involved last week.
[Sir] John Holmes, the UN emergency-relief co-ordinator, said in a statement from New York: "It is imperative that any relocation be wholly voluntary, in agreement with the internally displaced. Given that security forces were threatening the displaced with sticks and rubber hoses at Otash camp, the involuntary nature of this relocation is clear, and is contrary to agreements with the government."
A joint UN and African Union team rushed to the scene on Sunday night, but were denied access by a representative of the Sudanese government's Humanitarian Aid Commission.
After entering the area by another route, they saw 10 vehicles with heavy machine-guns surrounding a group of internally displaced people and eight lorries being loaded with possessions. Up to 20 families appear to have been forced into the vehicles, the others ran off.
"A lot of people fled, which is a natural response. We don't know where they are now," said Orla Clinton, a UN spokesperson in Khartoum.
UN protection staff and other aid workers were frantically searching refugee camps in the area yesterday [in order] to try to find them, but by mid-afternoon had found nobody.
HAC told the UN that the operation was an initiative of the security forces. Officials said [that] the displaced persons' goods were being kept near one of Nyala's bus stations, where families could go and collect them.
On Sunday, a few hours before the relocation, Mohammed Salih, the senior spokesperson for the governor of South Darfur, told the Guardian: "Otash has some Kalma families and the UN agencies and the government are preparing a new location. Otash is closed. We don't impose any solution that doesn't satisfy the choice of the internally displaced person. Any IDP has to choose for himself," he insisted.
Asked yesterday about the UN accusations that force was used, Mr Salih said: "That's a lie."
"The IDPs are still in Sudan. They're not going to be taken to Chad, or on to Paris", he said, referring to allegations of abduction involving a French charity.
From IRIN...
Delegates attending the Darfur peace talks in Libya – apparently undaunted by the no-show of several key rebel groups - have called for a peaceful end to the suffering of civilians and a political agreement that strengthens the communities living in the war-ravaged region.
"We are looking for unity, not fragmentation," Abusaid El Hassan, one of four speakers for the Sudanese-government delegation said during a plenary session on 28 October.
Abdel Magid Dosa, coordinator and legal consultant of the Sudan National Movement for Reformation and Development, a civil-society group, said: "We are serious about being here; we are all aware that war is not in man's nature, rather it is peace that is the nature of man.
"The reason for the violence in Darfur is the scorched-earth policy that the government has adopted. The government is the one bombarding the people, because rebel movements there do not own planes."
The government delegation is led by Nafie Ali Nafie, while Ahmed Ibrahim Diraige of the Sudan Federal Democratic Alliance spoke on behalf of the movements present during the opening of the talks on 27 October and their desire for peace.
Other speakers at the plenary stressed the need to end suffering and violence through a political agreement that would ensure [that] Sudan does not disintegrate.
However, Ibrahim Abdallah, a representative of the Justice and Equality Movement faction led by Idriss Ibrahim Azraq, broke ranks with the others, saying [that] the "right to self-determination is the final solution" for the Darfur crisis.
"We must recognise that a unity based on the marginalisation of another part of the country is unworkable," he said. "We must have self-determination after a transitory phase, because the surveys that our organisation has carried out in IDP [internally displaced persons] camps in Darfur show that 80 percent of the displaced support the right to self-determination."
Most speakers agreed [that] the core of the Darfur crisis was hinged on the security of the Darfur people, cessation of hostilities, economic recovery, land, and governance.
Mohamed Ali Nasser, representing the Sudan Liberation Movement, said [that] the nature of the dispute in Darfur was social, political, and economic. "We know that freedom is not granted or inherited - one has to struggle for it, and we will strive for it through negotiations," he said.
Four and a half years of violence in Darfur has led to the deaths of an estimated 200,000 people and the displacement of another two million.
The Sirte talks follow the signing in Abuja, Nigeria, in 2006 of the Darfur Peace Agreement. Signed by one faction of the already-splintered Sudan Liberation Movement, the agreement quickly fell apart.
On 29 October, the UN Secretary-General’s envoy to Darfur Jan Eliasson and his AU counterpart Salim Ahmed Salim, who are mediating the Sirte talks, met representatives from the Sudanese government, civil society, international partners, and rebel groups.
"I refuse to state that the peace process is interrupted," Eliasson told reporters. "The train has left the station for the road to peace. The question is how many passengers will get on the train."
Meanwhile, the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, [Sir] John Holmes, has expressed concern over alleged forced relocations in an IDP camp in South Darfur.
The Sudanese government has denied the incident.
"I am alarmed about the reports of forced relocation last night [28 October] from Otash camp in Nyala, South Darfur, both about the manner in which the relocations were apparently carried out, and the possibility that such action could contribute to more violence," Holmes said in New York.
Otash camp shelters over 60,000 people, and during the incident, new IDPs from Kalma camp, the largest in Darfur, were surrounded by police. A team comprising personnel from the UN, the AU Mission in Sudan, and the International Organisation for Migration was denied access to the camp by the representative of the Humanitarian Aid Commission.
According to the UN, the team managed to enter the camp, and witnessed 10 vehicles with heavy machine guns surrounding a group of IDPs, while eight large commercial trucks were being loaded with the belongings of women and children. The police said [that] the people were being moved to Amakassara.
(An earlier version is also still available.)
Darfur rebels boycotting peace talks in Libya said on Tuesday [that] they would meet envoys from an African Union-U.N. mediation team, but set conditions that gave little hope [that] they would change their positions.
Mediators had hoped to unite the rival rebel factions before peace talks opened in Libya on Oct. 27. But negotiations began in the coastal Libyan town of Sirte with none of the key factions present.
On Tuesday, the joint U.N. and AU mediation team said [that] it was sending delegations to the rebel leadership who did not attend.
"We are having consultations with those here in Sirte, and will be having consultations with those outside too," said AU spokesman Noureddine Mezni.
He did not have a specific date for the talks.
The Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) and Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) Unity, the main fighting factions in Darfur, said [that] they wanted unified rebel delegations to attend any talks.
"Whether or not they come, this will not change the reality," JEM chief negotiator Ahmed Tugod Lissan told Reuters from Darfur. "If they want to take us to Sirte, they have to remove all those other (rebel) factions."
Lissan said [that] earlier mediators had not invited the "genuine parties that should be part of the peace process" to the talks, siding instead with the Sudanese government by inviting people specified by Khartoum.
He said [that] only one delegation from JEM and one from SLA should be invited.
SLA Unity said [that] it would need at least one or two months to unify its cadres. "We want time to hold internal consultations, and we want all the SLA factions to unite under one leadership, and go as one delegation," said SLA Unity head Abdallah Yehya.
TENSION
Some factions also object to the venue -- Libya -- saying [that] its leader, Muammar Gaddafi, is not a neutral party, because of his historic role in regional turmoil and recent comments [that], they say, minimised the seriousness of the Darfur conflict.
"Libya is not a neutral place," said senior SLA commander Jar el-Neby.
Another key rebel leader, SLA chairman and founder Abdel Wahed Mohamed el-Nur, who is supported by hundreds of thousands of Darfuris, said [that] he would not attend until a U.N. force had deployed and provided security, a condition that could take more than a year to finalise.
He rejected the peace talks from the outset.
"Except for Salim Ahmed Salim, I am ready to meet anyone from the mediation and anyone who is serious about real peace," he said, referring to the AU envoy for Darfur who mediated a May 2006 peace deal which most factions rejected.
"But I have made my position very clear. I am not going to these talks."
Mediators had hoped [that] the negotiations in Libya would help end spiralling chaos in Darfur which has claimed an estimated 200,000 lives and driven 2.5 million from their homes. The world's largest aid operation is struggling, amid continued violence to sustain around two-thirds of Darfur's population.
With the spread of arms during the conflict, tribal clashes have worsened. In the past 10 days, 120 people were killed in fighting between two Arab tribes in South Darfur, the United Nations said on Tuesday.
The Sirte meeting is the first attempt to gather Darfur rebels and the government around a negotiating table since 2006, when the AU mediated Darfur peace talks in Abuja, Nigeria.
Signed by only one rebel faction, the Abuja deal had little support among Darfuris in displacement camps, and it triggered fresh violence, as rebels split into more than a dozen factions.
Pekka Haavisto, U.N. Darfur envoy Jan Eliasson's deputy, said [that] the faster [that] mediators sought to attract absent rebel chiefs, the better chances of success [that] the process would have.
"I believe that with good diplomatic work, we can get most groups in," said Haavisto, who helped the mediators prepare for the Sirte talks. "The faster [that] we can meet these groups, the better," he told reporters at a Helsinki news conference.
On Tuesday an Arab League donor conference for Darfur opened. Diplomatic sources said [that] Arab countries would donate some $300 million to the relief effort. Sudan receives around $1 billion a year in U.N. aid, mostly from Western nations.
Rebels and Sudanese officials have begun a 'constructive' new round of peace talks aimed at ending the ethnic conflict in Sudan's Darfur region, the UN and [the] African Union said [on] Tuesday.
The talks began over the weekend in Sirte, Libya, hometown of Libyan leader Moamer Gaddafi, and mediators said [that] the discussions would involve substantive issues and could last up to three weeks. Two plenary sessions were held since Saturday, attended by envoys from the Sudanese government, rebel groups, more than a dozen observer countries, and civil society.
The talks are being mediated by Jan Eliasson, the UN special envoy for Darfur, and Salim Ahmed Salim of the African Union.
'We welcome the constructive tone and spirit of the interventions during those discussions,' the two mediators said in a statement distributed at UN headquarters in New York. 'We have consistently called for an end to violence and a cessation of hostilities.'
The Sudanese government declared a unilateral ceasefire on Saturday, which was not matched by the small number of rebel groups at the meeting. Some key rebel leaders have also refused to join the talks.
'We call on all parties to the conflict to make a similar commitment without delay,' Eliasson and Salim said. 'The parties cannot talk and fight at the same time.'
Eliasson and Salim said [that] the [substantive] talks constitute the second stage of the peace talks, lasting for about three weeks, before a third and final stage of negotiations. The substantive talks would taking place in Sirte and 'elsewhere as appropriate.'
The peace talks in Libya are part of UN efforts to end the conflict in Darfur, which since 2003 has killed more than 300,000 people. The UN and [the] AU are deploying a peacekeeping operation of up to 30,000 military troops and civilians in Darfur [in order] to monitor the peace agreement [that] they hope to achieve in Sirte.
Top envoys from the United Nations and the African Union chairing talks in Libya on the troubled Darfur region of Sudan today [Tuesday] welcomed the Khartoum Government’s unilateral declaration of a cessation of hostilities, and called on all parties to the conflict to make a similar commitment without delay.
“The parties cannot talk and fight at the same time, without tragic consequences to the population of Darfur,” said UN envoy Jan Eliasson and his AU counterpart, Salim Ahmed Salim, in a joint statement issued in Sirte. “It is critical that all parties do their utmost to improve the security and humanitarian conditions of the people in Darfur.”
The talks, which opened on 27 October, mark “a turning point in the long search for a lasting political solution to the crisis in Darfur,” the envoys said, calling the opening the first stage of a three-phased peace process.
The statement voices appreciation for the attendance of the Government of Sudan, and of leading personalities and representatives of the movements, as well as representatives from civil society. But the envoys said [that] they “regret that leaders of some of the movements chose not to attend the opening session, and hope [that] they will soon join the process.”
This first phase of the talks included “two lively plenary debates where representatives from the Government of Sudan, the movements, civil society, including women, regional partners, and international observers exchanged views and discussed key issues pertaining to the peace process,” said the envoys, welcoming the “constructive tone and spirit of the interventions during those discussions.”
Closed meetings were then held with the parties, regional partners, and international observers, according to the statement.
The second phase will play out over the next few weeks, as the envoys continue to engage in intensive discussions with the parties on the substantive issues to be addressed in the third stage of negotiations.
Declaring that the peace process is “irreversible,” the statement says [that] the conflict-affected Sudanese deserve no less. “We owe it to the people of Darfur to make every effort to end their suffering and allow them to live their lives in peace and dignity.”
Meanwhile, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Sudan, Ashraf Qazi, has also welcomed the peace talks in Sirte, emphasizing that peace can only be achieved through an inclusive political process supplemented by recovery and development programmes.
He told an Arab League Donor Conference in Khartoum that peace and stability in all of Sudan is crucial to resolve the humanitarian emergency in the war-ravaged and impoverished Darfur region, where conflict has killed more than 200,000 people and uprooted 2.5 million more.
“Sustained peace throughout Sudan is the key to ending the humanitarian crisis in Darfur, and to moving towards a more-holistic goal of recovery and development throughout Sudan,” Mr. Qazi said.
Noting that the Darfur humanitarian operation remains an “enormous challenge,” he said [that] the humanitarian community remains concerned about the suffering and insecurity in Darfur, where the population faces continued displacement and ongoing insecurity.
“A successful humanitarian response is dependent on widespread respect for the basic humanitarian principles of impartiality, humanity, and independence of humanitarian actors, and I would like to take this opportunity to appeal to all parties involved in the conflict to adhere to these principles,” he said.
Ameerah Haq, the Deputy Special Representative for Sudan and UN Humanitarian Coordinator, told participants that funding to meet humanitarian needs will surge from $650 million this year, to $825 million next year.
She added that aid workers are worried about the insecurity in camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs), particularly in South Darfur, as well as the proliferation of arms in camps and rising levels of violence.
Ms. Haq urged all parties to cease arming camp residents, and to respect the principles of voluntary return and security camps as neutral humanitarian spaces.
Comments