Clashes in Sudan leave 250 dead
Pastor Dale Morgan
Clashes in Sudan leave 250 dead*
Mohamed Osman
May 30, 2009 - 10:29AM
Fighting between rival Arab tribes in western Sudan's oil-rich Kordofan
region killed almost 250 people over two days earlier this week,
including 75 policemen, Sudan's interior minister said.
Tribal clashes over cattle-grazing and water rights are common across
Sudan, but the violence has grown worse over the years with the number
of arms left over from the two-decade-long civil war between the north
and the south that ended in 2005.
The Messariah and Rezeigat tribes that clashed on Tuesday and Wednesday
straddle the border region between southern Kordofan and neighbouring
Darfur, where a separate conflict that has claimed 300,000 lives has
raged for more than six years.
Interior Minister Hamed Ibrahim told the cabinet on Thursday that in
addition to the police, 169 tribesman were killed in the fighting,
including 89 from the Messariah and 80 from the Rezeigat. Calm has now
returned to the area, he was quoted as saying by the state news agency.
A previous round of fighting last year between the two tribes left over
70 from both sides dead, Messariah chief Babou Nimr Mukhtar told The
Associated Press.
Mukhtar said fighting began on Tuesday when 2,000 Rezeigat gunmen on
horseback and in trucks attacked his tribe. Police were deployed to the
area to prevent the fighting but were attacked by the Rezeigat, he said.
"Calm is restored. But there is no guarantee it will last," said
Mukhtar. He stressed that tribal chiefs, not security forces, were the
only ones who could end the rivalry.
Mukhtar said 109 people from his tribe were killed in the fighting, 20
more than the government indicated. The differences could not
immediately be reconciled, and it was unclear if all the tribesman
killed were gunmen.
These clashes are separate from the war in Darfur between mostly ethnic
African rebels and government forces and allied Arab militias. Many fear
the Darfur conflict could spill over into neighbouring Kordofan,
exacerbating already rising violence.
Separate tribal clashes in the country's south over the past three
months have claimed the lives of about 900 people, mostly women and
children.
Hamid said the government was investigating the cause of this week's
fighting and would bring the instigators to trial.
Kouider Zerrouk, a spokesman for the United Nations in Sudan, called the
clashes "very alarming" and said the organisation was also investigating.
Fighting in southern Kordofan is particularly concerning because it
contains some of Sudan's largest oil resources and its borders are
disputed by northern and southern officials in the government.