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SITREP 23 18 MAR 05
GENERAL SITUATION:
We have received more assurances that the UN Security
Council will get the Sudan Mandate signed in the very near future,
but even if they do they will still be more than two months behind schedule.
The word to us is that JMC will close down operations
on 20 JUN 05 whether the UN forces are here or not. This may just be
posturing to induce the UN to pull finger, but The Head of Mission
(HOM), BG Jan Erik Wilhelmsen says that that will be it. Our current
Friends of Nuba Mandate runs until 20 JUL 05. After that there will
be no more money in any case.
If JMC actually does shut down, it looks as though the
American monitors and the other PAE support personnel will be Darfur bound
to complete our contracts.
SECTOR THREE OPERATIONS:
This has been an active week for us. Around 7:00 pm on 13
MAR 05 two badly beaten young Moro men from the SPLM village of
Al Nugra (about 5or 6 kms from our HQ) were brought in to us for medical
assistance and transport to Kadugli Hospital. Cippho,
our medic, determined that one was too badly injured to be transported in our
trucks. As it was too late to get a helo casevac, we called
the Danish Church Aid (DCA) demining HQ just a few kilometers up the road
for assistance. They promptly dispatched their ambulance
and medical personnel to help us out. We took the two injured men to
Kadugli Hospital, where it was determined that the less severely
man had a mild concussion and required some suturing. The more badly injured
man, however, had two depressed skull fractures; another
running down the left side of his skull, and had seven cuts requiring
extensive suturing. He has not as yet completely regained
consciousness, and his condition remains extremely grave. He has been
moved to Kauda by JMC helicopters for air movement to the
hospital in Lokichokio, Kenya for further treatment.
It seems that they got into a dispute with seven Hamera
nomads, who are currently in the area, over some missing goats. The Hamera
are a subdivision of the Shanable nomads. Give the traveling people of
Europe and the United States the ruthlessness of the Russian Mafia,
and you have your basic Shanabla. Although they I believe profess Islam, they
seem to have no more qualms about raping, murdering,
robbing and capturing slaves from their Muslim brothers as from any other
sects. The seven Hamera proceeded to beat the two Moro
men with clubs and leave them unconscious at the scene. The less badly injured
of the two went for help when he regained consciousness.
The two were then transported to us by their families on hand carried beds.
The incident occurred at about 11:00 am and they only got to
us at about 7:00 pm. By the time they were stabilized and prepared for
movement, it was after 7:30 pm. We got them to the hospital, which
did not even have a doctor or suturing material in the ER, around 9:00 pm.
Later that evening two Hamera men were brought into the GOS Army garrison at
Al Atmour with relatively minor gunshot wounds,apparently the victims of retaliation by someone close to the injured Moro men. The
same ambulance that had brought the Moro men into Kadugli was on its way back to DCA, and turned around and made another trip
to the hospital with the Hamera casualties. I went with a team first thing the next morning to Al Atmour to investigate the matter, and
Andrew Bell took another team to Al Nugra to investigate from that side. The Garrison Commander seemed to have the situation well in
hand in Al Atmour, with a plan to keep the Hamera well to the West, and the local SPLA Battalion Commander from Tangal had gone to
Al Nugra immediately upon receipt of the news to keep a lid on things from that side. We therefore stood down and left them to get on with it.
There is no conclusive evidence as yet of any CFVs, as the
first attack is obviously a purely criminal matter, and the second has yet to
be proven to be an SPLA action. Further, there seems to be no reason to
fear the spread of hostilities with both military commanders well
on top of the situation. The police must now take over and do their job.
Another problem with which we have been dealing is the
dispute between a family that recently returned from IDP areas near Khartoum
and demanded the immediate return of the building currently occupied by
the local GOS Police detachment. This has proved a difficult case,
as the claimant has been extremely intransigent and impatient, and the
villagers do not really want the GOS Police there to begin with.
The GOS offer to build alternative facilities has been stymied by the
village’s stubborn refusal to allocate even a small piece of ground for
the new facility. This will actually provide the village with a free facility
for which they would have to pay themselves when the Joint
Integrated Police Force is set up anyway. My discussions with the claimant and
his family, and the villagers, have been intense and in
depth (in diplomatic parlance), with occasional frank exchanges of
opinion. I am hopeful that we can resolve the entire issue by Monday,
when BG Wilhelmsen is scheduled to come to bless the entire project.
And of course the usual Military Inspections go on, if at a
slightly less intense pace. The Sector Commander is on three week’s leave
as of two days ago, leaving Andrew and me to deal with things here. This is
not difficult as long as the work is routine, but we seem to
have drawn a fair number of special problems of late. These are usually
time consuming, if for no other reason than that they cannot
be managed, scheduled and coordinated with other issues. But they
certainly keep things from getting too boring around here!
MICHAEL’S WORLD:
I continue to be fit, busy and happy with my work. Except
that I miss Karen, my dogs and my friends; and that Toyota Hiluxe pickups
(estimable li’l varmints though they may be) are no real substitutes for
Dodge Ram 2500 pickups with high output Cummins diesel
engines, life is good. Michael
SITREP 24 25 MAR 05
GENERAL SITUATION:
We received word this morning that UN Security Council has
at long last signed the Sudan Mandate. Better late than never, I suppose.
We get ever more frequent visitations from various organizations intended
to replace JMC. The Special Representative of the
Secretary General, (SRSG) one Jan Pronk, is due to come by on Sunday
morning. Hopefully some of them are listening to the operators
out in the sectors, but I wouldn’t want to bet the ranch on it.
How all the delays in New York will affect the handover
timetable also remains to be seen, but at this point we are expecting JMC
operations to shut some time in late June.
SECTOR THREE OPERATIONS:
When we left our friends in the happy little hamlet of
Karkaria (see SITREP 23), your correspondent had, as the result of some
serious negotiating with the disaffected elements in the village, elicited
an agreement from them to hold off on any precipitous action
involving the eviction by force of the local GOS Police from the building
they were occupying until
BG Jan-Erik Wilhelmsen, the Head of Mission (HOM,=Commander) could come on Monday,
21 MAR 05. HOM (have you added this to your glossaries
yet?) wished to discuss the situation with the village. With his many years
of experience as a peacekeeper, culminating in one of the truly great, if
unheralded, success stories in the field (JMC), and his many
years of experience in negotiations at every level, I believe he expected
that he could quickly arrive at a successful resolution of the matter.
Just for a little extra emphasis, he was accompanied by another brigadier
general (GOS Police), the two full colonel equivalent members
of the Chairman’s Group from both factions, and major from the GOS Police.
He had not yet met the citizens of Karkaria. After hours of
discussion, offers of assistance to the village and remarks by all the
Distinguished Guests, the villagers huddled and came back with the
offer of a piece of unoccupied land.
Unfortunately, inspection of the proffered property,
achieved after a combined drive and walk of over two kilometers, revealed
that it
was barren piece of rock and gravel too far from the village to be of any
use as a police facility. The offer was rejected as being totally
unrealistic. Back to square one. The villagers were asked to ponder the
matter further, and the VIPs departed.
When I returned on Wednesday to follow up, I found that
the police had vacated the building; had been reinforced by approximately
twenty additional officers from Provincial HQ in Kadugli, and had been
offered a permanent site in the vicinity of the local school. The
headmaster of the local school had convened the parent -teacher council and
persuaded them to agree to provide the site. This wise and
generous act defused what had been a potentially explosive situation. At
this juncture everyone was satisfied, and content to live with
this set of conditions.
I contacted HOM and advised him of the changes. I
suggested that this was probably the best result we could hope to achieve
under the circumstances. Although a site within the epicenter of the village
had been desired, and this site was almost a quarter mile
from the center, it was within the limits of the contiguous village. He
agreed with my further suggestion that we ‘declare victory, police
up the barbed wire, and go home‘.
Yesterday we returned to Karkaria to congratulate, thank,
etc those villagers who deserved it. Twenty one sheets of galvanized
roofing material which the sheiks said had been appropriated by the GOS Army
during the war, and whose return had been promised
as part of a satisfactory agreement, were duly produced. All the
headmaster asked in return for averting a possible breakdown of the
ceasefire were one or two empty drums for water for the school. I brought
him four, and told him to put a ’wish list’ together before the
HOM arrived in the afternoon. By the time HOM arrived I had had my
translator produce an English version for him. HOM agreed to
almost all the requests, and the school will soon be the recipients of
school materials, new benches, a brick molding press and some water
transporters courtesy of JMC. Far more has been given for far less return,
and to far less worthy recipients.
Did I mention that the population of Karkaria is a tough
crowd to please? I don’t believe that I have ever encountered a more
stubborn, disputatious and argumentative group in my life! I believe that
everyone in town has a mirror so that when he has run
out of outsiders, neighbors or family with whom to argue and squabble, he
can go and argue with himself in the mirror. When we left,
the sheiks and c
itizens were fighting among themselves over the distribution of the roof
sheets. Fortunately, I had had them dropped off next to the
temporary police HQ, so I loaded up my team, waved goodbye to all and
sundry, and motored on home to Um Serdiba.
While I was engaged in these activities, Andrew kept busy
with inspections and preparations for VIP visits. We seem to be developing
into a very effective leadership team, with labors divided according to
each one’s skills as well as by requirements.
MICHAEL’S WORLD:
At this point I am making definite preparations for my
leave in May, when I hope to see many of you. I am also making tentative
plans
to move over to the Darfur AO in June or July. Take care, Michael