Author: Maggie Fick

Speaking today to reporters in Cape Town, South Africa, Deng Alor Kuol, Sudan’s foreign minister, called for the International Criminal Court’s case against Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir to be postponed for a year: We are saying we are asking for one year for postponement because this will give us time to work for peace in Darfur which we have already started with one movement, in Darfur we have many movements, more than ten about fifteen… It does not matter if there are fifteen rebel movements or fifty. The Sudanese government does not deserve any more time to “work for peace ...

During Hillary Clinton’s first trip abroad as Secretary of State, the global financial crisis has been the primary topic of conversation and concern in the Secretary’s meetings, receptions, and speeches from Tokyo to Jakarta. In an interview with ABC’s Martha Raddatz in Tokyo, Secretary Clinton agreed with Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair’s recent assertion that the global financial crisis is the primary security threat facing the United States today: SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I think what Director Blair was saying, which is a very important point, is we get fixated sometimes on the headlines of dangers. And that is not, ...

Last week, Dennis C. Blair, the new U.S. Director of National Intelligence addressed the Senate Intelligence Committee on the security threats facing the United States. Major papers and sources from around the blogosphere quickly noted that top on Blair’s list of U.S. intelligence concerns was not the al Qaeda terrorist threat, but the global economic crisis. On his new “Aid Watch” blog, noted economist William Easterly was all over Blair, who he derided for his “amateur opinions” on the global financial crisis and who he essentially told to mind his own business (Easterly also managed to squeeze in a potshot ...

Unbelievable. Well, not entirely. We are talking about the government of Sudan. Yesterday, Khartoum signed a confidence-building agreement with Darfur’s most significant rebel group, the Justice and Equality movement, or JEM. And today, Reuters reports that the JEM has accused the Sudanese government of launching new attacks in Darfur, including government aircraft bombings in the East Jebel Marra region of South Darfur. Reuters also noted, “There had been an unusually high number of Antonov aircraft taking off and landing early on Wednesday” in El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur. Is this Khartoum’s new definition of a charm offensive in ...

The writing is on the wall, the pieces are in place, and Déby’s mercenaries are landing attack helicopters in Abéché. All this can only mean one thing: rebellion season is fully underway in Chad. Enough Said reported recently on the developments of the Khartoum-backed Chadian rebel coup plot. Since then, it has become increasingly likely that there will be coup attempt on N’Djamena in the coming weeks. Chad expert Roland Marchal suspects that Khartoum might encourage the Chadian rebels to attack if the ICC issues an arrest warrant for President Bashir. This move may be Khartoum’s best way to counter ...

U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice vented her frustration at the failure of the U.N. Security Council to reach agreement on a statement condemning the escalating violence and civilian deaths in Darfur: We're really quite deeply disappointed that the Security Council after over a week of effort couldn't reach consensus on a clear presidential statement that would have condemned the increased bloodshed in Darfur…We had hoped to have a presidential statement that would have spoken with one voice in condemning the ongoing violence. Who blocked the Council from issuing a unanimous presidential statement? Yes, you guessed it, it ...

Via UN Dispatch, a New York Times video from July 2008, after the International Criminal Court’s Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo applied for an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omer al-Bashir. As you might recall, shortly following this announcement, Bashir launched an international “charm offensive” which even included some PR stunts in Darfur, including this rally: I bring this up now not only because I wanted to share this bizarre and unsettling video in case you missed it last summer, but also to raise a question that we at Enough—along with many other analysts—have been puzzling over: What is Bashir’s next ...

Michael Gerson, a former White House speechwriter and key adviser in the Bush administration, writes today in his Washington Post column that he has “changed his mind” about the “usefulness of ICC indictments in situations such as Sudan.” Gerson now believes that the ICC arrest warrant provides a game-changing opportunity to,” hold Bashir personally responsible for achieving massive improvements, or personally responsible for committing massive crimes.” Gerson’s piece emphasizes the importance of international cooperation in pressuring Bashir immediately after the arrest warrant is issued. Hopefully the U.N. Security Council read the Post today ...

While rumors continue to fly in the Hague and in New York regarding the expected indictment of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, talks between Darfur’s JEM rebels and the Sudanese government continue in Doha, Qatar. After the first day of talks on Tuesday (which, it is important to note, are not “Darfur peace talks,” but are better described as “talks about talks”), the JEM representative, Djibril Ibrahim, underlined the rebel group’s goal of “adopting confidence-building measures” before “address[ing] the key bones of contention.” For his part, Nafie Alie Nafie, President Bashir’s close adviser and the head of the Sudanese government delegation ...

In addition to the questions regarding the exact timing of the International Criminal Court’s issuance of an arrest warrant against Omar al-Bashir, and which of the three categories of charges against Bashir—crimes against humanity, war crimes, and genocide—the judges will endorse, there is a third, slightly confusing ICC-related matter: Journalists and advocacy groups have occasionally (not always) conflated the terms indictment and arrest warrant and many are unsure of what exactly Ocampo requested to be handed down. It is important to understand the difference between the two terms. An indictment is a criminal accusation, while an arrest warrant is a ...