Getting to Success: Darfur Peace Talks Need Wide Participation Says Oxfam

Posted: 9 November 2007

In the weeks leading up to the peace talks, continued violence forced thousands of people from their homes in Darfur.

For the people of Darfur, the weeks leading up to the late-October start of peace talks saw a new increase in violence that forced tens of thousands more of them from their homes.

They joined the ranks of 2.5 million others who have fled since early 2003 when fighting first erupted between rebel groups and government forces in the remote western region of Sudan. Nearly five years later, the opening of the peace talks in Libya has served to underscore just how complex the situation in Darfur has grown: The rebel groups have become increasingly fragmented—with too many factions to keep count of—and many parties announced their intention to boycott the talks. The talks began anyway, but were soon delayed as a result.

Oxfam—which is providing water, sanitation and other vital services to 500,000 conflict-affected people in Darfur and neighboring Chad—is demanding that all the many parties to the conflict immediately cease hostilities. With so many different factions on the ground, any agreement signed without wide participation is likely to fail.

Oxfam is also calling for all parties to the conflict to immediately end attacks on civilians and ensure that humanitarian workers can safely deliver aid to address the enormous and growing humanitarian need.

“Safety and security is by far the biggest concern for both civilians and our staff,” said Caroline Nursey as she wrapped up an 18-month posting in Khartoum as Oxfam’s country program manager for Sudan. “In terms of security, we are operating at the very limit of what we can tolerate as an organization, and if the situation continues to deteriorate, then we may be left with no option but to withdraw from Darfur. The humanitarian impact of this could be catastrophic.”

Lawlessness and violence have a stranglehold on the region where four million people are now in need of aid, and the many different rebel factions operate in a climate of almost complete impunity. There are frequent hijacking of vehicles and attacks on aid workers.

Not even the African Union peacekeepers—a 7,000-member force assigned to protect civilians in the vast region—are safe from the violence. In late September, an attack on one of their compounds in North Darfur left 10 of them dead.

The United Nations has authorized an expanded force of 26,000—the largest peacekeeping force in the world. But its full deployment will not be completed before late in 2008 at a cost of $3.4 billion for its first year of operation. In the meantime, Oxfam is urging the international community to offer more support to the existing African Union mission so it can provide better protection for the people of Darfur.

“People in Darfur still live in daily fear of violence,” said Nursey. “It’s vital that the world leaders do more to ensure an end to the violence so that aid agencies can continue to do our life-saving work.”