DARFUR SUDAN RESOURCE WAR

vast subterranean puddles that stretch west into Chad, and south to Nigeria and Uganda; not the technology; just the simple fact of the oil.
This is a resource war, fought by surrogates, involving great powers whose economies are predicated on growth, contending for a finite pool of resources
if it were not also an invisible war.
Invisible because it is happening in Africa. Invisible because our mainstream media are subsidized by the petroleum industry.
The real driving force behind the North-South conflict became clear after Chevron discovered oil in southern Sudan in 1978.
Oil pipelines, pumping stations, well-heads, and other key infrastructure became targets
John Garang, leader of the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), declared these installations to be legitimate targets of war. For a time, the oil companies fled from the conflict, but in the 1990s they began to return. Chinese and Indian companies were particularly aggressive,

It was a Chinese pipeline to the Red Sea that first brought Sudanese oil to the international market.
Under a power-sharing agreement, SPLA commander John Garang would be installed as vice president of Sudan, alongside President Omar al-Bashir.
Darfur, to the west, was left out of this treaty.
the size of France, sparsely populated but oil rich.
With the signing of the treaty last January
new seismographic studies were undertaken by foreign oil companies
doubling Sudan's estimated oil reserves
to at least 563 million barrels
Khartoum claims
5 billion barrels
a pittance compared to the 674 billion barrels of proven
six Persian Gulf countries
The very modesty of Sudan's reserves speaks volumes to the desperation with which industrial nations are grasping for alternative sources of oil.
Oil revenues to Khartoum have been about $1 million a day, exactly the amount which the government funnels into arms

"As Chinese and Indian companies venture into countries like Sudan, where risk-aversive multinationals have hesitated to enter, questions are being raised in the industry about whether state-owned companies are accurately judging the risks to their own investments, or whether they are just more willing to gamble with taxpayers' money than multinationals are willing to gamble with shareholders' investments."

Three weeks later, Garang was killed in a helicopter crash. When word of his death emerged, angry riots broke out

IT'S ALL ABOUT ABYEI

Tension has risen between the Khartoum government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) [over] lack of progress in the implementation of key provisions of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA).

"The SPLM is frustrated because it believes the NCP [the ruling National Congress Party] is deliberately failing the CPA,"

US President George W Bush and Southern Sudan President Salva Kiir [meet] on 15 November.

Al-Bashir also said he would not budge "an inch" on the contested borders of the oil-rich Abyei region. "The NCP is ready for war and will not ... retreat from the 1905 border,"

The SPLM gave a 9 January 2008 deadline for the resolution of several provisions in the CPA - including the

• Abyei protocol,

• redeployment of forces,

• demarcation of the border,

• population census,

• lack of transparency in oil sector management,

• democratic transformation and rule of law, and

• national reconciliation.

SPLM leaders deny there is a plan to break away from the rest of Sudan after the January deadline...Riek Machar, Vice-President of Southern Sudan, said.

The oil-rich Abyei region, which was granted special administrative status...A decision by the Abyei Boundary Commission was disputed by the NCP..."They want to implement the protocol minus the areas that have oil because they want to carve them out of the South. This is not acceptable."


another complication - a growing rapport between the SPLM and rebels from the war-ravaged Darfur region, who recently met in Juba to discuss a common strategy against the Khartoum government.

DARFUR REBELS FOR TALKS IN TANZANIA

ARUSHA, Tanzania (Reuters) - Darfur rebel factions began arriving in Tanzania on Friday for African Union-United Nations sponsored negotiations aimed at reconciling their differences ahead of peace talks with the Sudanese government.


The talks to end the four-year conflict in western Sudan have taken on a new importance since the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday approved the deployment of 26,000 peacekeeping troops and police to stem the bloodshed in Darfur.


The major factions have loose alliances and are in constant negotiations to form new coalitions.

Here are the major players:

* SLA - Abdel Wahed Mohamed el-Nur - Nur has few troops left based in western Jabel Marra. But from Darfur's largest Fur tribe, he commands huge popular support especially in the camps housing more than 2 million people driven from their homes during the fighting. Nur refuses to attend the Arusha talks.

* JEM - Khalil Ibrahim - Dogged by splits and with claims by JEM's military leadership that it has overthrown Ibrahim, which he denies, observers say JEM is not a significant power on the ground but is included to avoid the group acting as a spoiler. Ibrahim has been sanctioned by the United States for hindering the peace process. His group will be represented at Arusha.

* Jar el-Neby and Suleiman Marajan - Based in North Darfur, these two are important figures with many troops in Darfur. They had wanted a commanders' unity conference before Arusha but have decided to attend the meeting.

* SLA-Unity - Abdallah Yehia. Commanders include Ahmed Kubur in Darfur. SLA-Unity loosely encompasses other prominent SLA rebels including Sherif Harir. Yehia says Unity field commanders will not attend Arusha unless SLA Humanitarian Coordinator Suleiman Jamous is released.

* United Front for Liberation and Development - Sherif Harir. SLA figure Khamis Abdallah and three other smaller factions formed a new umbrella group in Eritrea last month. Each faction alone counts for little on the ground, analysts say, but by virtue of the unification have earned a seat at talks.

* Suleiman Jamous - The elderly Jamous has been virtually imprisoned in a U.N. hospital in Kordofan, a region neighbouring Kordofan, for 13 months. All agree he is influential and respected among Darfuris and all rebel factions. Khartoum says if he leaves the U.N. building he will be arrested. This week 11 prominent activists including South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu wrote to Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir to request his release. Jamous, the SLA humanitarian coordinator, was the liaison between rebels and the world's largest aid operation in Darfur until the United Nations airlifted him to Kordofan for medical treatment last year.

GEORGE GALLOWAY KICKING ASS

What Imperialists Don't Say: Oil is Behind Struggle in Darfur

June 4, 2006 9:07 | by G. Dunkel

Chad, which was once a French colony and still is occupied by French troops, is accusing Sudan of supporting and encouraging an April 14 raid on its capital, Ndjamena. It is threatening to expel 200,000 Sudanese living in Chad who get their support from the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

Sudan-which at one time was a British colony, but has since been using its oil to develop an independent economy-charges that Chad has been supporting rebellion in Darfur. Sudan wants the UNHCR to financially support the 15,000 Chadians who have fled to Sudan recently to escape heavy fighting in eastern Chad.

The fierce fighting in eastern Chad at the end of March resulted in the combat death of Chadian Army commander Brig. Gen. Abakar Youssouf Mahamat Itno, underlining the army's decline.

China Plays A Different Role

Darfur is known to have major yet untapped oil reserves, ... While France and the US are the ... with significant military forces in Africa, Britain still plays a major diplomatic and political role there, generally in coordination with Washington.

China plays a different role. The Western imperialists see China as their growing competitor for Sudan's oil. China has actually helped Sudan's economic development while serving its own needs for oil.

According to a Dec. 23, 2004, report in the Washington Post, China National Petroleum Corp. (CNPC), owned by the Chinese government, invested $300 million in an expansion of Sudan's largest refinery, doubling its output. The refinery now supplies most of Sudan's petroleum needs.

The CNPC also began trial production of oil at a field in southern Darfur in 2004 and has a 41-percent share of the oil from a field in the Melut Basin. Another Chinese firm, Sinopec Corp., built a 1,000-mile pipeline from that complex to Port Sudan on the Red Sea, where China's Petroleum Engineering Construction Group has built a tanker terminal. All in all, China buys about two-thirds of Sudan's oil.

US Policy: Divide and Rule
Beginning in the 1970s Sudan began moving in a radical Islamic direction, rejecting the neocolonial relations that the United States and other European powers wanted to impose.

A well-organized and well-financed rebellion in southern Sudan began soon after. The United States supported the south financially, politically and militarily ... By tightening an economic embargo on the Sudanese government, the US could also exert economic pressure.

... military attacks, like the cruise missile strike in 1998 that blew up the only pharmaceutical plant in Sudan. ... A delegation led by former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark of the International Action Centre visited the ruins of the plant and confirmed that it had simply been making medicines.

In 2005, the central government and the Sudanese People's Liberation Movement-the group which led the struggle in the south-ratified an agreement. The settlement granted the south substantial autonomy, a 50-50 split of oil revenues and a referendum on full independence within six years. China was instrumental in the negotiations for this peace agreement. Once the Sudanese settled this conflict, the imperialists needed another one to keep up the threats and pressure on Sudan.

Washington Foments Division

Drought and the subsequent encroachment of the desert have led to fighting over grazing and water rights in Darfur, which escalated in 2003 into a major conflict. The fighting has grown so intense that tens of thousands of people are reported to have died and 200,000 to have fled across the border into Chad. Two competing armed movements-the Sudanese Liberation Army and the Movement for Justice and Equality-won some early victories against the Sudanese Army. These two armed movements maintained their logistic and training bases in the eastern part of Chad, near the border with Darfur.

Once the rebellion in Darfur began, the Sudanese government set up counter-militias, called Jinjaweed, recruited from nomadic ethnic groups in Darfur who mainly speak Arabic. The Sudanese Liberation Army and the Movement for Justice and Equality recruited from ethnic groups in Darfur who don't use Arabic. The US government, among others, is trying to exacerbate these differences by defining this conflict as between "Arab vs. black." Washington has accused Sudan of "genocide" and "ethnic cleansing." However, Paul Moorcraft, a British expert on Sudan, points out, "Darfur's Arabs are black, indigenous African Muslims-just like Darfur's non-Arabs."

The African Union has 7,000 troops in Darfur trying to keep the peace. But the imperialist powers want more direct control by replacing the African Union forces with either NATO or UN troops in order to further imperialist interests in the region and to deny the Sudanese control over their own territory.

Propaganda for NATO Intervention

The New York Times, whose right-wing columnist Nicholas D. Kristof just won a Pulitzer prize for demanding US intervention in Darfur, supplies the liberal cover for imperialist troop deployment. Two Zionist groups, the American Jewish World Service and the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, have taken a very active role in building a national rally set for April 30 whose main demand is direct US intervention in Darfur to "stop the genocide." The AJWS is pushing to replace the African Union soldiers in Darfur with 20,000 UN or NATO troops.

But that would require the approval of the UN Security Council. China is very likely to veto any such resolution. So the US and Britain are stepping up their propaganda against Sudan and against China's significant support and investment there. France, the main competing imperialist power in Africa, is concerned about Sudan. But its real worry is Chad and its oil, which is currently being extracted by a consortium led by ExxonMobil. France is concerned that a key part of its sphere of influence in Africa is shrinking.

The World Bank has forced a deal on Chad that restricts how that country can spend its oil revenue and that limits its oil income per barrel to $10 to $15 less than world market prices. (Jeune Afrique, April 16-22) Opposition to the World Bank oil deal is growing in Chad. And many Chadians also resent the fact that French soldiers are still guarding government buildings 45 years after independence.

The US want to get President Déby out and a new president in who relies on it, not France. The very day of the attack on Ndjamena, US Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick called on Chad to adopt a "different political process" and to reach a "satisfactory arrangement" with the political opposition. Under-secretary of State for African Affairs Donald Yamamoto began a two-day visit there on April 24.

Report of information trip to Chad and Cameroon - January 16th to 26th, 2007

Committee on Economic Cooperation and Development of the German Bundestag


Oilfields in Chad and the Sudan. The Chad-Cameroon Pipeline runs from Doba to Kribi (left) and the Sudanese Pipeline to Port Soudan (right). (Source: www.rfi.fr)

CORP WATCH: SUDAN REBELS

by Nima Elbagir, Reuters
April 19th, 2005

• Sudan on Tuesday said its ABCO corporation -- in which Swiss company Cliveden owns 37 percent -- had begun drilling for oil in Darfur, where preliminary studies showed there were "abundant" quantities of oil.

• "The Sudanese people have never benefited from these (oil) discoveries," said Ahmed Hussein, the London-based spokesman for the Justice and Equality Movement. "The oil must wait until a final peace deal is signed."

LONDON, April 19 (Reuters) -

Sudan's main oilfields are in the south and disputes over oil prolonged negotiations to end 20 years of civil war.

Mohamed Siddig, a spokesman for Sudan's Ministry of Energy and Mining, told Reuters by phone on Monday: "The drilling (in Darfur) was undertaken on the basis of the geological studies and surveys which proved the presence of oil in abundant quantities."

Sudan Liberation Movement spokesman Adam Ali Shogar told Reuters from the Chadian capital N'Djamena that the drilling for oil was a waste of time...

... without a just distribution of wealth and a resolution to the conflict it is pointless."

Sudan began exporting oil in 1998 and exports around 300,000 barrels per day, which is set to rise to 500,000 bpd by August. Work on the first Darfur oil well, southwest of El-Fasher in North Darfur State, is under way.

... the rebels at the start of the rebellion, they were asking for 80 percent of Darfur's oil wealth," Mohamed Issam, a Sudanese political analyst, told Reuters from Khartoum.

"Now they know for a fact the oil is there. ...

CORPWATCH "DARFUR" KEYWORD SEARCH

AFRICAN OIL

• But what has most made Sudan a violent place has been the discovery of oil.

• The Khartoum government has already lost control of the south, where most of its reserves lie.

• The China National Petroleum Corporation bought the rights to Block 6, the largest oil and gas concession field still controlled by Khartoum, which lies mostly in Darfur.

• Production costs are believed to be a bargain 22 cents (less than 12p) a barrel,

• and with Rolls-Royce Marine reportedly supplying tens of millions of dollars worth of pumping equipment this summer Block 6 production is alleged to have risen from 10,000 to 40,000 barrels a day.

• To the east lies Somalia, where the descent into war is portrayed as historical enmity ...

• The real reason is likely to be that the Ogaden region, which borders Somalia, sits on a not yet exploited gas field.

• The Malaysian oil giant Petronas has bought three concession blocks there. Addis Ababa fears a resurgent Somalia will seek to annex Ogaden.

• The likely coming war there is in part gas-powered.

Ogaden (pronounced and often spelled Ogadēn, Somali: Ogaadeen) is a part of the Somali Region in Ethiopia. Sometimes known as "Abyssinian Somaliland," some locals refer to it as Ogadenia (Somali: Ogaadeeniya). The inhabitants are predominantly ethnic Somali and Muslim. The fact that some Somalis call the entire Somali region of Ethiopia "Ogadenia" is a cause of much friction in the region, because there are significant other clans in the Ogaden, such as the Sheikhal, Hawiye and Marehan.[citation needed] For this reason the titles "Somali Galbeed", which means "Western Somalia," is often preferred by supporters of the concept of Greater Somalia.