Press reports allow us to glimpse some of the key features of the
report of John Danforth, US special envoy for Sudan. Soon to be
submitted to President Bush, the document evidently has two key
features. First, the Report presumes to define the terms of southern
self-determination, in particular by excluding the possibility of
southern secession. This seems unwise for a number of reasons, not
least because it has the effect of acceding to Khartoum’s position on
the issue prior to the peace talks in which the terms of
self-determination will actually be negotiated. Second, the Report seems
to see in oil development the incentives for peace. But in suggesting
that an oil revenue-sharing mechanism might be the “silver bullet”
solution in the search for peace, the Danforth report is either
exceedingly nave or disturbingly expedient. Nothing in the news
accounts of the Report (primarily those of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch)
suggests that the realities of present oil development in the south have
been sufficiently understood.
Eric Reeves [April 30, 2002]
Smith College
Northampton, MA 01063
413-585-3326
ereeves@smith.edu
A full assessment of the Danforth Report (“the Report”) will obviously
have to await its public release. And the St. Louis Post-Dispatch
(whose reporter Jon Sawyer has evidently had access to parts of the
Report) suggests the Bush administration will need some time to assess
Danforth’s findings and recommendations. But given previous reporting
on the Danforth mission, the comments to the Post-Dispatch reporter by
Danforth himself and his chief assistant, Robert Oakley, and in light of
what is reported on the basis of partial access to the Report, two
things seem clear:
[1] The Danforth/Oakley team seems never to have grasped fully the
significance of the self-determination issue for southerners, or to see
how deliberately the Egyptian-Libyan Initiative sought to undermine
self-determination as defined in the IGAD process. As a result of this
shortcoming, the Report has tried to lower the bar for Khartoum in
negotiating this critically important issue. By demoting
self-determination as defined by the IGAD “Declaration of
Principles”—which the Khartoum regime in 1997 accepted as the basis
for peace negotiations—Danforth/Oakley have in effect tried to
predetermine what should be negotiated.
The mistaken nature of such an approach is trenchantly analyzed by John
Prendergast, co-director of the Africa programs at the International
Crisis Group:
“It’s bad diplomacy for those who want to make peace in Sudan to
pre-determine what the end result should be. You lose a lot by saying,
‘You can’t have secession, now let’s negotiate. You empower (the
government in) Khartoum, and you absolutely alienate the southerners”
(Associated Press, April 26, 2002).
Self-determination cannot be redefined on the basis of Danforth’s
limited engagement with and comprehension of what is the most essential
issue for all significant southern constituencies. This “realism,” as
Robert Oakley is reported to have described the redefinition, is finally
expediency, and does little to take into account the truly real
aspirations of the people of southern Sudan. Negotiating the terms of
self-determination must be done in a diplomatic forum that takes full
cognizance of those aspirations, not by US diplomatic fiat.
To be sure, negotiations for self-determination that preserve the
commitment embodied in the IGAD “Declaration of Principles” will be
difficult. Creative diplomacy of the sort offered in the reports from
the International Crisis Group will be essential. But such negotiations
will simply never get underway if the US presumes to insist that it will
define the terms under which southerners can think about
self-determination. Moreover, attempting to preempt secession as a
possibility will only convince the Khartoum regime that it can
successfully hold out for a further attenuation of this key southern
right.
[2] On the basis of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch report published April
28, 2002, it would appear that the Danforth Report will attempt to deal
with the role of oil development in a perversely illogical fashion. The
basic idea is evidently to extend the Nuba Mountain cease-fire to the
oil regions of Western Upper Nile province:
“The Muslim-dominated government, which controls the oil fields in
south-central Sudan, would agree to share oil revenue with the rebel
groups that control most of southern Sudan;
“The rebels would suspend their attacks on oil facilities;
“Both sides would agree to international monitoring;
“The peace, if it held, would permit increased investment by
international oil companies—and thus increased revenue for both north and south.”
(St. Louis Post-Dispatch, April 28, 2002)
But this account, which has a superficial plausibility, dissolves into
contradiction as soon as we look at the realities presently obtaining in
the oil regions. The Khartoum regime, far from showing signs that it is
truly interested in a peaceful settlement to the conflict, is
accelerating its war against civilians in the oil regions of Western
Upper Nile, with unprecedented destructiveness. The clear goal is to
de-populate and control as much of the oil regions as possible—this in
order to “secure” operations for companies already producing (Talisman
Energy of Canada, China National Petroleum Corp. Petronas of Malaysia)
and to allow for the re-entry of companies like Lundin Petroleum
(Sweden) and OMV (Austria), which were forced to suspend operations this
past January because of insecurity.
The massive and brutally destructive attacks on civilians—which were
to have ceased when Khartoum regime nominally agreed with the Danforth
mission on this key issue—have only intensified, with no sign that
international monitoring is anywhere close to beginning on a scale
demanded by the catastrophe engulfing the oil regions. Khartoum’s
full-scale reneging on its commitment to Danforth concerning attacks on
civilians is all too suggestive of the meaning of “agreements” secured
from this regime.
Indeed, far from showing signs of a willingness to negotiate a just
peace, Khartoum gives every sign that it is convinced it will prevail
militarily. The regime’s Defense Minister very recently returned from a
military hardware-shopping spree in Russia, spending more of Khartoum’s
oil revenues. Indeed, there is good evidence that Khartoum’s military
spending has already exceeded realized oil income and that the regime is
actually purchasing weapons now with anticipated revenues. This will
make it even more difficult for the regime to engage in meaningful
discussions of revenue sharing with the south.
Nominally, of course, Khartoum claims that it is even now devoting
equitable resources from oil revenues to the south. But this is utter
nonsense, and serves only to reveal how shamelessly the regime will lie
about the realities of oil and oil revenues. Khartoum’s accounting for
oil revenue expenditures is completely lacking in transparency, even as
there is no credible mechanism in place that can do anything to force
equitable distribution of oil revenues. The world must “trust”
Khartoum’s account, even as it is asked to “trust” Khartoum’s word
when it declares that it has agreed to halt attacks on civilians.
On the terms the Danforth report lays out, it is simply not clear what
incentive Khartoum would have to negotiate away revenues it is presently
realizing and devoting to a military effort that also serves as a source
of ongoing political power. And if Khartoum will not negotiate
meaningfully over oil revenues, why should anyone expect that the
southern opposition will not continue to target oil infrastructure,
knowing that oil development only heightens the military purchasing
power of its opponent and oppressor?
To be sure, Khartoum certainly wants a cease-fire, but only one that
preserves its present revenue stream and would allow its military forces
to be gradually expanded. It may “agree” to revenue sharing in order to
obtain such a cease-fire—but only in the way in which it has “agreed”
to halt attacks on civilians in the oil regions. It will not allow
meaningful monitoring and distribution of revenues to commence with the
cease-fire.
In the end, such a dubious cease-fire would simply enable the regime
eventually to exert full military control over the more southerly oil
concessions areas, even as it preserves its present control over the
producing concession areas. A cease-fire that Khartoum can obtain
merely by agreeing to revenue sharing is no cease-fire at all, simply a
lull in the fighting that works exclusively to Khartoum’s advantage. As
a consequence, it is absurd to think that the southern opposition will
agree to an immediate cease-fire with no further requirements of the
Khartoum. This would simply be to lock into place the regime’s economic
advantage in controlling oil revenues, and leave the south with no
leverage in negotiating issues beyond a cease-fire, one that Khartoum
could violate whenever it felt resumed fighting was in its interest.
The present catastrophic situation in the oil regions of southern Sudan
requires immediate and robust international response. One effective
proposal for action, suggested yesterday (April 29, 2002) in a release
by the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, would be to
demand that a cease-fire in Sudan’s conflict be accompanied by an
internationally administered trust fund for oil revenues:
“The Commission recommended that any comprehensive cease-fire in Sudan be conditioned on placing the country’s oil revenues in an
internationally administered trust fund to be expended solely for
developmental and humanitarian purposes on an equitable basis in both
the north and the south. ‘A cease-fire without such an arrangement
will make the regime far less likely to engage in good-faith
bargaining over power-sharing,’ [USCIRF] Chairman Young said.”
Though Khartoum is exceedingly unlikely to agree to such an
arrangement, the regime’s refusal will signal just how intransigent it
has become. For this reason, the Commission also urged that Khartoum be
pressured to negotiate a just peace by means of the Sudan Peace Act:
“In order to move Khartoum to the peace table, the Commission also
urged the Administration and the Senate to support the House version of
the Sudan Peace Act, which includes important disclosure requirements
and a provision limiting access to American capital markets by foreign
oil companies involved in Sudan’s oil industry (provisions that were
first proposed by the Commission in its 2000 Annual Report).”
Unconscionably, the Senate Republican leadership continues to hold the
Sudan Peace Act in legislative limbo, even as the catastrophe in Sudan
accelerates. If the peace process is to have a realistic chance of
success, there simply must be additional pressures on Khartoum to
negotiate in good faith. The Sudan Peace Act in its House version
represents precisely such pressure.
The absence of any proposals for pressuring Khartoum is precisely the
failing of the Danforth report. In recasting the right of southern
self-determination in a fashion favored by Khartoum, in speaking so
naively about the present realities of oil production, revenue use, and
Khartoum’s accelerating human destruction in a bid to control southern
oil fields, the Report—insofar as we can glimpse it through press
reports—seems destined to retard rather than advance the cause of a
just peace for Sudan.
We must hope that the White House and the State Department will regard
this document as merely advisory in its diplomatic strategy and some of
its key assessments, and that its essential feature is to signal a green
light for further US involvement in the peace process. An
opportunity—perhaps a unique opportunity—presently exists to bring
peace to Sudan. But the pitfalls are many and the US must move both
expeditiously and wisely—showing a willingness to deal with all
parties, but only with a clear-eyed assessment of the challenges posed
by the behavior and nature of the National Islamic Front regime in
Khartoum