[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 90 (Wednesday, June 22, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1155-E1156]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     SUDAN: HANGING IN THE BALANCE

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. FRANK R. WOLF

                              of virginia

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, June 22, 2011

  Mr. WOLF. Mr. Speaker, I rise today with a great sense of urgency to 
call attention to the unfolding nightmare taking place in Sudan right 
at this very moment.
  I submit for the Record an article today from the New York Times 
describing the heinous actions taken by the Sudanese Army against their 
own people. The article quotes an American official as saying that 
without mediation, ``you're going to have massive destruction and death 
in central Sudan, and no one seems able to do anything about it.''
  Indeed, no one seems to be doing anything about it.
  Have we forgotten the tragic history of Rwanda? Of Darfur? Are the 
Nuba people destined to the same grim fate? Have we learned nothing 
from these previous mass annihilations of people?
  The New York Times reports that, ``United Nations officials in 
Southern Kordofan, the state that includes the Nuba Mountains, estimate 
that dozens have been killed in aerial bombings in the past two weeks 
and maybe dozens more in extrajudicial killings. Nuban officials put 
the civilian death toll in the hundreds.''
  The story continues, ``Sudanese soldiers are planting land mines in 
several towns, United Nations officials said, and possibly digging mass 
graves. Many people in the mountains are Christian, and church 
officials say Christians have been attacked and churches burned.''
  The Times piece echoes reports I heard last week from a young man who 
was a former intern in my congressional office. He has been living and 
working in Sudan for the past two years and is in continuous touch with 
people on the ground in Sudan, including in areas that have been 
virtually cut off from the outside world.
  In the face of this tragedy, the administration is AWOL. The press is 
hardly covering the story. Congress is barely engaged.
  What more will it take?
  Time is running short and the situation is grim. The world must not 
continue to turn a blind eye to slaughter.

                [From the New York Times, June 20, 2011]

        As Secession Nears, Sudan Steps Up Drive To Stop Rebels

                         (By Jeffrey Gettleman)

       Nairobi, Kenya.--The Sudanese Army and its allied militias 
     have gone on an unsparing rampage to crush rebel fighters in 
     the Nuba Mountains of central Sudan, bombing thatch-roofed 
     villages, executing elders, burning churches and pitching 
     another region of the country into crisis, according to 
     United Nations officials and villagers who have escaped.
       ``The market was burning,'' said Salah Kaka, a mother of 
     four who trekked for days with thousands of others to a 
     mushrooming refugee camp after her husband disappeared during 
     an air raid. ``I dug ditches in the ground and hid the 
     children.''
       Tens of thousands of rebel fighters have refused the 
     government's threat to disarm, digging into the craggy 
     hillsides. They are demanding political reform and autonomy, 
     a familiar refrain in Sudan's marginalized hinterlands that 
     has set off insurgencies in Darfur in the west, as well as 
     eastern and southern Sudan.
       ``This is going to spread like wildfire,'' said an American 
     official who was not authorized to speak publicly. Without 
     mediation, ``you're going to have massive destruction and 
     death in central Sudan, and no one seems able to do anything 
     about it.''
       The Sudanese Army has sealed off the area and threatened to 
     shoot down United Nations helicopters. Sudan's forces 
     detained four United Nations peacekeepers and subjected them 
     to ``a mock firing squad,'' the organization said Monday, 
     calling the intimidation part of a strategy to make it nearly 
     impossible for aid agencies and monitors to work in the 
     region.
       It seems that the Sudanese government, facing upheaval on 
     several fronts, especially with the southern third of the 
     country preparing to declare independence next month, is 
     determined to suppress the rebels and prevent them from 
     encouraging other restive areas to rise up.
       Even after the southerners secede, countless fault lines 
     remain in northern Sudan. Non-Arab people in the Nuba 
     Mountains, Darfur, Blue Nile State, Kasala--and all the way 
     down the Nile to Egypt--have long been chafing against an 
     increasingly isolated government dominated by a small group 
     of Arabs and led by President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, a 
     war crimes suspect indicted by the International Criminal 
     Court.
       ``Bashir is facing enormous pressure,'' said E. J. 
     Hogendoorn, a program director at the International Crisis 
     Group. ``There are a number of areas that could rebel 
     again,'' he said, and the offensive in the Nuba Mountains 
     ``may actually exacerbate resentment and inadvertently unite 
     armed opposition movements.''
       United Nations officials in Southern Kordofan, the state 
     that includes the Nuba Mountains, estimate that dozens have 
     been killed in aerial bombings in the past two weeks and 
     maybe dozens more in extrajudicial killings. Nuban officials 
     put the civilian death toll in the hundreds.
       Sudanese soldiers are planting land mines in several towns, 
     United Nations officials said, and possibly digging mass 
     graves. Many people in the mountains are Christian, and 
     church officials say Christians have been attacked and 
     churches burned.
       ``So many people have been made to leave their homes,'' 
     said Ali Shamilla, liaison officer for the Nuba Relief, 
     Rehabilitation and Development Organization. ``Many are 
     living in caves.''
       Witnesses said government soldiers were shooting ``the 
     black people,'' a reference to Nubans, who are often darker 
     skinned than the Arab-dominated military. Human rights groups 
     worry that this could begin a new round of ethnic cleansing, 
     given the wholesale destruction of communities that has been 
     part of how war is fought in Sudan.
       Hundreds of thousands died in Darfur after the government 
     razed villages and armed militias to throttle rebels there, 
     leading to genocide charges against Mr. Bashir. Millions died 
     in the decades of civil war between north and south, under 
     many of the same tactics.
       The same thing happened in Nuba. In the mid-1980s, southern 
     rebels opened bases in the Nuba Mountains. Residents who had 
     long felt discriminated against by the Arab rulers of Sudan 
     joined the southerners in droves.
       The rulers responded by arming Arab militias--just as it 
     would in Darfur--and setting them loose on impoverished 
     villagers. Tens of thousands of civilians were killed and 
     villagers were incarcerated in ``peace camps,'' forced to 
     convert to Islam. Entire villages were wiped out.
       ``Nuba were often just shot on sight by Khartoum forces, no 
     questions asked,'' said Roger P. Winter, a former State 
     Department official, who testified Thursday during a 
     Congressional hearing on Sudan's future. ``Today, again, Nuba 
     are positioned for liquidation by Khartoum forces.''
       This may sound hyperbolic. But as Julie Flint, an author 
     who first visited the Nuba area in 1992, argued, some of the 
     same men responsible for earlier atrocities in Nuba are in 
     charge once again, including Ahmed Haroun, the Southern 
     Kordofan governor, indicted by the International Criminal 
     Court for crimes against humanity connected to Darfur.
       ``A new war in Nuba threatens to be a replay of Darfur,'' 
     Ms. Flint said.
       The Sudanese government does not deny bombing Nuban 
     villages, arguing that the Nuba militia were supposed to 
     disarm but did not. One Sudanese official said the war could 
     go on ``for some years.'' Nuban militia leaders have vowed to 
     fight until there is ``regime change'' in Khartoum or 
     autonomy for Nuba.
       Under the accords that set in motion the south's secession, 
     Nubans were supposed to hold ``popular consultations'' to 
     determine their future, but that has not happened. Now that 
     the south is on the verge of realizing its hard-fought goal--
     independence many Nubans feel their demands have been 
     deferred.
       In the north, oil had helped buy friends and woo enemies, 
     but huge economic uncertainties loom. The south has most of 
     the oil, and in any deal before the south splits off, the 
     north will almost certainly get less than it used to.
       Already, riots have broken out in central Sudan's Arab 
     heartland, as Mr. Bashir has warned of austerity measures. 
     Many analysts say the recent military activity along the 
     north-south border, including the north's seizure of the 
     disputed Abyei area and its push in the Nuba Mountains, is 
     part of a hard-knuckled negotiation to secure more oil 
     revenue.
       Southern Sudan's leaders are reluctant to go to war over 
     Nuba, but the southern-allied militiamen in Nuba are part of 
     the overall southern military command, so the south could be 
     dragged into the conflict.
       During a recent meeting, the top Nuban militia commander, 
     Abdel Aziz al-Hilu, said that before any cease-fire he would 
     have to inform ``Chairman Salva,'' meaning southern

[[Page E1156]]

     Sudan's president, Salva Kiir. Mr. Abdel Aziz also said that 
     if things don't change, ``fires will just break out 
     everywhere, here, in Blue Nile, in Darfur,'' according to 
     someone at the meeting.
       ``We, the people of Sudan, are ready to remove them,'' 
     vowed Mr. Abdel Aziz, the person said. ``We have guns.''
       Josh Kron contributed reporting from Parieng, Sudan.

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