Timeline Sudan
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The Sudanese people speak over 100
languages. There are 19 major ethnic groups that are further divided
into more than 600 ethno-linguistic groups. Southern Sudan is the
size of France and Germany combined. The Darfur region is nearly the
size of France.
(SFC, 1/28/97, p.A8)(MT, Fall. ‘97, p.21)(Econ,
5/15/04, p.23)(Econ, 10/15/05, p.49)
Much of Sudan in ancient times was known as Nubia.
(www.numibia.net)
The Dinka Tribe is the
dominant ethnic group of southern Sudan. They are renowned for their
deep ebony skin and height.
(SFC, 4/15/96,A-8)
Sunni Muslims dominated the
government.
(WSJ, 8/21/98, p.A4)
12000BC-10000BC
A site along the Nile River in Sudan has a graveyard (Site 117) of
this period that indicates warfare between communities.
(NH, Jul, p.31)
1991BC-1962BC Amenemhet I (Amenemhat I) founded
Egypt’s 12th Dynasty of Egypt and ruled for some 30 years. In 2007
Prof. Jahi Issa and Salim Faraji authored “The Origin of the Word
Amen: Ancient Knowledge the Bible Has Never Told,” in which they
argued that the word Amen is derived from a pre-dynastic Egyptian
culture found in the Sudan with roots in the ancient name for
pharaoh, Amen, spelled in some cases as Amun.
(http://www.ancient-egypt.org/history/11_13/12.html)(SSFC, 12/2/07,
p.A2)
1700BC Nubia, known as the Kingdom of Kush in the
Bible. By this time the Nubians have established sizable cities with
a class society of workers, farmers, priests, soldiers bureaucrats
and an aristocracy with technological and cultural skills on a level
with other advanced civilizations of their day.
(MT, 10/95, p.10-11)
750BC-719BC Piye (Piankhy)
ruled Kush (Nubia). In 722 he extended his rule to Egypt. Kashta,
ruler of Kush, had begun a campaign against Egypt. With the help of
his son, Piankhy, he was successful and Piankhy became pharaoh of
Egypt. The Nubian King Piye conquered the weakened and disunited
Egypt and became the first of several Nubian Pharaohs who ruled a
unified Egyptian and Nubian state for the next century.
(eawc, p.7)(MT, 10/95,
p.10-11)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
722BC Piye (Piankhy) marched
north from Nubia and began his conquest of Egypt where he founded
the 25th Dynasty. He consolidated his rule over Egypt and Kush and
became the 1st king of the 25th Dynasty. It has been suggested that
he revived pyramid building for royals in Egypt, a tradition that
had gone extinct for over eight centuries.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)(Arch, 9/02,
p.55)
690BC-664BC The Nubian Pharaoh
Taharqa, brother of Shebitku, ruled over the upper Nile
Nubian-Egyptian state. He is mentioned in the Bible as a pyramid
builder. A sculpture of the Kushite king was discovered in the
basement of "God's House Tower," an archeological museum, in England
in 2000.
(MT, 10/95, p.10-11)(SFC, 2/16/00,
p.A8)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)(Arch, 9/02, p.55)
663BC The Kingdom of Kush was
driven out of Egypt but flourished in the Sudan until the 4th
century CE.
(NG, May 1985, p.607)
593BC The Nubians were defeated
by a resurgent Egyptian dynasty after which they moved their capital
from Napata to Meroe.
(Arch, 9/02, p.56)
270BC The Nubian royals opted
for burial at Meroe about this time and pyramids were built there
for some 700 years.
(Arch, 9/02, p.56)
23-24 Strabo (b.~63-64BC),
Greek geographer and historian, died about this time. He had
traveled to Egypt and Kush, met members of the Noba tribe, and
decided to call their country Nubia. Strabo is mostly famous for his
17-volume work Geographica, which presented a descriptive history of
people and places from different regions of the world known to his
era.
(Arch, 9/02,
p.55)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strabo)
350 In Sudan the last pyramid
in the Egyptian tradition was built at Meroe about this time. The
Meroe dynasty ruled Kush for more than 1,000 years until the
kingdom's demise in 350 AD.
(Arch, 9/02, p.55)(AP, 3/3/10)
632-661 The Rashidun Caliphate, also known as the
Rightly Guided Caliphate, comprising the first four caliphs in
Islam's history, was founded after Muhammad's death. At its height,
the Caliphate extended from the Arabian Peninsula, to the Levant,
Caucasus and North Africa in the west, to the Iranian highlands and
Central Asia in the east. It was the one of the largest empires in
history up until that time.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rashidun_Caliphate)
c1600 Mahmud al-Kati authored
the Tarikh al-Fattash, a history of the Sudan up to the late 16th
century.
(AM, 7/04, p.36)
1862 Jun, Samuel and Florence
Baker arrived in Khartoum on their search for explorers John Speke
and James Grant.
(ON, 10/01, p.9)
1862 Dec 18, Samuel and
Florence Baker departed Khartoum on their search for explorers John
Speke and James Grant.
(ON, 10/01, p.9)
1863 Feb 15, Samuel and
Florence Baker encountered John Speke and James Grant at the
frontier village of Gondokoro (southern Sudan). Speke and Grant said
they had found the Nile’s headwaters at a lake they named Victoria.
(ON, 10/01, p.9)
1863 Mar 26, Samuel and
Florence Baker departed Gondokoro to find a lake called Luta N’Zige,
through which flowed a branch of the Nile.
(ON, 10/01, p.9)
1869-1899 In 2007 Dominic Green authored “Armies
of God: Islam and the Empire on the Nile, 1869-1899 – The First
Jihad of the Modern Era.”
(Econ, 8/18/07, p.75)
1876 Apr 11, General Sir
Charles ("Chinese") Gordon ended religious tolerance in Sudan.
(MC, 4/11/02)
1877-79 British Gen. Charles "Chinese" Gordon
served as the governor of Sudan.
(WSJ, 4/4/01, p.A21)
1879 Aug 23, Governor-general
Charles Gordon of Sudan returned to Cairo.
(MC, 8/23/02)
1881 Jun 29, Muhammad Ahmad
(1844-1855) proclaimed himself as the Mahdi or messianic redeemer of
the Islamic faith in Sudan. El Mahdi (The One Who is Guided by God)
soon united the disparate tribes of Sudan and led a successful
military campaign against the Turco-Egyptian government of the Sudan
(known as the Turkiyah).
(WSJ, 8/25/98, p.A14)(ON, 4/02,
p.9)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad_Ahmad)
1882 British Gen. Charles
"Chinese" Gordon (49) retired from active duty and moved to
Jerusalem.
(WSJ, 4/4/01, p.A21)
1882 Former British Gen.
Charles "Chinese" Gordon, Field Marshal in the Turkish army,
commanded the Egyptian forces in Sudan.
(WSJ, 4/4/01, p.A21)
1883 Nov 3, A poorly trained
Egyptian army, led by British General William Hicks, marched toward
El Obeid in the Sudan--straight into a Mahdist ambush and massacre.
(HN, 11/3/98)
1883-1884 In Sudan British officered Egyptian
armies were defeated by the forces of El Mahdi, called Dervishes by
the British.
(WSJ, 8/25/98, p.A14)
1884 Jan 18, General Charles
("Chinese") Gordon departed London for Khartoum.
(MC, 1/18/02)
1884 Jan, Lord Garnet Wolseley,
adjutant-general of the British Army, asked Charles Gordon to come
out of retirement and lead an evacuation of 15,000 European and
Egyptian civilians from Khartoum, Sudan. Gordon agreed.
(ON, 4/02, p.9)
1884 Feb 18, General Charles
Gordon arrived in Khartoum to battle the Mahdi and his terrorists.
(MC, 2/18/02)
1884 Mar 11, Gen. Gordon
learned that the telegraph cable to Cairo had been cut. Khartoum
soldiers killed 5 Mahdists at Halfaya. Mahdist insurgents in return
massacred 150 men from the Khartoum garrison as they were cutting
wood.
(ON, 4/02, p.10)
1884 Mar 13, Siege of Khartoum,
Sudan, began. Gen. Gordon ordered a counter-attack at Halfaya and
troops rescued some 500 from a Mahdist assault.
(ON, 4/02, p.10)(MC, 3/13/02)
1884 Mar 16, A 2nd
counter-attack at Halfaya failed and Gordon ordered 2 commanders to
be executed.
(ON, 4/02, p.10)
1884 Oct 22, General Charles
Gordon received a letter from Mahdi near Khartoum. British Gen’l.
Charles "Chinese" Gordon was sent to Khartoum to evacuate the
Egyptian garrison. Gordon decided to hold the city against El Mahdi.
(WSJ, 8/25/98, p.A14)(MC, 10/22/01)
1884 Nov 3, A British steamboat
arrived a Khartoum with news that a relief force was on its way.
(ON, 4/02, p.10)
1885 Jan 2, Gen. Wolseley
received the last distress signal of Gen. Gordon in Khartoum.
(MC, 1/2/02)
1885 Jan 26, In Sudan General
"Chinese" Gordon (Charles George Gordon, 51), British gov-gen of
Sudan, was killed on the palace steps in the garrison at Khartoum by
the forces of Muhammad Ahmed, El Mahdi. In 1961 "General Gordon’s
Khartoum Journal," edited by Lord Elton, was published.
(WSJ, 8/25/98, p.A14)(HN, 1/26/99)(MC,
1/26/02)(ON, 4/02, p.10)
1885 Jan 28, Gen’l. Garnet
Wolseley arrived at Khartoum to relieve Gen’l. Gordon, but arrived 2
days late. El Mahdi died soon thereafter but was succeeded by the
Khalifa.
(WSJ, 8/25/98, p.A14)(ON, 4/02, p.10)
1885 Jun 22, In Sudan Muhammad
Ahmad (b.1844), religious leader of the Samaniyya order, died of
typhus. His chief deputy, Abdallahi ibn Muhammad took over the
administration of the nascent Mahdist state.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad_Ahmad)
1886 Henry Stanley (1841-1904),
Welsh-born journalist, led the Emin Pasha Relief Expedition to
"rescue" Emin Pasha, the governor of Equatoria in the southern
Sudan.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Morton_Stanley)
1896 Sep 21, General Horatio
Kitchener's army occupied Dongola, Sudan. Gen’l. Herbert Kitchener
led the British conquest of the Sudan. The "kit bag," another name
for a knapsack, was named after him.
(SFEC, 3/29/98, Z1 p.8)(WSJ, 8/25/98, p.A14)(MC,
9/21/01)
1897 Aug 31, General Kitchener
occupied Berber, North of Khartoum.
(MC, 8/31/01)
1898 Apr 8, British General
Horatio Kitchener defeated the Khalifa, leader of the dervishes in
Sudan, at the Battle of Atbara. Anglo-Egyptian forces crushed 6,000
Sudanese.
(HN, 4/8/99)(MC, 4/8/02)
1898 Sep 1, Lord Kitchener's
army bombed Omdurman, Sudan. Lt. Winston Churchill approached
Omdurman, the rebel capital, as a scout in the cavalry along with
the rest of Gen. Kitchener's army of 25,000 men. [see Sep 2]
(ON, 10/99, p.2)(MC, 9/1/02)
1898 Sep 2, Anglo-Egyptian
lines under Gen’l. Kitchener were charged by 50,000 fanatical
Dervishes and were mowed down by howitzers, machine guns and rifles.
Lt. Winston Churchill led one of the last (and most useless) cavalry
charges in history. Sir Herbert Kitchener led the British to victory
over the Mahdists at Omdurman and took Khartoum. The Dervishes left
11,000 dead and 16,000 wounded. The Anglo-Egyptian army suffered
fewer than a dozen casualties. In 1899 Winston Churchill published
"The River War, An Account of the Reconquest of the Soudan." This
was the 1st use of the machine gun in battle.
(WSJ, 8/25/98, p.A14)(HN, 9/2/98)(ON, 10/99,
p.3)(MC, 9/2/01)
1898 Sep 6, Lord Kitchener
destroyed Mahdi's tomb in Omdurman (Sudan).
(MC, 9/6/01)
1899 Nov 24, Abdullah ibn
Mohammed al-Ta'a'ishi, Mahdi of Sudan (1883-99), died.
(MC, 11/24/01)
1902 The novel "The Four
Feathers" by A.E.W. Mason, was published. It was set mainly in
England and Ireland over the years 1882-1888 during England’s war in
the Sudan and went on to inspire 7 films.
(SFC, 9/20/02,
p.D1)(http://www.stmoroky.com/reviews/books/4feather.htm)
1907 The first primary school
for girls was founded by the Bedris family. It grew to become the
private Ahfad University.
(SFC, 2/20/98, p.A12)
1916 Independent sultanates
ruled the Darfur region of Sudan until this year.
(WPR, 3/04, p.32)
1916 George Reisner
(1867-1942), American archeologist, began excavating pyramids at
Meroe, Sudan.
(Arch, 9/02,
p.55)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mero%C3%AB)
1917 Darfur was an independent
sultanate until 1917, when it was the last region to be incorporated
into the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. The Fur, largely peasant farmers,
occupy the central belt of the region Also in this central zone are
the non-Arab Masalit, Berti, Bargu, Bergid, Tama and Tunjur peoples,
who are all sedentary farmers.
(www.sudanupdate.org/REPORTS/PEOPLES/Darf.htm)
1924 Nov 19, Sir Lee Stack, the
Sirdar and Governor-General of the Sudan, was assassinated. This and
subsequent British demands, which Egypt’s PM Zaghloul felt to be
unacceptable, led Zaghloul to resign and to play no further role in
government.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saad_Zaghloul)
1924 Nov 22, England ordered
the Egyptians out of Sudan.
(MC, 11/22/01)
1924 Slave trading was made
illegal.
(SFC, 5/23/02, p.A15)
1941 Feb 16, The Italians lost
their last position in the Sudan.
(HN, 2/16/98)
1954 Mar 1, Rebellion during
visit of President Naguib in Khartoum Sudan, 30 die.
(SC, 3/1/02)
1955 Aug 18, South Sudanese
openly open fire and told the government in Khartoum that enough is
enough. Southern Sudanese were transported in thousands to Port
Sudan to dig salt for the survival of the northern government.
Regions in South Sudan come together to give support to Torit
mutineers. The Torit mutiny resulted into the Anya-nya I war that
ended with the Addis Ababa Agreement in 1972.
(www.sudantribune.com/18-August-1955-South-Sudan-heroes,23627)
1955 Fighting erupted between
north and south Sudan. The black southerners are Christian and
animist, while the northerners are mostly Arabic and Muslim.
Southern troops mutinied and demanded autonomy or secession.
(SFC, 4/15/96,A-8)(SSFC, 3/25/01, p.C8)
1956 Jan 1, Sudan became
independent from Britain. Northern Muslim parties took over rule.
Southerners demanded autonomy and civil war began.
(WSJ, 8/25/98, p.A14)(SFC, 11/17/00, p.A20)(WSJ,
10/22/03, p.A4)(Econ, 5/15/04, p.21)
1957 Mohammed Wardi (26) began
his singing career in Sudan. He became known as the Golden Throat
and blended Nubian music into the Arabic language.
(SFC, 9/21/07, p.A12)
1958 In Sudan the 1st in a
series of military coups overthrew the civilian-elected government.
(WSJ, 10/22/03, p.A4)
1959 A water agreement between
Egypt and Sudan was based on an annual net yield of 96.2 billion
cubic yards of water and gave Egypt 72.15 billion and Sudan 20.04.
Ethiopia got no allocation and never recognized the treaty.
(WSJ, 8/22/97, p.A1)
1960s Leni Riefenstahl, German
filmmaker, published a collection of photographs of the Nuba tribe
of southern Sudan.
(SFC, 9/10/03, p.A19)
1969 May 25, Sudanese
government was overthrown in a military coup. Gaafar an-Nimeiry
(1930-2009), came to power with the support of communist and
socialist leaders.
(http://countrystudies.us/sudan/23.htm)(AP,
5/31/09)
1970 Nov 27, Syria joined the
pact linking Libya, Egypt and Sudan.
(HN, 11/27/98)
1971 Mohammed Wardi,
Nubian-Sudanese singer known as the Golden Throat, began a 2 year
prison term under the authoritarian regime of Gen. Jaafar Nimeiri,
who ruled Sudan from 1969-1985.
(SFC, 9/21/07,
p.A12)(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/350170.stm)
1970s Large quantities of oil
were discovered under south-central Sudan.
(SFC, 6/13/01, p.D3)
1972 Mar 27, The Addis Ababa
accords ended fighting between north and south Sudan. It made the
south a self-governing region. Pres. Gaafar Muhammed Nimeiri ended
the 17 year civil war in the Sudan between the north and south.
(www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/sudan-civil-war1.htm)(WSJ,
10/22/03, p.A4)
1973 Mar 2, Arab commandos,
"Black September" terrorists, led by Abu Jihad executed 3 hostages:
US ambassador Cleo A. Noel (54), deputy George Curtis Moore (47) and
Belgian charge d’affaires Guy Eid (38), in Khartoum, Sudan. Pres.
Nixon refused their demands. The operation was later reported to
have been organized by Yasser Arafat.
(WSJ, 1/10/02,
p.A12)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khartoum_diplomatic_assassinations)
1973 Sep, Gen. Jaafar Nimeiri,
Sudan’s military ruler, introduced Islamic Sharia law.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/350170.stm)
1973 Hassan Turabi, Sudanese
scholar, authored "Women in Islam and Muslim Society."
(www.soundvision.com/Info/women/turabi.asp)
1976 The deadly Ebola virus was
1st identified in western Sudan and the nearby region of Congo.
(SFC, 1/8/02, p.A6)
1978 Chevron discovered oil in
Sudan and sank wells north of Bentiu.
(SFC, 6/13/01, p.D3)(WSJ, 10/22/03,
p.A4)(www.hrw.org/reports/2003/sudan1103/10.htm)
1980 The giant Kenana sugar
processing plant opened in Sudan. In 2002 El Nazir, Osman &
Desai, and Govind D. authored “Kenana: Green Gold of Sudan.”
(www.shell-me.com/english/oct2002/views1.htm)(http://tinyurl.com/2vpzhc)
1980 French oil giant Total SA
leased an oil patch in southern Sudan the size of Pennsylvania. In
2005 the lease came under dispute as southern Sudan gained limited
autonomy and signed an oil deal with London-based White Nile Ltd.
(WSJ, 6/19/06,
p.A1)(www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article20234)
1983 Sudan’s Pres. Gaafar
Numeiri brought in Sharia law as the basis for criminal law causing
much grievance in the non-Muslim south.
(Econ, 8/8/09, p.44)
1983 Civil War began again in
the Sudan when the People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) renewed the
battle for greater autonomy from the Muslim north. The discovery of
oil in the middle of the country and the imposition of Shariah law
by the government reignited violence.
(SFC, 5/29/96, p.A8)(SFC, 1/31/98, p.A9)(SSFC,
3/25/01, p.C8)
1983-1987 Drought in Sudan drove nomadic Zaghawa
and Arab groups southwards into the central Fur region of Jebel
Marra.
(www.sudanupdate.org/REPORTS/PEOPLES/Darf.htm)
1983-1998 The civil war killed some 1.5 million
people over this period.
(SFC, 11/3/98, p.A10)
1984 Sudan enacted a
land-tenure law that allowed the government to take over land
abandoned for one year.
(SFC, 12/4/04, p.A8)
1984 War rekindled in the
Sudan. A government official stated that: "The southerners were
being used by the Marxist Ethiopians and by Col. Qaddafi of Libya to
cause trouble for Sudan." Pres. Nimeiri set an edict to make Islamic
law the code of the land. The Sudanese People’s Liberation Army was
led by John Garang a former Sudanese army colonel with a Ph.D. in
economics from Iowa St. Univ.
(NG, May 1985, p.609)
1984 Chevron Corp. pulled out
of Sudan after rebels killed 3 employees.
(SFC, 6/13/01, p.D3)
1985 Jan 18, In Sudan Mahmud
Mohammed Taha (b.1909) was hanged for refusing to recant his
unorthodox views on Islam. Sudanese president Jaafar Nimeiri, on the
advice of Islamist leader Hassan al-Turabi, ordered the execution.
(AFP,
4/23/06)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Mohamed_Taha)
1985 Apr 4, A coup in Sudan
ousted pro US President Gaafar Nimeiry and replaced him with Gen.
Dahab.
(HN, 4/4/99)(WSJ, 12/8/99, p.A19)
1985 Christian Col. John Garang
and Muslim leader Sadiq el-Mahdi helped to restore democracy, but
soon grew at odds.
(WSJ, 3/4/97, p.A14)
1985 The people of the Nuba
Mountains allied themselves with the Sudanese People’s Liberation
Army (SPLA) after government backed Arab militias attacked their
villages.
(SSFC, 1/7/01, p.D1)
1986 May 15, In Sudan Francis
Bok (7) was kidnapped when Arabs from a government-armed militia
swept into his village shooting the men and cutting off their heads
with swords.
(WSJ, 5/23/02, p.A1)(http://tinyurl.com/ybn8g5)
1986 Ahmed Al-Mirghani (d.2008
at 67) headed the last democratically elected government of Sudan
until 1989 before a military coup led by current President Omar
al-Bashir unseated him.
(AP, 11/3/08)
1986 In Sudan Sadiq al-Mahdi
became the country’s last democratically elected prime minister.
(Econ, 12/13/08, p.68)
1986 Sudan became subject to
American sanctions. The IMF ended financial assistance to Sudan.
(Econ, 8/5/06, p.42)
1986-1989 Arms were channeled into Darfur by
Sudan’s central government under Sadiq al-Mahdi, which armed the
southern Baggara Arabs as a militia to fight against the SPLA (at
that time threatening insurgency in the region), and also armed the
northern Arab tribes, who were loyal to the Ansar of the Prime
Minister's Umma Party.
(www.sudanupdate.org/REPORTS/PEOPLES/Darf.htm)
1988-1989 The war induced famine in Sudan killed
some 250,000 people.
(SFC, 11/3/98, p.A10)
1989 Jun 30, In Sudan the
elected coalition government was overthrown. Omar Hassan al-Bashir
and Sheik Hassan al-Turabi, brother-in-law of Sadiq el-Mahdi, seized
power. They imposed an Iranian style theocracy along with the strict
Muslim Shariah law on the country including the Christian southern
Sudan. The National Islamic Front (NIF) overthrew a democratic
government under prime minister Sadiq el-Mahdi and have ruled ever
since. The Umma Party and the Democratic Union party established
bases in Cairo and Eritrea and later allied with rebel groups that
included the Southern People's Liberation Party.
(SFC, 4/5/97, p.A12)(SFC, 2/20/98, p.A12)(SFC,
12/29/98, p.A6)
1989 A peace conference in
mid-1989, mediated by the Sultan of the minority Masalit,
temporarily settled some issues between Arabs and Fur. The
government was forced to admit publicly that the problem was not
merely one of banditry.
(www.sudanupdate.org/REPORTS/PEOPLES/Darf.htm)
1989 The NIF divided the 9
provinces of Sudan’s Darfur region into 26, weakening the
traditional tribal leadership.
(WPR, 3/04, p.32)
1989 A devastating draught
prompted the international community to launch a massive relief
effort called Operation Lifeline Sudan.
(SFC, 4/15/96,A-8)
1989 An attack on Danbar, one
of the villages in the Wade Saleh, left 226 people dead from the
non-Arab population.
(www.sudanupdate.org/REPORTS/PEOPLES/Darfur2.htm)
1990 Mar, Following the
Sudanese government's failure to make any move toward restoring
democracy after the June 1989 military coup, the US government
suspended all development assistance to Sudan under Section 513 of
the Foreign Assistance Act, which mandates a cutoff in most U.S. aid
to any nation where an elected government has been overthrown in a
coup. However, food aid under P.L. 480 and humanitarian assistance
are permitted to continue.
(www.hrw.org/reports/1992/WR92/AFW-09.htm)
1990 Islamist leader Hassan
al-Turabi invited Osma bin Laden to Sudan and provided him with a
safe haven from 1991 to 1996, when the Al-Qaeda chief was eventually
expelled under mounting international pressure on Khartoum.
(AFP, 4/23/06)
1991 Nov 26, UNICEF said
fighting and crop failures in southern Sudan had forced an
unprecedented exodus of 200,000 people.
(AP, 11/26/02)
1991 Dec 13, Iran’s Pres. Akbar
Hashemi Rafsanjani visited Sudan with some 157 officials. He signed
agreements to train Sudan’s Popular Defense Forces, a version of
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, and agreed to pay China $300 million
for weapons ordered for Sudan.
(Econ, 4/4/09, p.50)(http://tinyurl.com/d6ruxp)
1991 Sudan adopted a federal
system with nine states, matching the nine provinces that had
existed from 1948 to 1973. The states were subdivided into 66
provinces, and then into 281 local government areas.
(www.statoids.com/usd.html)
1991 The Sudan People’s
Liberation Army, the main rebel group, began to divide along tribal
lines and now four factions control the south.
(SFC, 4/15/96,A-8)
1991 In Sudan the National
Democratic Alliance began as an opposition grouping.
(WSJ, 12/8/99, p.A19)
1991 In Sudan an Arab tribe
sought to resolve ancient disputes over land and water rights by
attacking the Zaghawa, Fur, and Massalit peoples in Darfur. Arab
groups launched a campaign in southwestern Darfur State that
resulted in the destruction of some 600 non-Arab villages and the
deaths of about 3,000 people. In southern Sudan the Nuer tribe
massacred Dinka civilians in Bor. Some Dinka later said tens of
thousands of women and children were killed, a number the Nuer
called an exaggeration.
(www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/36028.htm)(Econ, 5/8/10,
p.50)
1991 Sudanese intelligence
approached Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan and invited him to move to
Khartoum, which he did.
(WSJ, 9/13/01, p.A20)
1992 An agreement was made on
sharing water from Nubian sandstone aquifer system, the largest in
the world, located under Chad, Egypt, Libya and Sudan.
(Econ, 10/9/10, p.87)
1992 In Kenya the Kakuma camp
was founded for some 30,000 refugees from Sudan.
(WSJ, 10/23/02, p.B1)
1994 Feb 4, In Khartoum, Sudan,
five armed men attacked the mosque of Ansar al-Sunna during Friday
prayers, killing 19 and injuring 26 of the worshippers.
(www.africa.upenn.edu/Newsletters/SNV_2.html)
1994 Aug 14, Ilich Ramirez
Sanchez, the terrorist known as "Carlos the Jackal," was captured in
Khartoum, Sudan. He was jailed in France the next day.
(SFC,12/17/97, p.A18)(AP, 8/15/97)
1994 Osama bin Laden arrived in
Sudan from Afghanistan. He used his own money to finance road
construction projects in the desert north of Khartoum.
(SFEC, 8/23/98, p.A15)
1994 Ali A. Mohamed, a former
US Army sergeant, allegedly trained bodyguards for bin Laden in
Khartoum according to a 1999 US indictment.
(SFC, 5/20/99, p.A2)
1994 Sudan’s government began
funding the (LTA) Lord’s Resistance Army in retaliation for Uganda’s
support of the southern-based rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army.
(SFC, 5/25/98, p.A12)
1996 Feb. 27, A Sudanese
military plane crashed 25 miles south of Khartoum and killed 91
people on board. The plane was a US made C-130.
(WSJ, 2/28/96, p.A-1)
1996 April 26, The UN called
for sanctions against Sudan.
(WSJ, 5/21/96, p.A-1)
1996 May 4, A Sudanese
passenger plane crashed and killed all 53 onboard. The plane was a
Russian Antonov-24 and had tried to land outside of Khartoum in an
area cleared for a new airport because sand covered the runways at
Khartoum.
(SFC, 5/5/96, p.A-14)
1996 May 20, Britain ordered
the expulsion of 3 Sudanese diplomats as part of the UN’s April 26
call for sanctions.
(WSJ, 5/21/96, p.A-1)
1996 May 28, Sudan asked Muslim
militants to leave in an attempt to end UN diplomatic sanctions. The
UN imposed sanctions to force the turn over of three suspects in the
1995 assassination attempt on Egypt’s Pres. Mubarek.
(WSJ, 5/28/96, p. A-18)
1996 May 28, Two human rights
groups accused Sudan of rights violations. Amnesty Int’l. reported
that children were kidnapped, enslaved and shot. Human Rights Watch
in Nairobi, Kenya, said that the denial of basic freedoms is routine
and that an arms embargo should be imposed on all sides in the civil
war.
(SFC, 5/29/96, p.A8)
1996 May, Osama bin Laden was
driven out of Sudan under pressure from the Clinton administration.
His horse, “Swift Like the Wind,” was left behind. He had lived
there for some years running a construction company and allegedly
recruiting and training terrorists. Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, a Saudi
Arabian-backed jihadist leader, invited bin Laden back to
Afghanistan and bin Laden returned.
(SFC, 8/21/98, p.A2)(SFC, 12/17/04, p.W4)(Econ,
9/17/05, p.40)(WSJ, 8/21/98, p.A4)
1996 Jul 12, At least 700,000
people were facing starvation in southern Sudan because of the
Khartoum government’s refusal to allow large-scale food aid.
(SFC, 7/12/96, p.A14)
1996 Aug 31, Torrential rains
threatened Sudan and Egypt with floods.
(SFC, 8/31/96, p.A4)
1996 Oct, Former prime minister
Sadiq el-Mahdi escaped house arrest in Khartoum and fled to Eritrea.
1996 Nov 2, Some 160,000 Beja
people faced famine in northern Sudan because of a 2-year draught in
the region.
(SFC, 11/2/96, p.A18)
1996 Oct, After a peace
agreement was established between Pres. Omar Hassan al-Bashir and 6
minor rebel factions, Kerubino [Kuayin] Kwanying Bol, a founding
members of the rebels, was promoted to major general in the Sudanese
army and attacked Bahr el Ghazal. Farming in this province of the
Dinka tribe was disrupted and led to famine. Rebel leader John
Garang refused to go along. Bol was a liberation army commander who
switched allegiance to the government’s side and then turned on the
civilian population in his home territory.
(SFC, 4/10/98, p.A17)(SFC, 7/29/98, p.A8)
1996 The Ashifa plant in
Khartoum opened as a 50-50 venture between Bashir Hassan Bashir and
a shipping company called Baaboud Trading and Shipping Agencies. The
plant supplied malaria tablets and veterinary medicine for cattle.
It was sold in 1998 to Salaheldin Idris.
(WSJ, 8/24/98, p.A9)
1996 In Sudan’s Abyei region
the Heglig oil field was first developed and operated by the Greater
Nile Petroleum Operating Company. Sudan held a majority stake, with
shares owned by companies from China, Malaysia and India.
(AP, 7/22/09)
1996 The Red Cross suspended
field work in Sudan after 2 members of its staff were seized briefly
by a splinter rebel group.
(SFC, 5/15/98, p.D3)
1996 The US embassy in Khartoum
was abandoned.
(WSJ, 8/21/98, p.A1)
1997 Jan 28, The government
faced a new rebel offensive.
(SFC, 1/28/97, p.A8)
1997 Jan, Many of the rebel
opposition leaders were arrested in Khartoum.
(WSJ, 3/4/97, p.A14)
1997 Mar 1, The government
signed an agreement to build a 900-mile pipeline from the southern
oilfields to Port Sudan on the Red Sea. Chinese National Petroleum
would control 40% and Petronas of Malaysia would own 30% through its
state owned oil company.
(WSJ, 3/11/97, p.A22)(SFC, 6/13/01, p.D3)
1997 Mar 9, The national
Democratic Alliance (NDA) began an offensive in the southern state
of Equatoria.
(SFC, 4/3/97, p.A10)
1997 Mar 21, Rebel leader John
Garang prepared to attack Juba and claimed that the entire southern
Sudan was under their control. Government information minister Tayeb
Ibrahim Mohamed Kheir claimed that Ugandan forces were involved with
the rebels.
(SFC, 3/22/97, p.C1)
1997 May, In the village of
Marial Bai, raiders killed 23 people and stole livestock. 67 women
and children were missing and believed to have been abducted.
(SFC, 7/31/97, p.A10)
1997 Sep, Gen. Omar Bashir
accepted a 3-year-old proposal to hold direct negotiations with the
Sudanese People’s Liberation Army (SPLA).
(SFC,10/30/97, p.A12)
1997 Nov 4, US sanctions
against Sudan were tightened due to the Iran-allied government’s
support for int’l. terrorism and abysmal human-rights record. After
lobbying by trade associations the sanctions excluded US imports for
gum arabic, a key ingredient for soft drinks, and other goods as an
emulsifier.
(WSJ, 11/5/97, p.A1)(SFC, 12/2/97, p.A8)
1997 Production of gum arabic
from the acacia tree accounted for nearly half of Sudan’s $20
million annual exports to the US. The derivative is used in soft
drinks, cookies, and printing ink.
(WSJ, 8/24/98, p.A14)
1997 China began investing in
Sudan following US sanctions there. By 2005 Sudan provided China
with about 5% if its oil imports.
(WSJ, 3/29/05, p.A2)
1998 Jan 30, The city of Wau
fell to rebels who pretended to defect and then attacked from
inside.
(SFC, 1/31/98, p.A9)
1998 Feb 12, Lt. Gen’l.
Al-Zubeir Mohammad Saleh, the country’s first vice-president, was
killed along with 7 others in a plane crash in the southern Sudan.
Rebels of the SPLA claimed to have shot the plane down.
(SFC, 2/13/98, p.D5)
1998 Apr 2, Sudanese soldiers
shot and beat to death 74 student conscripts who tried to flee the
Ailafoon military camp. At least 55 others drowned when their boat
capsized on the blue Nile while they tried to escape.
(SFC, 4/13/98, p.A12)
1998 May 14, The Red Cross
announced that it would resume operations after an 18-month break
due the kidnapping of 2 staff members.
(SFC, 5/15/98, p.D3)
1998 Jun 10, Three aid workers
were killed when gunmen opened fire on a UN relief convoy.
(SFC, 6/11/98, p.C2)
1998 Jun 30, Bombs were set off
on this 9th anniversary of the coup that brought the National
Islamic Front to power. 2 Catholic priests and 20 other men were
arrested in August for the bombing. The 2 priests and at least 18
others were released in Dec 1999.
(SFC, 12/8/99, p.A16)
1998 Jun, A new constitution
was ratified.
(SFC, 12/29/98, p.A6)
1998 Jul 15, Sudanese rebels
declared a 3 month cease fire to allow food shipments to reach
hundreds of thousands hungry people in the southwest.
(WSJ, 7/16/98, p.A1)
1998 Jul 29, A UNICEF report
said 130 people were dying every day in Ajiep out of a refugee
population of 70,000 from famine. A program to provide 15,000 tons
of food a month was planned. It would exceed the 1948 Berlin
Airlift.
(SFC, 7/29/98, p.A10)(SFC, 7/30/98, p.A16)
1998 Aug 3, The government
declared a unilateral cease-fire.
(SFC, 8/4/98, p.A12)
1998 cAug 7, Immediately after
the bombing of 2 US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, Sudanese
authorities arrested 2 men suspected of being involved in the plot.
(SFC, 7/30/99, p.A12)
1998 Aug 20, Pres. Clinton
ordered cruise missile attacks on Sudan and Afghanistan. About 50
missiles were fired at the camp of Osama Bin Laden and some 25
missiles against a suspected chemical plant in Khartoum. The plant
in Sudan was suspected of producing the chemical EMPTA, one of the
ingredients in VX nerve gas, but also an ingredient in fungicides
and anti-microbial agents. The US Operation Infinite Reach began in
Afghanistan and Sudan and cost over $50 million.
(WSJ, 8/21/98, p.A1)(SFC, 8/27/98, p.A10)(WSJ,
9/22/99, p.A8)
1998 Aug 20, A missile attack
destroyed the Sugar Sweet and Candy factory of Mustafa S. Ismaeil
and killed a guard there. The owner planned to sue the US for
damages.
(SFC, 8/24/98, p.A8)
1998 Aug 21, Pres. Omar
el-Bashir said that Sudan could prove that the bombed Shifa
Pharmaceutical factory was not used for chemical weapons. Ten people
were reportedly treated for injuries and damages were estimated at
$100 million.
(SFC, 8/22/98, p.A1,3)
1998 cAug 21, Sudanese
authorities, angered by the US attack of US cruise missiles,
released 2 men suspected in the bombing of 2 US embassies on Aug 7.
The men were sent to Pakistan.
(SFC, 7/30/99, p.A12)
1998 Aug 24, It was reported
that Salaheldin Idris, a Saudi Arabian banker, planned to sue the US
for $50 million for damages to his Ashifa pharmaceutical factory.
(WSJ, 8/24/98, p.A9)
1998 Sep 2, It was reported
that US officials acknowledged that they were not aware that Sudan’s
Shifa factory produced human and veterinary medicines. The admitted
that their only knowledge about what the plant produced came from
its Web site.
(SFC, 9/2/98, p.A9)
1998 Oct 15, Foreign Minister
Mustafa Osman Ismail said that Sudan will allow the UN to
investigate any site alleged to be making chemical weapons.
(WSJ, 10/16/98, p.A13)
1998 Dec 10, The death toll
from the 15 year civil war was reported to have reached at least 1.9
million. A 40 nation African conference on refugees opened in
Khartoum.
(SFC, 12/11/98, p.D3)
1999 Jan 1, All opposition
parties were to be allowed registration.
(SFC, 12/29/98, p.A6)
1999 Jan 15, The government and
rebels agreed to a 3-month extension of a cease-fire in a
southwestern province.
(SFC, 1/16/99, p.A11)
1999 Feb 8, An independent
scientist hired by the owner of the pharmaceutical plant bombed by
the US in August found no traces of chemical weapons.
(SFC, 2/9/99, p.A8)
1999 Feb 23, In Khartoum health
officials reported that some 140 people had died from meningitis and
that another 1000 suffered from the disease.
(SFC, 2/24/99, p.C3)
1999 Mar 5, From Sudan it was
reported that southern rebels had kidnapped 7 people working with
the Int'l. Committee of the Red Cross near the town of Bentiu, 500
miles south of Khartoum.
(SFC, 3/8/99, p.A16)
1999 Apr 28, The US announced
that it would allow US firms to sell food and medicine to Iran,
Sudan and Libya.
(SFC, 4/29/99, p.A3)
1999 May 3, The Justice and
Treasury departments agreed to unfreeze the assets of Saleh Idris,
the owner of the Sudanese factory that was bombed by US cruise
missiles Aug. 20, 1998.
(SFC, 5/4/99, p.A14)
1999 May 7, The rebels
postponed peace talks indefinitely.
(SFC, 5/8/99, p.C14)
1999 May, A team of 10,000
Chinese laborers under China Natural Petroleum Corp. completed a
1,000 mile oil pipeline, 2 wells and a refinery after 18 months of
work. In exchange Sudan gave CNPC exclusive drilling rights to over
40,000 square miles near the city of Bor.
(WSJ, 12/20/99, p.A22)
1999 Jul 12, It was reported
that heavy fighting had left 150,000 people without food after they
fled their homes.
(WSJ, 7/12/99, p.A1)
1999 Jul 14, The Sudanese
government banned aid flights to Western Upper Nile province where 2
factions allied to the government were fighting for control of oil
fields. This soon put 150,000 people to face starvation.
(SFC, 7/29/99, p.A16)
1999 Jul 27, The US eased
sanctions against Iran, Libya and Sudan to allow the sale of food,
medicine and medical equipment.
(SFC, 7/27/99, p.A5)
1999 Aug 4, In Congo at least
518 people, mostly civilians, were killed when Sudanese planes, at
the request of Congo's government, bombed the rebel-held towns of
Makanza and Bogbonga. Sudan denied the charges and Congolese Pres.
Kabila denied responsibility.
(SFC, 8/5/99, p.A12)(SFC, 8/7/99, p.A12)
1999 Aug 30, Southern SPLA
rebels rejected an Egyptian-Libyan peace plan. The rebels held that
conditions put forward in negotiations were not included in the
plan.
(SFC, 8/31/99, p.A13)
1999 cOct 31, 25 Sudanese
fighters were massacred by rival militiamen when they arrived for
talks with Paulino Matep at Benitu
(SFC, 11/4/99, p.A18)
1999 Nov 22, Pres. Bashir
issued several decrees to promote national reconciliation.
(SFC, 11/26/99, p.B4)
1999 Nov 25, Pres. Bashir met
with former prime minister Sadiq al-Mahdi, head of the opposition
Umma Party.
(SFC, 11/26/99, p.B4)
1999 Nov 26, Sudan signed a
peace agreement with the opposition Umma Party in Djibouti to end
the 16-year old civil war.
(SFC, 11/27/99, p.A15)
1999 Nov 29, The rebel Sudan
People's Liberation Army rejected the Djibouti reconciliation
between the government and an exiled opposition group.
(SFC, 11/30/99, p.D3)
1999 Dec 7, An opposition group
summit began in Kampala, Uganda.
(WSJ, 12/8/99, p.A19)
1999 Dec 12, Sudan's Pres. Omar
el-Bashir dissolved parliament, headed by Hassan Turabi, under a
3-month state of emergency. He cited internal and foreign threats.
Parliament had been due to enact new constitutional amendments that
would have taken away the president’s say in the appointment of
provincial governors.
(WSJ, 12/13/99, p.A1)(SFC, 12/14/99, p.A12)(Econ,
6/28/03, p.48)
1999 Sudan created the
Commission for the Elimination of Abductions of Women and Children
to help eliminate slavery.
(SFC, 5/23/02, p.A15)
2000 Jan 24, Pres. Omar
el-Bashir reappointed an entirely new government. He fired 10
ministers, disbanded 2 ministries and appointed 25 new state
governors.
(SFC, 1/25/00, p.A12)
2000 Feb 8, A government plane
bombed the rebel town of Kaouda in the Nuba Mountains and 13
students under age 14 were reported killed.
(SFC, 2/9/00, p.C3)
2000 Feb 24, Some 160 aid
workers began leaving the southern region following a rebel
ultimatum to comply with new terms for aid deliveries or face
expulsion. At least 11 int'l. aid organizations refused demands for
higher taxes and more control.
(SFC, 2/29/00, p.A12)
2000 Mar 1, Government aircraft
bombed a hospital compound in rebel-held territory in Lui. 2 people
were killed and a dozen injured.
(SFC, 3/4/00, p.C1)
2000 May 6, Pres. Omar
el-Bashir dismissed Hassan Turabi as the secretary-general of the
ruling National Congress Party.
(SFC, 5/8/00, p.A13)
2000 Jul 13, In southern Sudan
rebels reported the killing of at least 92 pro-government fighters
of the Murahilin tribe after 2 days of fighting.
(SFC, 7/14/00, p.D2)
2000 Aug 23, A boat capsized on
the Blue Nile near Sinja and 35 people, mostly schoolchildren, died.
(SFC, 8/25/00, p.D8)
2000 Dec 8, In Garaffa, Sudan,
Abbas al-Baqer Abbas opened fire at the al-Sunna al-Mohammediya
Mosque and killed 20 people. 40 others were wounded and police
killed Abbas, a member of the Takfir wal Hijra militant Islamic
group.
(SFC, 12/9/00, p.A18)(SSFC, 12/10/00, p.A28)
2000 Dec 18, It was reported
that some 3.2 million people faced serious food and water shortages
due to the civil war and drought.
(SFC, 12/18/00, p.E6)
2000 Dec 29, Gen. Omar
el-Bashir was declared the winner in elections marred by an
opposition boycott. Civil war prevented voting in 3 of the 26
provinces.
(SFC, 12/30/00, p.A10)
2000 The Caine Prize for
African Writing, named in memory of the late Sir Michael Harris
Caine (1927-1999), was first awarded to Leila Aboulela (b.1964) of
Sudan at the Zimbabwe International Book Fair 2000 in Harare. Caine
was a former Chairman of Booker plc., Chairman of Africa 95, and
Chairman of the Booker Prize management committee for almost 25
years.
(www.caineprize.com/about.php)
2000 The “Black Book” document
began circulating among Sudanese rebels cataloguing how a handful of
people from 3 Arab tribes had grabbed most of the power in Sudan.
(Econ, 8/28/04, p.40)
2001 Jan 17, In Sudan some
30,000 people fled rebel-held regions in the Numa Mountains.
(SFC, 1/18/01, p.A16)
2001 Jan, Rebels attacked an
oil drilling derrick owned by China’s Great Wall Drilling Co. and 3
soldiers were killed along with 15 rebels.
(SFC, 6/13/01, p.D3)
2001 Feb 20, Hassan Turabi,
Sudan’s top Islamic theologian and former parliamentary speaker,
called for the Sudanese to rise against the government of Omar
el-Bashir. He was arrested the next day.
(SFC, 2/23/01, p.A20)
2001 Mar 8, In southern Sudan
dozens of gunmen attacked and looted an aid agency. 4 workers were
killed and 2 were kidnapped.
(SFC, 3/13/01, p.A18)
2001 Apr 4, Col. Ibrahim
Shamsul-Din, deputy defense minister, and 13 other high ranking
military officers were killed as their Antonov plane crashed on
takeoff in Adaril.
(SFC, 4/5/01, p.A11)
2001 May 9, In southern Sudan a
Red Cross plane was shot and its co-pilot, Dane Ole Friis Eriksen,
was killed. The plane managed to land in Kenya.
(SFC, 5/10/01, p.C5)
2001 May 24, The government
planned to halt air strikes against rebels in the south May 25 in an
effort to reach a cease-fire.
(SFC, 5/25/01, p.D6)
2001 May 27, Sec. of State
Colin Powell stopped in Uganda and urged the government of Sudan to
halt bombing in southern towns and to stop interfering with the
delivery of emergency assistance to victims of drought and war.
(SFC, 5/28/01, p.B12)
2001 The US House voted (422-2)
to forbid foreign oil companies doing business in Sudan from selling
securities in the US.
(SFC, 6/14/01, p.C3)
2001 Aug 29, In Sudan the UN
reported that 3,480 child soldiers had been sent back to their
southern homes following 6 months of retraining. 4,000 more children
were expected to transition out of the Sudan People’s Liberation
Army over the next 18 months.
(SFC, 8/30/01, p.A12)
2001 Sep 6, Pres. Bush named
John Danforth as a special envoy to broker a peace agreement in
Sudan’s civil war.
(SFC, 9/7/01, p.A14)
2001 Sep 26, Sudan began
rounding up extremists that have used the country as an operating
base.
(SFC, 9/27/01, p.A8)
2001 Sep 28, The UN Security
Council lifted sanctions against Sudan after the US abstained from
voting.
(SFC, 9/29/01, p.A10)
2001 Nov 1, Pres. Bush extended
sanctions against Sudan for one year.
(SFC, 11/2/01, p.D5)
2002 Feb 20, In Sudan a
government helicopter gunship attacked civilians waiting for food at
a UN site and at least 17 people were killed. The US suspended peace
efforts following the attack.
(SFC, 2/22/02, p.A13)
2002 Feb, Sudan arrested 9
terrorists including Anas al-Liby, a senior al Qaeda operative.
(SFC, 3/19/02, p.A9)
2002 Mar, Uganda and the
Sudanese government in Khartoum reached an agreement to allow forces
into southern Sudan.
(SFC, 5/16/02, p.A11)
2002 Mar, Ugandan forces in
"Operation Iron Fist" pursued the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) into
southern Sudan, where the rebels killed at least 470 villagers.
(WSJ, 5/13/02, p.A1)(SFC, 5/16/02, p.A11)
2002 Apr 20, Sudanese
government forces began a major offensive against 3 southern
provinces to oust the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army. Rebels
said hundreds of thousands of people were displaced.
(SFC, 4/24/02, p.A)
2002 Apr, Uganda and Sudan
restored diplomatic relations.
(SFC, 5/16/02, p.A11)
2002 May 22, A US-led int’l.
commission condemned the Sudanese government for allowing slavery to
flourish. Bondage to pay off debts still existed.
(SFC, 5/23/02, p.A15)
2002 May, William Luk opened a
bookshop in Rumbek, the capital of Sudan's Bahr el-Ghazal province.
It was believed to be the only bookshop in southern Sudan.
(Econ, 1/31/04, p.48)
2002 Jun 6, Ugandan troops
killed 67 rebels in a battle inside southern Sudan as part of a
continuing offensive to wipe out the 15-year old rebel group.
(AP, 6/6/02)
2002 Jun 27, In Khartoum,
Sudan, representatives of 57 Muslim nations pledged support for
Palestinians in a resolution that made no mention of President
Bush's call for Palestinians to elect a new leadership. In 21 months
of violence, 1,739 people have been killed on the Palestinian side
and 564 people on the Israeli side.
(AP, 6/27/02)
2002 Jul 20, Sudan signed a
peace deal with southern rebels in Kenya.
(WSJ, 7/22/02, p.A1)
2002 Jul 29, Sudanese
government-backed forces killed a foreign aid worker and abducted
three others in an oil-rich area of Sudan. A rebel leader said the
government killed some 1,000 civilians in a separate attack in the
same region.
(AP, 7/30/02)
2002 Jul 31, Sudanese rebels
claimed that government troops using bombers and helicopter gunships
attacked areas of a town in Sudan's oil-producing Western Upper Nile
Province.
(AP, 7/31/02)
2002 Aug 27, In Sudan more
members of the opposition Popular National Congress, including two
former government ministers, were arrested on suspicion of creating
"instability."
(AP, 8/28/02)
2002 Sep 2, The Sudanese
government suspended peace talks with southern rebels because of the
rebel takeover of Torit.
(AP, 9/2/02)
2002 Sep 27, In Sudan a thunder
storm killed 26 people in two separate accidents in Khartoum when a
Ferris wheel collapsed and a pleasure boat sank.
(AP, 9/28/02)
2002 Sep 29, A Saudi prince
signed deals worth $330 million to export Sudanese livestock and
build a five-star hotel in Sudan's capital.
(AP, 9/29/02)
2002 Oct 4, Regional mediators
said the Sudanese government and southern rebels have agreed to a
cessation of hostilities and the resumption of peace talks to end
the country's 15-year civil war.
(AP, 10/4/02)
2002 Oct 12, It was reported
that 164,000 Eritrean refugees had begun returning home from camps
in Sudan. Some 60,000 had already returned since 2001.
(SFC, 10/12/02, p.A10)
2002 Oct 15, Sudan's government
signed an agreement with rebels to suspend fighting during talks to
end their 20-year-old war.
(AP, 10/15/02)
2002 Oct 20, Sudan's government
lifted a ban on relief flights to the southern Equatoria region
after it signed a cease-fire with southern rebels.
(AP, 10/20/02)
2002 Dec 18, In Sudan a bus
crashed and burst into flames after hitting a hole on an
ill-maintained highway known as "the road of death," killing 30
people.
(AP, 12/19/02)
2002 In Sudan the
Machakos Protocol outlined steps necessary to achieve peace.
(WSJ, 10/22/03, p.A4)
2002 The Sudan Peace Act
threatened a series of US diplomatic actions against Sudan’s
Islamist regime if it did not end its civil war against Christian
and animist tribes in the south.
(WSJ, 5/26/04, p.A1)
2003 Feb, War flared up in
Sudan’s northwestern region of Darfur.
(Econ, 1/10/04, p.42)
2003 Mar, Fighting broke out
in the Darfur region of western Sudan between Government forces and
rebels from the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) and the Justice and
Equality Movement (JEM).
(www.un.org/News/dh/dev/scripts/darfur_formatted.htm)
2003 Apr, Sudan accused Eritrea
of supporting Sudanese rebels in the eastern part of Sudan.
(www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/hornafrica.html#eri)
2003 Apr, Refugees begin
arriving in eastern Chad to escape the conflict. Large numbers of
civilians become internally displaced people (IDPs) within Darfur.
(www.un.org/News/dh/dev/scripts/darfur_formatted.htm)
2003 Jul 8, A Sudanese airliner
crashed minutes after its captain reported technical problems
following takeoff, killing 116 people. The only survivor was a
2-year-old boy.
(AP, 7/8/03)
2003 Jul 11, In western Sudan
about 30 rebels and an undisclosed number of government troops were
killed during fighting near the border with Chad.
(AP, 7/13/03)
2003 Sep 4, The SLA and the
Sudanese government reach ceasefire agreement, but both sides soon
accuse the other of breaking it.
(www.un.org/News/dh/dev/scripts/darfur_formatted.htm)
2003 Sep 17, Tom Eric Vraalsen,
Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s Special Envoy for Humanitarian
Affairs in Sudan, announces the Greater Darfur Initiative, appealing
for $23 million to help those most in need.
(www.un.org/News/dh/dev/scripts/darfur_formatted.htm)
2003 Sep 25, Sudan's government
and main rebel group signed an agreement on security arrangements
for a six-year political transition in efforts to end their 20-year
civil war.
(AP, 9/26/03)
2003 Sep 27, An illness called
"nodding disease" was reported among children in southern Sudan. It
caused victims to convulse with sharp nods of the head while eating
or exposed to unusually cold conditions.
(SFC, 9/27/03, p.A28)
2003 Sep, Refugee numbers in
Chad reach 65,000. UN agencies estimate at least 500,000 people in
Darfur need humanitarian aid.
(www.un.org/News/dh/dev/scripts/darfur_formatted.htm)
2003 Oct 13, In Sudan, Hassan
Turabi, hard-line Islamic leader and top opposition figure, was
pardoned after more than 2 years under house arrest as part of a
release of political prisoners.
(AP, 10/13/03)
2003 cOct 18, In western Sudan
9 commercial hauling workers were killed during clashes between
warring tribes. Recent fighting in Darfur had created more than
600,000 refugees.
(AP, 10/26/03)(AP, 10/28/03)
2003 Oct 28, In western Sudan a
helicopter transporting troops crashed, killing 19 members of the
armed forces and a university student.
(AP, 10/29/03)
2003 Nov 1, It was reported
that central Sudan was experiencing its worst grasshopper attack in
3 decades. At least 11 people died and more than 16,000 were
hospitalized with a respiratory illness doctors link to an annual
locust invasion.
(SFC, 11/1/03, p.A8)(AP, 11/2/03)
2003 Dec 6, Sudan's vice
president and the leader of rebels fighting a 20-year civil war
resumed their talks on a comprehensive peace deal, boosted by a
landmark visit by rebels to the capital, Khartoum.
(AP, 12/6/03)
2003 Dec 21, The Sudan
government and rebels have moved a step closer to ending their
20-year civil war after agreeing on how to divide the country's oil
revenue.
(AP, 12/21/03)
2003 In Sudan a study indicated
that AIDS had infected about 1.6% of the population. By 2009 the
number was estimated to be approaching 3%.
(Econ, 7/4/09, p.42)
2003-2006 The Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) appeared
in the Darfur region. It consisted largely of members of the Zaghawa
tribe. Soon after the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) sprang up.
In response the government unleashed the janjaweed, an Arab militia
with ranks swollen by ex-criminals. By 2006 as many as 300,000
civilians were killed in the Darfur region.
(Econ, 5/15/04, p.22)(Econ, 8/28/04, p.40)(Econ,
5/13/06, p.14)
2003 Plumpy’nut, a peanut paste
developed in France in 1997, was 1st used on a large scale in
Sudan’s Darfur region to alleviate hunger.
(Econ, 11/5/05, p.51)
2004 Jan 6, The Sudanese
government and southern rebels agreed on how to share the country's
wealth, including oil revenues, solving a key issue and taking a
major step toward ending their 20-year conflict.
(AP, 1/6/04)
2004 Jan 26, Sudanese planes
dropped bombs in western Sudan, sending hundreds of people fleeing
across the border into Chad where aid workers scrambled to provide
them food and shelter in the barren desert.
(AP, 1/27/04)
2004 Feb 11, Sudan
government-backed militias reportedly attacked five villages in
southern Darfur region, killing between 68 and 80 civilians.
"Amnesty International continued to receive details of horrifying
attacks against civilians in villages by government warplanes,
soldiers and government-aligned militia."
(AP, 2/18/04)
2004 Feb 17, UN agencies began
urgently airlifting relief supplies into eastern Chad and western
Sudan to help more than 600,000 Sudanese lacking food, water and
medical supplies because of fighting.
(AP, 2/17/04)
2004 Feb 27, Sudanese
government forces launched a series of raids on western villages,
killing at least 70 civilians and forcing tens of thousands to flee.
(AP, 2/28/04)
2004 Mar 19, A senior U.N.
official said that fighting in western Sudan has intensified in
recent weeks, accusing Arab militia of systematically attacking
villages and raping women.
(AP, 3/19/04)
2004 Mar 31, In Sudan security
police detained Hassan Turabi, the leading Islamic opposition
leader, 3 days after members of his party were accused of conspiring
to topple the government.
(AP, 3/31/04)
2004 Apr 8, The Sudanese
government signed a cease-fire with rebels in the western Darfur
region.
(SFC, 4/9/04, p.A2)
2004 Apr 18, The UN reported
that at least 50,000 people have fled their homes in recent weeks
because of militia attacks and fighting between Sudanese government
and rebel forces in southern Sudan.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 21, Refugees in Chad
reported that Sudanese and Arab militias were conducting a "reign of
terror" to push blacks out of western Sudan.
(WSJ, 4/22/04, p.A1)
2004 May 4, The United States
walked out of a U.N. meeting to protest its decision minutes later
to give Sudan a third term on the Human Rights Commission.
(AP, 5/4/05)
2004 May 22, Arab militiamen
killed at least 56 people in a raid in western Sudan, just days
after the government declared the troubled region was stable.
(AP, 5/24/04)
2004 May 24, The WHO confirmed
an outbreak of the deadly ebola virus has killed four people in
south Sudan.
(AFP, 5/24/04)
2004 May 25, Sudanese officials
said the government has reached an agreement with rebels on issues
that have stalled talks to end the 21-year-old war, clearing the way
for a comprehensive peace deal. The talks in Naivasha, 60 miles west
of Nairobi, do not involve insurgents fighting a 15-month rebellion
in the Darfur region of western Sudan.
(AP, 5/25/04)
2004 May 26, Sudanese VP Ali
Osman Taha and John Garang, SPLA southern rebel leader, signed
protocols to pave the way for a comprehensive deal.
(AP, 5/27/04)(Econ, 5/29/04, p.14)
2004 May 26, The U.N. Security
Council called for the immediate deployment of international
monitors to Sudan's western Darfur region and put new pressure on
the country's government to end a conflict there.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 27, Relief workers
were racing against the clock to keep hundreds of thousands of
people from dying in Sudan's western Darfur region, in what has
become the biggest humanitarian crisis of "our age."
(AP, 5/27/04)
2004 May 28, The Sudanese
government and rebels from Darfur agreed that the first
international observers of a fragile ceasefire would deploy there
next week. Villagers in west Sudan said Sudanese aircraft bombed
their village and killed at least 11 people.
(AP, 5/28/04)(Reuters, 5/29/04)
2004 Jun 8, Britain planned to
give an extra 15 million pounds (27 million dollars) in relief aid
to Sudan's crisis-hit Darfur region.
(AFP, 6/8/04)
2004 Jun 14, UN humanitarian
chief Jan Egeland criticized the Sudanese government for blocking
aid workers, food and equipment from reaching the Darfur region.
(AP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 17, A Chad military
official said Arab militias, known as Janjawids, fought Chadian
troops in Birak, a locality inside Chad about 10 miles (six
kilometers) from the border with western Sudan. 69 Janjawids
militiamen were killed and two taken prisoner in the fighting. He
did not give figures for any losses among Chadian troops.
(AP, 6/17/04)
2004 Jun 19, Sudanese President
Omar Hassan al-Bashir ordered "complete mobilization" to disarm all
illegal armed groups in the western region of Darfur, including the
Arab militias who have been harassing African villagers.
(AP, 6/19/04)
2004 Jun 25-2004 Jun 27,
Ugandan rebels (LRA) in southern Sudan unleashed a two-day campaign
of arson, looting and murder, killing 100 villagers and forcing
15,000 others to flee their homes.
(AP, 7/9/04)
2004 Jun 26, Rebels from
Sudan's remote Darfur demanded the imposition of a military no-fly
zone, free access for aid workers and war crimes trials for Arab
militias who have looted and burned throughout the region.
(AP, 6/26/04)
2004 Jun 27, Saudi Arabia
dispatched two planeloads of aid to Sudan's war-torn western region
of Darfur.
(AFP, 6/27/04)
2004 Jul 1, The United Nation's
World Food Program (WFP) began airlifting enriched food from the
Ethiopian capital to Sudan's western Darfur region, where it
estimates 1.2 million people will need food aid every month until
October. UN Sec. Gen’l. Kofi Annan visited the area.
(AFP, 7/2/04)(WSJ, 7/2/04, p.A1)
2004 Jul 3, Sudan pledged to
disarm Arab militias, known as Janjaweed.
(Reuters, 7/3/04)
2004 Jul 6, Sudan ordered an
end to restrictions on the movement of aid to the Darfur region.
(WSJ, 7/7/04, p.A1)
2004 Jul 7, It was reported
that fighting between Arab and African tribes has killed at least 70
people and displaced thousands more this week in the Darfur region
of western Sudan.
(Reuters, 7/7/04)
2004 Jul 10, Sudan, under
international pressure to take action to end the humanitarian crisis
in Darfur, agreed with Chad to deploy a joint force along their
troubled border.
(AFP, 7/11/04)
2004 Jul 17, Sudanese rebels
walked out of peace talks, saying government representatives had
refused to meet their conditions for a new round of negotiations.
(AP, 7/17/04)
2004 Jul 23, Leaders from the 2
main rebel groups in Sudan's western Darfur region agreed to
participate in "substantive negotiations" for a political solution
to the humanitarian crisis.
(AP, 7/24/04)
2004 Jul 24, It was reported
that rebels fighting an 18-year insurgency in northern Uganda have
killed at least 42 civilians in southern Sudan in the past week.
(AP, 7/24/04)
2004 Jul 25, Central African
Republic President Francois Bozize wrapped up a two-day visit to
Sudan with a pledge to help his Sudanese counterpart Omar al-Beshir
resolve the crisis in the western Darfur region.
(AFP, 7/25/04)
2004 Jul 28, The Ugandan army
reportedly killed 120 rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) fighters
during clashes in southern Sudan and narrowly missed capturing
Joseph Kony, the insurgents' leader.
(AP, 7/29/04)
2004 Aug 1, The Sudanese
cabinet condemned the 30-day deadline for action on Darfur set by
the U.N. Security Council, but said it would implement a 90-day
program agreed earlier with U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan.
(AP, 8/1/04)
2004
Aug 3, A Sudanese official and Arab tribal leader said rebels
masquerading as Arab militia have killed 28 Arab tribesman in
attacks in western Sudan over the last week.
(AP, 8/4/03)
2004 Aug 2, The UN began
air-dropping food for refugees in Darfur, Sudan.
(WSJ, 8/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Aug 13, The first elements
of a 300-strong African Union protection force left Kigali, Rwanda,
for Sudan's troubled region of Darfur, Sudan.
(AP, 8/14/04)
2004 Aug 19, It was reported
that the Darfur refugee count in western Sudan had reached 11.2
million.
(WSJ, 8/19/04, p.A1)
2004 Aug 21, Sudan signed an
agreement to ensure the voluntary return of more than one million
people displaced by fighting in the Darfur region and said it was
giving Darfuris more say in local government.
(AP, 8/21/04)
2004 Aug 22, Sudan said it
would reduce paramilitary forces in Darfur by 30 percent to try to
ease tensions in the western region.
(AP, 8/22/04)
2004 Aug 24, The International
Committee of the Red Cross said it was mounting a major airlift of
relief supplies to Sudan's troubled Darfur region.
(AP, 8/24/04)
2004 Aug 25, Sudan said it had
closed its embassy in Washington after being unable to find a bank
that would handle its financial matters.
(AP, 8/26/04)
2004 Aug 29, The UN Security
Council set this date for Sudan to stop the killing in Darfur, allow
help to reach the region and disarm the militias terrorizing the
region.
(Econ, 8/28/04, p.39)
2004 Aug 31, The Sudanese
government said rebels in Darfur had kidnapped 22 health workers in
the strife-torn region, following the abduction of eight Sudanese
nationals working for international aid groups.
(AFP, 8/31/04)
2004 Sep 1, Rebels released six
Sudanese aid workers in Darfur, four days after they went missing
during a trip to register refugees.
(AP, 9/1/04)
2004 Sep 1, A U.N. report
called for a quick increase in the international monitoring force in
Sudan, saying the government has not stopped attacks against
civilians or disarmed marauding militias.
(AP, 9/1/04)
2004 Sep 5, London’s Sunday
Times reported that John Knight, a millionaire British arms dealer,
is reportedly fuelling a bloody civil war in Sudan by arranging to
supply its government with tanks, rocket launchers and a cruise
missile.
(AP, 9/5/04)
2004 Sep 10, Canada said it was
donating one million dollars (770,000 US) to United Nations efforts
to pacify strife-torn Darfur in western Sudan.
(AFP, 9/11/04)
2004 Sep 14, A UN World Health
report said 6-10 thousand people were dying from disease and
violence in Sudan’s Darfur region.
(SFC, 9/15/04, p.A3)
2004 Sep 15, A rebel faction
said peace talks with the Sudanese government and rebels from the
troubled Darfur region collapsed after three weeks without an
accord.
(AP, 9/15/04)
2004 Sep 18, A divided UN
Security Council approved a resolution threatening oil sanctions
against Sudan unless the government reins in Arab militias blamed
for a killing spree in Darfur and ordered an investigation of
whether the attacks constitute genocide.
(AP, 9/19/04)
2004 Sep 18, Ugandan helicopter
gunships and ground troops attacked a rebel hideout in southern
Sudan, killing at least 25 insurgents and capturing seven others.
(AP, 9/19/04)
2004 Sep 24, The UN High
Commissioner for Refugees proposed autonomy for the troubled Darfur
region of Sudan. The government has resisted this but said it would
be willing to discuss it anew in an effort to end the violence that
has killed 50,000 people.
(CP, 9/24/04)
2004 Sep 25, Sudanese
authorities accused an opposition party of plotting to kill more
than three dozen senior government officials and blow up key sites
in the capital.
(AP, 9/25/04)
2004 Sep 30, Sudan's foreign
minister pledged to allow more African troops and police to help end
the conflict in Darfur, responding to international demands for
action to protect civilians.
(AP, 10/1/04)
2004 Oct 4, Iranian President
Mohammad Khatami arrived in Khartoum to start a three-day visit to
Sudan.
(AP, 10/4/04)
2004 Oct 5, A Russian cargo
plane crashed in war-ravaged southern Sudan, killing all four people
onboard.
(AP, 10/6/04)
2004 Oct 6, Sudan's U.N.
ambassador challenged the US to send troops to the Darfur region if
it really believes a genocide is taking place.
(AP, 10/6/04)
2004 Oct 19, The International
Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said villages throughout Sudan's
Darfur region face an "unprecedented food crisis," worse than the
threat of famine in recent decades.
(Reuters, 10/19/04)
2004 Oct 21, Negotiations
between the Sudanese government and the National Democratic Alliance
(NDA), an umbrella organization for opposition groups from around
Sudan, opened in Cairo under the auspices of Egypt.
(AP, 10/23/04)
2004 Oct 22, The EU said its
member states will contribute $125 million to an African Union (AU)
force in Sudan's troubled Darfur region.
(AP, 10/23/04)
2004 Oct 26, In Nigeria a 2nd
day of peace talks on the crisis in Sudan's Darfur region broke off
after rebels called for more time to prepare proposals for a
long-term political resolution to the conflict.
(AP, 10/26/04)
2004 Oct 28, A contingent of 50
Nigerian soldiers arrived in Darfur, Sudan, aboard a US military
plane, the first of 3,000 extra African Union troops deployed to
monitor a shaky cease-fire.
(AP, 10/29/04)
2004 Oct 29, Sudanese rebel
leaders demanded that Islam be kept out of government in the war
torn region of Darfur.
(AP, 10/29/04)
2004 Oct 30, Rwandan troops
arrived in Sudan's remote Darfur region to join Nigerian soldiers
monitoring a shaky cease-fire in the country's troubled west.
(AP, 10/31/04)
2004 Nov 9, Sudan's government
and rebels agreed to sign fresh accords meant to stop hostilities in
Darfur.
(AP, 11/9/04)
2004 Nov 10, Sudanese police
raided a camp in Darfur for the second time this month, destroying
makeshift homes, firing into the air and shouting at terrified
villagers.
(AP, 11/11/04)
2004 Nov 16, Darfur rebels from
the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) handed over 20 prisoners of war to
the African Union (AU).
(Reuters, 11/16/04)
2004 Nov 19, Rebel officials
and the Sudanese government committed themselves to ending the
21-year civil war in southern Sudan before January, signing an
agreement at a special meeting of the UN Security Council in Kenya.
(AP, 11/19/04)
2004 Nov 22, Fighting near a
village in Sudan's crisis-plagued Darfur region killed at least 17
people, while helicopters rescued dozens of workers who fled into
the bush.
(AP, 11/22/04)
2004 Nov 25, The UN World Food
Program said it has suspended its operations in most of the Sudanese
state of North Darfur and relocated its staff to the capital due to
renewed clashes between rebels and government forces.
(AP, 11/25/04)
2004 Nov 26, Sudan's
pro-government Janjaweed militia killed 16 people in a western
village in the troubled Darfur region.
(AP, 11/27/04)
2004 Nov 27, In Sudan armed
tribesmen attacked and looted four villages, killing at least 15
civilians near the Darfur town of Kossa Hill.
(AP, 12/1/04)
2004 Nov 29, The Sudanese
government declared the representatives of two British humanitarian
organizations persona non-grata and gave them 48 hours to leave the
country.
(AP, 11/29/04)
2004 Dec 13, In Nigeria the
first face-to-face working meeting between Sudan government and
Darfur rebel negotiators began. Cease-fire violations were on the
rise in Sudan's bloodied Darfur region and the fighting was
"poisoning" peace talks.
(AP, 12/13/04)
2004 Dec 13, The UN restricted
its humanitarian operations in Sudan's troubled South Darfur area
following a shooting that killed two aid workers. Rebels said they
would boycott peace talks until the government stops a Darfur
offensive.
(AP, 12/14/04)(WSJ, 12/14/04, p.A1)
2004 Dec 16, The Sudanese
government agreed to stop a military offensive in Darfur region.
(AP, 12/16/04)
2004 Dec 18, The African Union
said Sudan had started withdrawing troops in Darfur ahead of an
evening deadline to end fighting there, but Khartoum said the
pullout was conditional on the rebels halting attacks.
(AP, 12/18/04)
2004 Dec 18, Sudan's government
kept up attacks on rebels in Darfur, defying a deadline set by
African Union mediators for an end to active hostilities.
(AP, 12/19/04)
2004 Dec 21, Sudan's government
and Darfur rebels agreed to formally end faltering talks. The
African Union urged both sides to stop fighting so peace efforts
could resume in January. Save the Children UK is pulling out of the
Darfur region of Sudan because four of its workers have been killed
there.
(AP, 12/21/04)
2004 Dec 25, The Sudanese
government said it has readied 13 planes for fighting swarms of
desert locusts, poised to enter the country from Egypt.
(AP, 12/25/04)
2004 Dec 26, The Independent
reported that British PM Tony Blair has ordered the military to
prepare to deploy up to 3,000 soldiers to the conflict-torn Sudanese
region of Darfur.
(AP, 12/26/04)
2004 Dec 27, In western Sudan
rebel forces attacked the market town of Ghubaysh and the government
retaliated. The UN World Food Program suspended food convoys to the
Darfur region following the attacks.
(AP, 12/29/04)
2004 Dec 31, Sudanese
government and southern rebel officials signed landmark deals on how
to implement a series of agreements on ending a 21-year civil war in
southern Sudan.
(AP, 12/31/04)
2004 Dec, Under a proposed
peace deal rebel leader John Garang (SPLA) would become
vice-president of a federal Sudan and allow southerners to vote for
independence in 6.5 years.
(Econ, 12/11/04, p.45)
2004 Dec, A 3-day attack by
Sudan’s government-sponsored militiamen left 32 people dead in the
village of Um Seifa.
(Econ, 4/2/05, p.41)
2004 The documentary film “Lost
Boys of Sudan” was first broadcast on PBS. It follows two Sudanese
refugees, made homeless by civil war in 1987, on an extraordinary
journey from Africa to America.
(www.lostboysfilm.com/about.html)(SFC, 5/28/08,
p.B5)
2004 In Sudan the Eastern Front
was set up as an alliance between 2 eastern tribal rebel groups, the
Rashaida tribe’s Free Lions and the Beja Congress. They were later
joined by the Darfuri’s Justice and Equality Movement (JEM). Eastern
Front’s bases in Eritrea were clearly abetted by the government of
Eritrea.
(Econ, 10/1/05, p.53)
2004 Dr. Halima Bashir (24) was
gang-raped by Sudanese soldiers after speaking out about atrocities
in Darfur. She told UN workers about the attack by the Janjaweed
militia. The military came after her. She was cut with knives,
burned with cigarettes and gang-raped repeatedly. They let her live,
taunting her with the words: "Now you can go and tell the world
about rape." She wrote about her experiences in her memoir, "Tears
of the Desert" (2008).
(Reuters, 10/6/10)
2004 China invested almost $150
million in Sudan this year.
(Econ, 10/28/06, p.54)
2005 Jan 8, Nigerian President
Olusegun Obasanjo flew to Sudan's troubled Darfur region to assess
the crisis there following talks with his Sudanese counterpart Omar
al-Beshir.
(AP, 1/8/05)
2005 Jan 9, Sudan's VP Ali
Osman Mohammed Taha and John Garang, the country's main rebel
leader, signed the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) to end
Africa's longest-running conflict. The treaty said: The 10 states in
southern Sudan will be secular, while the north will practice
Islamic law; Former rebels will hold 30 percent of national posts,
the south will be autonomous; Oil revenues from the south will be
split 50-50 between the north and south: The south will vote on
independence in 2011; UN observers will monitor a cease-fire and
demobilization of troops.
(AP, 1/9/05)(AP, 1/10/05)(Econ, 12/3/05, p.24)
2005 Jan 11, Fighting raged on
in Sudan's western Darfur region where despite a peace accord ending
a separate conflict in southern Sudan.
(AP, 1/12/05)
2005 Jan 16, The Sudanese
government and an alliance of opposition groups reached a tentative
agreement on Sudan's political future that builds on a peace accord
already signed with southern rebels.
(Reuters, 1/16/05)
2005 Jan 22, South Sudan leader
John Garang arrived in his southern bastion for the first time since
a peace accord ended Africa's longest-running civil war.
(Reuters, 1/22/05)
2005 Jan 26, The Sudanese air
force bombed villagers in South Darfur, observers from the African
Union reported, and an international aid organization said
casualties were inflicted. The UN said renewed fighting in Sudan's
Darfur region may have killed up to 105 civilians and displaced more
than 9,000 last week.
(AP, 1/26/05)
2005 Jan 29, In Sudan police
clashed with rioting tribesmen in the Red Sea coastal city of Port
Sudan, leaving at least 17 people dead and 16 injured. A tribal
representative claimed 23 people were dead and 100 others were
wounded.
(AP, 1/29/05)(Econ, 10/1/05, p.43)
2005 Jan 31, A UN-appointed
commission accused the Sudanese government of gross, systematic
human rights violations in Darfur, but stopped short of labeling the
violence in the region as genocide.
(AP, 1/31/05)
2005 Feb 3, In Sudan the pilot
of a cargo plane that was losing altitude steered away from a
built-up area and crashed in open space outside Khartoum, killing 7
crew members.
(AP, 2/3/05)
2005 Feb 3, The Kremlin said
President Vladimir Putin has signed a resolution that would have
Russian troops join a proposed U.N. peacekeeping operation in Sudan.
(AP, 2/3/05)
2005 Feb 4, A Swiss-based group
said Arab tribes in northern Sudan have freed 880 slaves during the
past two weeks and allowed them to returned to southern Sudan.
(AP, 2/4/05)
2005 Feb 9, Sudanese Aviation
Minister Ali Tamim Fartak said European aviation consortium Airbus
Industrie has cancelled the 45-million dollar debt owed to it by
Sudan Airways.
(AFP, 2/9/05)
2005 Feb 16, In Sudan 6 tribal
leaders in a southern Darfur area agreed to cease attacks against
each other and drop all claims for blood money for past assaults on
tribesmen.
(AP, 2/17/05)
2005 Feb 19, Libyan leader
Moamer Kadhafi and Egyptian Pres. Hosni Mubarak backed an African
solution to the crisis in Sudan's Darfur region during 2 rounds of
talks in Cairo.
(AFP, 2/19/05)
2005 Feb 20, In Sudan Sheik
Abdul-Rahim al-Buraei (82), a top Sufi Islamic cleric who wrote
mystical poems and helped peace efforts, died.
(AP, 2/21/05)
2005 Feb 23, In Sudan an
explosion at an ammunition dump in the southern town of Juba killed
24 people.
(Reuters, 2/23/05)
2005 Feb 28, African Union (AU)
chairman, Nigeria's President Olusegun Obasanjo, met Sudan's first
vice president Ali Taha over the bloody crisis in Darfur region.
(AFP, 2/28/05)
2005 Mar 4, Tribes from western
Sudan and the neighboring Central African Republic signed a peace
charter in a bid to end cross-border clashes.
(AFP, 3/4/05)
2005 Mar 9, Jan Egeland, UN
humanitarian chief, said far more people have died in Sudan's
ravaged Darfur region than the 70,000 reported since last year, and
many of those deaths were from preventable causes like pneumonia and
diarrhea. Egeland said some 180,000 people died in Darfur over the
past 18 months from hunger and disease.
(AP, 3/9/05)(Econ, 4/2/05, p.41)
2005 Mar 14, Experts said
poachers are killing between 6,000 and 12,000 elephants a year to
supply illegal ivory markets in Sudan to meet growing Chinese
demand. Most of the elephants are killed in southern Sudan, Congo
and the Central African Republic, with some ivory also coming from
Kenya and Chad.
(AP, 3/14/05)
2005 Mar 23, France presented a
U.N. resolution allowing for the prosecution of Sudanese war crimes
suspects at the International Criminal Court, forcing the US to
choose between accepting a body it opposes or casting a politically
damaging veto.
(AP, 3/23/05)
2005 Mar 25, The UN Security
Council voted to send 10,700 peacekeepers to Sudan to monitor a
peace deal ending a 21-year-civil war.
(AP, 3/25/05)
2005 Mar 28, Sudanese
authorities said they had detained 14 people on suspicion of crimes,
including rape and murder, committed in the war-ravaged western
region of Darfur.
(AFP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 29, The UN Security
Council ordered the Sudanese government to inform the UN before
sending any more weapons to Darfur.
(Econ, 4/2/05, p.42)
2005 Mar 31, After weeks of
often bitter negotiations, the UN Security Council approved a
resolution to refer Sudanese war crimes suspects to the
International Criminal Court, agreeing to major concessions demanded
by United States.
(AP, 4/1/05)
2005 Apr 5, Tens of thousands
of Sudanese marched through the capital Khartoum against a UN
resolution referring war crime suspects to the International
Criminal Court.
(AP, 4/5/05)
2005 Apr 5, The UN handed
prosecutors from the International Criminal Court thousands of
documents and a list of 51 people to be investigated for alleged war
crimes in Sudan's conflict-wracked Darfur region.
(AP, 4/6/05)(Econ, 4/9/05, p.38)
2005 Apr 6, Security forces
stormed the headquarters of Sudan's main opposition party, arresting
scores of its members and top officials, apparently because of
celebrations marking an anti-government uprising nearly 20 years
ago.
(AP, 4/6/05)
2005 Apr 8, The World Food
Program said food rations will be cut for more than one million
Darfuris who have fled fighting to makeshift camps in the region
because of a drastic shortage of funds.
(Reuters, 4/8/05)
2005 Apr 12, Donors exceeded
Sudan's aid requests by pledging $4.5 billion to help it recover
from Africa's longest civil war amid criticism of Khartoum for
failing to halt atrocities in Darfur.
(Reuters, 4/12/05)
2005 Apr 28, The African Union
agreed to more than triple the size of its peacekeeping force in
Sudan's western Darfur region.
(AP, 4/29/05)
2005 Apr 30, Sudanese leaders
began work on drafting an interim constitution expected to seal a
peace deal with the south, but major opposition groups boycotted the
opening session.
(AFP, 4/30/05)
2005 Apr, Sudan and Uganda
mounted their 1st joint military operations against the Lord’s
Resistance Army (LRA).
(Econ, 5/7/05, p.41)
2005 May 7, Canadian Press
reported that Canada will send up to 150 military personnel to Sudan
to help the African Union and a UN mission keep the peace.
(CP, 5/7/05)
2005 May 11, In Sudan's
conflict ridden Darfur region 2 main rebel groups signed a
declaration pledging to adhere to a cease-fire and help facilitate
the flow of humanitarian relief aid.
(AP, 5/11/05)
2005 May 13, The 2 main rebel
groups fighting in Sudan's Darfur region announced they were willing
to resume stalled peace talks, dropping their previous conditions
for new negotiations.
(AP, 5/13/05)
2005 May 13, Canada said it
would go ahead with plans to send military advisors to Sudan's
Darfur region despite Khartoum's insistence that it did not want the
troops to enter the country.
(Reuters, 5/13/05)
2005 May 17, Eritrean President
Issaias Afeworki met with Sudan Pres. Omar al-Beshir in Tripoli,
Libya. Beshir demanded that Eritrea refrain from harboring armed
Sudanese opposition and stops offering assistance to that
opposition.
(AP, 5/17/05)
2005 May 18, In Sudan at least
17 people were killed in clashes between refugees and police in a
squatter area some 10 kilometers (six miles) east of Khartoum.
(AFP, 5/19/05)
2005 May 20, Illinois lawmakers
voted to have the state sell off about $1 billion worth of
investments in companies doing business with Sudan, part of a
nationwide campaign to protest genocide in the African nation.
(AP, 5/20/05)
2005 May 24, NATO Secretary
General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said NATO will offer airlift, training
and other logistics support to African Union (AU) forces struggling
to end the civil war in Sudan's Darfur region.
(AP, 5/24/05)
2005 May 26, International
donors pledged an additional $200 million to fund the African Union
peacekeeping operation in Sudan's western Darfur region during a
conference in Ethiopia to discuss the ongoing violence.
(AP, 5/26/05)
2005 May 28, In Sudan tens of
thousands of chanting refugees lined the muddy streets of Darfur's
largest camp to greet the U.N.'s Kofi Annan, who later listened as
women raped during the conflict told their stories.
(AP, 5/28/05)
2005 May 29, The World
Association of Newspapers' (WAN), meeting in Seoul, awarded veteran
Sudanese journalist Mahgoub Mohamed Salih its 2005 press freedom
award.
(AP, 5/30/05)
2005 May 31, Sudan arrested a
second aid worker from the Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) aid agency
over a report on hundreds of rapes in the troubled Darfur region.
(Reuters, 5/31/05)
2005 Jun 2, In Sudan 5 people
were killed and 16 others injured when a passenger plane crashed
shortly after take-off from Khartoum and caught fire.
(AP, 6/2/05)
2005 Jun 6, The International
Criminal Court at the Hague formally announced the opening of a war
crimes investigation in Sudan's Darfur region after receiving a list
of 51 potential suspects from UN.
(AP, 6/6/05)
2005 Jun 11, A new round of
peace talks on Sudan's Darfur region ran into early problems as
Khartoum's negotiators rejected Eritrean participation, stopping the
first behind-closed-doors plenary session from going ahead.
(Reuters, 6/12/05)
2005 Jun 18, Sudan signed a
reconciliation deal with one of the country's largest opposition
groupings. The accord with the National Democratic Alliance is part
of the government's drive to clean up Sudan's multiple political and
military conflicts.
(AP, 6/18/05)
2005 Jun 19, Eastern Sudanese
rebels launched a major offensive near the country's main port,
capturing government troops in what Khartoum charged was an
operation mounted with the complicity of Eritrea.
(AP, 6/20/05)
2005 Jun 25, Rebels in Sudan's
remote east urged the world's media to come and see damage in
civilian areas that they say was caused by government bombing. They
said the bombing began in the Barka Valley on June 23 and resulted
in a large but unknown number of civilian casualties who filled
hospitals in Port Sudan and the town of Tokar.
(AFP, 6/25/05)
2005 Jun 25, Gov. Rod
Blagojevich signed a new state law that requires Illinois to divest
about $1 billion worth of pension investments in companies that do
business in Sudan to protest the ongoing humanitarian crisis in the
country's Darfur region.
(AP, 6/25/05)
2005 Jun 30, Sudan announced
the imminent end of a 16-year state of emergency across most of the
giant country and began releasing political prisoners, including the
leading Islamic opposition figure.
(AP, 6/30/05)(WSJ, 7/1/05, p.A1)
2005 Jul 5, Sudan and two
Darfur rebel groups signed a "declaration of principles" aimed at
helping bring peace to Darfur, but failed to reach a comprehensive
deal to stop the violence that has left tens of thousands dead.
(AP, 7/6/05)
2005 Jul 6, Sudan's National
Assembly unanimously passed a new constitution that steps away from
complete Islamic rule and paves the way for a Christian former rebel
leader to be inaugurated as first vice president later this week.
(AP, 7/6/05)
2005 Jul 8, John Garang, the
rebel leader in a two-decade civil war for southern autonomy,
returned to Sudan's capital for the first time in 22 years to take
up his new position as first vice president in the government he
once fought.
(AP, 7/8/05)
2005 Jul 9, In Sudan John
Garang, the former rebel leader who spent 21 years fighting
Khartoum's government, was sworn in as first vice president. Garang
and Pres. Omar el-Bashir signed into being Sudan's new constitution.
(AP, 7/9/05)(AP, 7/10/05)
2005 Jul 10, Sudan's new
presidency on Sunday lifted the state of emergency in Sudan, except
in the conflict-torn regions of Darfur and the east.
(Reuters, 7/10/05)
2005 Jul 17, The Sudanese
council of ministers held its last meeting in Khartoum ahead of the
formation of a power-sharing cabinet that will include southern
former rebels.
(AP, 7/17/05)
2005 Jul 19, In his first
decrees as Sudan's No. 2 leader, former rebel chief John Garang
dissolved his guerrilla movement and dismissed all government
officials in 10 southern states.
(AP, 7/19/05)
2005 Jul 21, Sudanese security
officers roughed up members of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's
entourage; Rice demanded and got an apology.
(AP, 7/21/06)
2005 Jul 31, John Garang (60),
Sudan's vice president and former southern rebel leader, died when
the helicopter he was flying in crashed into a mountain in southern
Sudan in bad weather killing him and the other 13 people on board.
(AP, 8/1/05)
2005 Aug 1, Rioters burned cars
and threw stones in Sudan's capital following news of the death of
VP John Garanga in a helicopter crash. Garang's longtime deputy,
Silva Kiir, was quickly named to succeed him as head of his Sudan
People's Liberation Army and as president of south Sudan. 36 people
died in riots.
(AP, 8/1/05)(AP, 8/2/05)
2005 Aug 2, Violent mobs surged
again into the streets of Sudan's capital sparked by the death of
Sudanese vice president and former southern rebel leader John
Garang.
(AP, 8/2/05)
2005 Aug 3, Southern Sudanese
Arabs fled Juba after ethnic Africans angered by the death of their
popular rebel leader went on a two-day rampage, chasing Arabs in the
street and burning Arab shops and homes. At least 18 people were
killed. Northern and southern Sudanese leaders called for calm
during a third day of clashes in the capital that have killed at
least 84 people since the death of former southern rebel John
Garang. Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir announced the launch of a
committee to probe the death of vice president John Garang.
(AP-Reuters, 8/3/05)
2005 Aug 4, The Sudanese Red
Crescent (SRC) said at least 130 people have been killed and around
350 injured after 3 days of violence following the death of former
rebel leader and First Vice President John Garang.
(Reuters, 8/4/05)
2005 Aug 9, In Sudan Lt. Gen.
Salva Kiir Mayardit, the commander of the Sudan People's Liberation
Army was inaugurated as Sudan's first vice president and president
of the new, autonomous southern government.
(AP, 8/9/05)
2005 Aug 11, Southern leader
Salva Kiir Mayardit was sworn in as Sudan's 1st vice president.
(AP, 8/11/05)
2005 Aug 26, The UN food relief
agency said that it's battling to feed 90,000 Eritrean and Ethiopian
refugees displaced in eastern Sudan mainly due to a serious funding
shortfall.
(AP, 8/27/05)
2005 Sep 2, The African Union
said it is suspending peacekeeper deployments to Sudan's war-torn
western Darfur region for nearly three weeks due to lack of jet fuel
and heavy rains.
(AP, 9/2/05)
2005 Sep 19, Rebel groups said
militias backed by the Sudanese government killed 30 people over the
weekend in fresh attacks in Darfur, threatening new peace talks
under way in Nigeria. The Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) and the
Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) said 17 people were killed in
Korbia in northern Darfur Sep 17 and 13 died in attacks on Jabel
Marra in the west on Sep 18.
(Reuters, 9/20/05)
2005 Sep 20, Sudanese soldiers
inflicted "heavy casualties" in driving off rebels who overran a
town in the troubled Darfur region.
(AP, 9/21/05)
2005 Sep 23, The UN Security
Council extended the peacekeeping mission in Sudan by six months.
(AP, 9/23/05)
2005 Sep 25, Sudanese President
Omar al-Beshir met with King Abdullah in the Saudi city of Jeddah to
discuss cooperation between their countries and regional
developments.
(AP, 9/25/05)
2005 Sep 28, Jan Egeland, UN
humanitarian chief, said escalating violence in the Sudanese region
of Darfur is threatening to halt aid work as increasing numbers of
international staff come under attack.
(AP, 9/28/05)
2005 Sep 28, An unprecedented
attack on a displaced persons' camp in Sudan's embattled Darfur
region reportedly killed 29 people. UN reports said up to 300 armed
Arab men on horses and camels attacked the camp in northwest Darfur
and burned about 80 makeshift shelters.
(AP, 9/29/05)
2005 Oct 3, Sudan's government
and rebels from the war-ravaged Darfur region agreed to sit down for
face-to-face talks after a week of bickering that had put
discussions on hold.
(AP, 10/3/05)
2005 Oct 4, Sudan's government
and rebels from Darfur met for a 2nd day of talks in Nigeria. The
visiting Dutch PM urged all parties to reach a power-sharing deal by
the end of the year.
(AP, 10/4/05)
2005 Oct 7, The Sudanese
government agreed for the first time to allow Ugandan troops to
pursue members of the rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in all
parts of southern Sudan.
(AP, 10/12/05)
2005 Oct 8, In Sudan's Darfur
region 2 African Union peacekeeping soldiers from Nigeria and 2
civilian contractors were killed in an ambush.
(Reuters, 10/8/05)
2005 Oct 9, Rebels freed 36
members of an African Union team, including an American monitor, who
were kidnapped earlier in the day in Sudan's western Darfur region.
(AP, 10/9/05)(AP, 10/10/05)
2005 Oct 12, In Egypt a sit-in
by hundreds of Sudanese refugees outside the offices of the UNHCR in
the Cairo entered its 14th day, even as the agency insisted it could
not meet their asylum demands. Some 14,400 Sudanese refugees were
registered in Egypt.
(AP, 10/12/05)
2005 Oct 16, Rebels and
Sudanese forces clashed in North Darfur with artillery fire killing
a number of civilians.
(AP, 10/17/05)
2005 Oct 19, The UN said
fighting and insecurity throughout Darfur is hindering food and
relief aid to tens of thousands of people and forcing more displaced
Sudanese into already crammed refugee camps.
(AP, 10/19/05)
2005 Oct 20, Sudan's government
and rebels ended a sixth round of talks on the crisis in the
country's western Darfur region, announcing no agreements but
pledging to reconvene in a month to push forward the slow-moving
peace process.
(AP, 10/20/05)
2005 Oct 25, The UN said
Sudanese refugees released 15 aid workers they had detained on Oct
23 in a crowded camp in the violent western Darfur region. Five
Sudanese nongovernment organization employees were still being held.
(AP, 10/25/05)
2005 Oct 31, UN envoy Jan Pronk
condemned the killing of 2 deminers contracted to the United Nations
in southern Sudan in an ambush by suspected Ugandan rebels.
(AP, 10/31/05)
2005 Nov 8, The US State
Department issued its 7th annual report to Congress on religious
freedom. It cited Burma, China, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Saudi
Arabia, Sudan and Vietnam as restricting religious freedom.
(AP, 11/8/05)
2005 Nov 9, An employee of the
Sudanese embassy in Iraq was shot dead by armed men who opened fire
on his car in the west of Baghdad.
(AP, 11/9/05)
2005 Nov 12, In Egypt hundreds
of Sudanese refugees staging a sit-in outside UN offices in Cairo
began a hunger strike to press their case for asylum.
(AFP, 11/12/05)
2005 Nov 16, A court set up by
Sudan to try war crimes in its violence-plagued Darfur region issued
its 1st sentences, condemning to death 2 soldiers in the torture
killing of a Sudanese citizen.
(AP, 11/16/05)
2005 Nov 19, Sudanese troops
and rebels clashed in the western Darfur region clashed and a rebel
group said 14 civilians and eight insurgents had been killed in the
past 48 hours.
(Reuters, 11/20/05)
2005 Nov 23, Sudan and Uganda
said they have renewed a deal letting Ugandan troops pursue leaders
of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels deep into Sudanese
territory.
(AP, 11/23/05)
2005 Nov 29, A Sudanese Darfur
rebel faction said it attacked a town in West Darfur state, killing
37 soldiers and police, to push for its inclusion in peace talks due
to open in the Nigerian capital Abuja later in the day.
(AP, 11/29/05)
2005 Dec 2, In Nigeria rebel
leaders from the western Sudanese region of Darfur rejected an
African Union draft agreement on power-sharing between their forces
and the government in Khartoum, pushing the sides' seventh session
of peace talks close to stalemate.
(AFP, 12/02/05)
2005 Dec 17, A first group of
southern Sudanese refugees began their journey home after two
decades of living in a camp in Kenya.
(AP, 12/17/05)
2005 Dec 18, Chad blamed its
neighbor Sudan for a rebel raid on an eastern garrison and announced
it was exercising its right to pursue the attackers on Sudanese
soil. A spokesman said an early morning attack on Adre's garrison
was mounted by army deserters allied with a recently formed rebel
group called the Rally for Democracy and Liberty (RDL), which Chad
accuses of being a "militia used by the Sudanese government."
(AP, 12/18/05)
2005 Dec 19, In Sudan some 500
camel and horse-riding assailants killed 20 civilians and burned
their huts in West Darfur.
(AP, 12/21/05)
2005 Dec 19, Chad's army said
its forces had killed about 300 rebels after they launched a failed
offensive on a border town in one of the worst attacks in an
escalating conflict. Chad's foreign minister said the troops then
chased the rebels into Sudan and destroyed their bases across the
border.
(AP, 12/19/05)
2005 Dec 21, The UN and the
African Union condemned an attack on a village in Sudan’s western
Darfur region in which camel and horse-riding assailants killed 20
civilians and burned their huts.
(AP, 12/21/05)
2005 Dec 23, Two Arab satellite
television channels said that a Sudanese diplomat and five other men
had been kidnapped in Iraq. A Sudanese Foreign Ministry spokesman
appealed for their release in an interview with Qatar-based
Al-Jazeera.
(AP, 12/23/05)
2005 Dec 28, Sudan denied
Chadian accusations it was supporting dissidents trying to oust
Pres. Idriss Deby and said an African Union summit would go ahead in
Khartoum in January.
(Reuters, 12/28/05)
2005 Dec 30, Sudan said it will
close its embassy in Baghdad in an effort to win the release of six
kidnapped employees. Al-Qaida in Iraq threatened to kill the
captives if the diplomatic mission remained.
(AP, 12/30/05)
2005 Dec 30, Sudanese security
forces jailed without charge Zuheir Sirraj, a columnist for the
al-Sahafa daily paper. He was accused of slandering President Omar
Hassan al-Bashir in a move some parliamentarians called
unconstitutional.
(Reuters, 12/31/05)
2005 Dec 30, Egyptian police
turned water cannons on Sudanese war refugees and beat them with
sticks, clearing out a squatters camp in a city park. At least 10
people were killed.
(AP, 12/30/05)
2005 Dec 31, In Egypt several
Sudanese migrants injured when police violently cleared a ramshackle
camp died later from their wounds, raising the death toll from the
clash to 25. Sudanese refugees began trickling across the border to
Israel following the clashes.
(AP, 12/31/05)(Econ, 8/25/07, p.45)
2005 Sudan’s GDP grew at an 8%
rate. The IMF projected 13% growth for 2006.
(Econ, 8/5/06, p.42)
2005 Some 200 Sudanese fleeing
the bloodshed in Darfur made their way to Israel, where they were
placed under low-security lockup.
(SFC, 6/9/06, p.A14)
2005 A UN unit called the Joint
Integrated Unit was created and stationed in Malakal, Sudan, after
the 2005 north-south peace deal that ended more than two decades of
civil war.
(AP, 2/4/11)
2006 Jan 3, A Foreign Ministry
spokeswoman said Egypt will deport 654 Sudanese refugees who were
violently evicted from a protest camp in a Cairo park last week.
(AP, 1/3/06)
2006 Jan 4, Chad's President
Idriss Deby urged the UN to take control of Sudan's volatile Darfur
region because he said Khartoum was using the conflict there to
destabilize neighboring states.
(Reuters, 1/4/06)
2006 Jan 11, Rebel sources said
Sudanese troops had entered Hamesh Koreb, a town in eastern Sudan,
and threatened to evict ex-southern rebels in a move that could
threaten a landmark year-old peace deal.
(AFP, 1/11/06)
2006 Jan 12, UN
Secretary-General Kofi Annan said he wants the US and European
countries to help form a tough mobile force that would stop the
bloodshed, rape and plunder in Sudan's Darfur region.
(AP, 1/12/06)
2006 Jan 13, Sudan rejected a
suggestion by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan that the United States
and Europe help set up a possible mobile force in Darfur to
supplement African troops now on the ground.
(AP, 1/13/06)
2006 Jan 21, African nations
were split over Sudan's bid to head the African Union, a move which
could scuttle peace talks in the country's Darfur region and damage
Africa's efforts to improve its image abroad.
(AP, 1/21/06)
2006 Jan 22, Sudanese President
Omar Hassan al-Bashir urged the world to provide more equipment and
other support for cash-strapped African forces monitoring a
tentative truce in Sudan's violent Darfur region.
(AP, 1/22/06)
2006 Jan 22, Sudanese police
raided a human rights meeting, seized documents and laptops and
briefly detained participants on the eve of an African summit in the
country.
(AP, 1/23/06)
2006 Jan 23, African leaders
began their annual summit in disarray, failing to resolve dissension
over Sudan's bid to chair the 53-state body. An AU official said 5
African leaders have asked Sudan to withdraw its bid to head the
African Union because the appointment could sink Darfur peace talks
and dent the group's credibility.
(AP, 1/23/06)
2006 Jan 24, A government
spokesman said Sudan has withdrawn from the competition to lead the
African Union amid criticism of its human rights record. Diplomats
said the presidency would go to the Republic of Congo.
(AP, 1/24/06)
2006 Jan 27, The UN said
killings, rapes and indiscriminate attacks on civilians continue in
Darfur, accusing Sudanese soldiers of apparently coordinating with
armed militia in terrorizing the troubled region.
(AP, 1/27/06)
2006 Feb 3, Some 55,000
Darfuris fled Janjaweed attacks in Mershing, Sudan. Panic-stricken
refugees stampeded, trampling to death about 13 infants. Another 220
children disappeared during the flight.
(Econ, 2/11/06, p.46)(http://tinyurl.com/s4pj4)
2006 Feb 3, The UN Security
Council authorized planning for the expected UN takeover of
peacekeeping operations in Sudan's conflict-wracked Darfur region.
(AP, 2/3/06)
2006 Feb 6, Sudanese officials
said some seven people were killed in southern Sudan in recent
clashes between renegade armed militias and the south Sudan army,
despite a 2005 peace deal to end Africa's longest civil war there.
(Reuters, 2/6/06)
2006 Feb 8, In Libya the
leaders of Sudan and Chad signed a peace agreement to end increasing
tension over Sudan's Darfur region, pledging to normalize diplomatic
relations and deny refuge to each other's rebel groups. A communique
issued by Sudan, Chad and Libya, as well as Burkino Faso, Congo and
the Central African Republic, whose leaders attended the talks, said
a committee of African countries overseen by Libya would monitor the
implementation of the deal.
(AP, 2/9/06)
2006 Feb 11, In southern Sudan
a military transport plane blew a tire while landing at Aweil,
swerved off the runway and exploded, killing all 20 people on board.
(AP, 2/12/06)
2006 Feb 14, Darfur rebels said
they had shot down a government helicopter and captured the only
surviving crew member, named as Captain Muawiya Zubeir.
(AP, 2/14/06)
2006 Feb 18, The WHO said a
cholera outbreak in south Sudan has claimed 52 lives with more than
2,000 cases of the deadly disease.
(AP, 2/18/06)
2006 Feb 22, A secret list
compiled for the UN Security council said Sudan's interior and
defense ministers and its national intelligence chief are among 17
people the UN Security Council should punish for blocking peace in
Darfur.
(Reuters, 2/22/06)
2006 Feb 25, In Rhode Island
Brown University announced it will stop investing in companies that
do business in Sudan because the country has been accused of
genocide.
(AP, 2/25/06)
2006 Feb 28, A top UN envoy
said Sudan has begun a campaign to keep African Union troops in
Darfur and prevent a UN force from taking over efforts to restore
peace there. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Libyan leader
Moamer Kadhafi rejected the replacement of an AU force in the
Sudanese region of Darfur by UN peacekeepers.
(AP, 2/28/06)
2006 Mar 6, Leaders from the
main Darfur rebel group renounced Abdel Wahed Mohamed el-Nur, their
party president, saying he was acting unilaterally and endangering
fragile peace talks.
(Reuters, 3/6/06)
2006 Mar 8, Western powers
sought to persuade Sudan to agree to a weak African Union
peacekeeping force being turned into a more robust UN mission to
stop killing in the Darfur region. Thousands of Sudanese protested
in Khartoum against any deployment of UN troops in Darfur.
(Reuters, 3/8/06)
2006 Mar 10, The African Union
decided to extend its peacekeeping mission in Sudan's Darfur region
for six months to give itself time to negotiate a peace agreement,
but it promised to transfer control to the United Nations once that
is accomplished.
(AP, 3/10/06)
2006 Mar 11, In Sudan 5 members
of the main opposition group in eastern Sudan were arrested or
detained, in a move party officials said hindered any chance to
start long-delayed peace talks.
(Reuters, 3/11/06)
2006 Mar 12, African Union
mediators presented cease-fire proposals for the conflict in Sudan's
Darfur region, asking rebels and the Sudanese government to work
together to end military activity against relief supply routes and
refugee camps.
(AP, 3/12/06)
2006 Mar 13, Jan Egeland, the
UN humanitarian chief, said increasing violence has left hundreds of
thousands of civilians in Sudan's Darfur region without food and
facing the prospect of widespread disease and death within weeks.
(AP, 3/13/06)
2006 Mar 13, Jan Egeland, the
UN humanitarian chief, said increasing violence has left hundreds of
thousands of civilians in Sudan's Darfur region without food and
facing the prospect of widespread disease and death within weeks.
(AP, 3/13/06)
2006 Mar 15, Gunmen attacked a
compound of the UN refugee agency in the town of Yei in southern
Sudan, killing one person and critically wounding two others.
(AP, 3/16/06)
2006 Mar 24, The UN Security
Council voted keep UN peacekeepers in Sudan to monitor an accord
ending a 21-year civil war and authorized planning for the expected
extension of the UN force's operations to Darfur.
(AP, 3/24/06)
2006 Mar 28, In Sudan Arab
League Secretary-General Amr Moussa called on Arab leaders to move
toward a goal of "entering the nuclear club" and making use of
atomic energy for peaceful purposes. The absence of at least 10
heads of state, including President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and Saudi
Arabia's King Abdullah, raised concerns of a lackluster summit.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, In Sudan Arab
leaders promised to fund African soldiers in Darfur from October
this year, despite international pressure to allow the United
Nations to take over the mission.
(Reuters, 3/28/06)
2006 Apr 3, Jan Egeland, the
U.N.'s top humanitarian official in Sudan, said the government
barred him from visiting Darfur to prevent him seeing poor
conditions there.
(AP, 4/3/06)
2006 Apr 5, Sudan said it would
allow UN Undersecretary Jan Egeland to visit Darfur.
(AP, 4/5/06)
2006 Apr 11, The UN Security
Council demanded that the Sudanese government and rebels reach
agreement by April 30 to end the conflict in Darfur.
(AP, 4/11/06)
2006 Apr 12, Britain and the US
called for sanctions against four Sudanese who have blocked peace
efforts and violated human rights in the conflict-wracked Darfur
region.
(AP, 4/12/06)
2006 Apr 12-2006 Apr 13,
Sudanese Janjaweed militia with local Chadian recruits shot or
hacked to death 118 villagers in eastern Chad in a bloody spillover
of violence from Sudan's Darfur region.
(Reuters, 5/25/06)
2006 Apr 14, Chad broke off
diplomatic relations with Sudan and threatened to expel 200,000
Sudanese refugees, blaming its neighbor for a rebel attack that
killed 350 in the capital.
(AP, 4/14/06)
2006 Apr 15, Cambodian soldiers
departed to Sudan for a UN-backed landmine clearing operation,
saying they hoped they could use their experience recovering from
civil war to help the war-torn Sudanese.
(AFP, 4/15/06)
2006 Apr 15-2006 Apr 17, In
southern Sudan 15 people including 11 civilians were killed in
clashes between militia fighters, straining a deal that ended the
country's north-south civil war.
(Reuters, 4/17/06)
2006 Apr 19, A UN spokesman
said Sudan has refused to grant visas for a UN military assessment
mission planning a UN peacekeeping operation in Darfur.
(Reuters, 4/19/06)
2006 Apr 21, Canada said 2 RCMP
members are heading to Sudan to assist the UN mission there in
training and supporting Sudanese police and, where possible,
advising them on policing methods.
(CP, 4/21/06)
2006 Apr 22, Hassan al-Turabi,
a Sudanese Islamist leader who once protected Al-Qaeda supremo Osama
bin Laden, was branded an apostate by the country's Muslim scholars
for taking a liberal stand on women's rights.
(AFP, 4/23/06)
2006 Apr 25, The UN Security
Council imposed sanctions on four men accused of atrocities in
Sudan's Darfur region, the first time it has moved to punish those
responsible for three years of conflict that has left 180,000 dead.
(AP, 4/25/06)
2006 Apr 28, The UN food agency
said it is cutting rations in half for about 3 million refugees in
Sudan's war-ravaged Darfur region because of a shortage of money,
calling it "scandalous" that it has to stretch out supplies while it
pleads for funds.
(AP, 4/28/06)
2006 Apr 28, Five member of US
Congress were willingly arrested and led away from the Sudanese
Embassy in plastic handcuffs after protesting the Sudanese
government's alleged role in atrocities in the Darfur region.
(AP, 4/28/06)
2006 Apr 30, The Sudanese
government said it was ready to sign a draft peace deal with rebels
from its Darfur region, but the rebels said they still had
reservations about the agreement.
(AP, 4/30/06)
2006 Apr 30, Some 100,000
rallied in Washington DC, SF and other US cities to urge the Bush
administration to take decisive action to stop the genocide in
Darfur.
(SFC, 5/1/06, p.A1)
2006 May 1, Under pressure from
the US rebels in Sudan's Darfur region agreed to continue
negotiations in Nigeria with the Sudanese government after rejecting
a peace proposal that would end a conflict that has killed tens of
thousands of people.
(AP, 5/1/06)
2006 May 5, Sudan's government
and the largest Darfur rebel group agreed to sign a peace plan,
marking major progress in an internationally backed effort to end
the death and destruction in western Sudan. Two other rebel factions
rejected the deal. The Abuja deal allocates an initial $30 million
in compensation from the government for more than 3 million Darfuris
the United Nations says were affected by the conflict. Opposition
groups in the camps dismissed the $10 per person payout as a joke.
(Reuters, 5/5/06)(AP, 6/6/06)
2006 May 8, Darfur refugees
rioted and forced the UN humanitarian chief to rush from their camp,
then later attacked African peacekeepers and killed a translator in
a sign of deep tensions in Sudan’s war torn region despite a fragile
peace deal. Arab militias, known as Janjaweed, attacked Labado town
in South Darfur, killing and injuring up to 50 people. The AU has a
base in Labado town.
(AP, 5/8/06)(Reuters, 5/20/06)
2006 May 13, In Sudan 6 people
were killed when demonstrators opposed to a peace deal the Sudanese
government signed with Darfur rebels clashed with police in the
war-torn region.
(AFP, 5/14/06)
2006 May 16, Seven
African-American members of the US Congress were arrested at the
Embassy of Sudan, where they were protesting atrocities in that
country's Darfur region.
(AP, 5/17/06)
2006 May 16, The UN Security
Council passed a resolution pressing Sudan to cooperate with the
United Nations as it prepares take over peacekeeping in Darfur from
an underfunded African Union force.
(AP, 5/16/06)
2006 May 17, The UN said armed
militiamen had ignored a peace pact and attacked several
villages this week in Sudan's Darfur region, killing at least 11
people and wounding many others.
(AP, 5/17/06)
2006 May 19, In Sudan's Darfur
region dozens were killed in a major attack by government-backed
militias on Shearia town, the latest in a wave of raids since a
peace deal was signed earlier this month.
(AP, 5/20/06)
2006 May 23, A high-level UN
delegation arrived in Sudan to press a reluctant government to
accept a large force of U.N. peacekeepers in the strife-torn Darfur
region.
(AP, 5/23/06)
2006 May 24, The African Union
accepted a NATO offer to extend its assistance in Sudan's violent
Darfur region, stressing its presence there would remain small.
(Reuters, 5/24/06)
2006 May 25, Sudan said it
would permit the UN to lay the groundwork for possible deployment of
a peacekeeping force in Darfur, but cautioned that the world body's
role would be smaller than some Security Council members want.
(AP, 5/25/06)
2006 May 26, In Sudan one
African Union soldier was killed and another critically wounded when
heavily armed men ambushed a patrol not far from their base in West
Darfur.
(Reuters, 5/29/06)
2006 Jun 8, Breakaway factions
from two rebel groups that rejected last month's peace accord for
Sudan's violence-riven Darfur region signed declarations committing
themselves to the pact. Southern Sudanese leaders said they are
organizing peace talks with the rebel Lord's Resistance Army and the
Ugandan government to try to end the brutal war in northern Uganda
that has spilled across the border into their own country.
(AP, 6/8/06)
2006 Jun 9, Tribal leaders
rejected the possibility of UN peacekeepers replacing African Union
forces in Darfur, with one chief threatening a "holy war" if
non-African troops come to the Sudanese region.
(AP, 6/10/06)
2006 Jun 11, Amnesty
International released a report saying China's sales of military
vehicles and weapons to Sudan, Nepal and Myanmar have aggravated
conflicts and abetted violence and repressive rule in those
countries.
(AP, 6/11/06)
2006 Jun 14, The chief
prosecutor of the International Criminal Court said his office had
documented massacres with hundreds of victims in Sudan's war-torn
Darfur region as well as hundreds of rape cases.
(AFP, 6/14/06)
2006 Jun 15, Sudan said the
International Criminal Court did not have jurisdiction over crimes
in the violent Darfur region and no officials would be interrogated
by the court.
(AP, 6/15/06)
2006 Jun 15, The US Senate
allocated $60 million toward launching a UN peacekeeping mission in
the Darfur region of Sudan.
(AP, 6/15/06)
2006 Jun 19, The Sudanese
government and the Eastern Front under Eritrean mediation signed a
ceasefire agreement and pledged to work for a comprehensive
settlement of their dispute.
(AFP, 10/10/06)
2006 Jun 20, Sudanese state
news said President Omar Hassan al-Bashir ruled out letting UN
troops into the Darfur region, saying he would not permit such a
deployment as long as he was in power.
(AP, 6/20/06)
2006 Jun 20, Chad accused Sudan
of cross-border attacks and urged the Security Council to meet over
its neighbor's alleged "aggression and destabilization."
(AP, 6/20/06)
2006 Jun 25, Sudan suspended
the work of all UN missions in Darfur except for UNICEF and the
World Food Program, in response to the use of a UN helicopter to
transport a rebel leader.
(AP, 6/26/06)
2006 Jun 26, The Sudanese
government lifted its partial suspension of UN work in
conflict-wracked Darfur.
(AP, 6/26/06)
2006 Jul 3, Sudan's foreign
minister rejected calls by the top UN envoy in the country to make
additions to a peace deal for Darfur after widespread rejection of
the accord. A group of Sudanese rebels in more than 50 cars attacked
the town of Hamarat Sheikh in the Kordofan region of Darfur. At
least a dozen people were killed. In southern Sudan at least six
people were killed and 11 wounded when gunmen ambushed a German aid
agency vehicle. Witnesses said the attackers, some of whom were
uniformed, were rebel fighters with the LRA.
(Reuters, 7/3/06)(AP, 7/5/06)(AFP, 7/5/06)
2006 Jul 12, A UN official said
rebels in Darfur are fighting each other with the Sudanese military
apparently supporting one faction, sometimes with aircraft disguised
as relief planes.
(AP, 7/12/06)
2006 Jul 21, The UN refugee
agency said international aid operations in refugee camps in the
Zalinge area of Sudan's Darfur region have been suspended after
three water workers were killed by a mob.
(Reuters, 7/21/06)
2006 Jul 24, In Sudan’s South
Darfur's vast Kalma camp, 17 women were raped by armed militiamen as
they went out to collect firewood.
(Reuters, 7/29/06)
2006 Jul 25, A Darfur rebel
leader was in Washington to meet President Bush, who is trying to
convince Khartoum to accept UN peacekeepers to quell the increasing
violence in Sudan's remote west. President Bush pressed Darfur rebel
leader Minni Arcua Minnawi to help implement a deal aimed at ending
the violence in western Sudan.
(AP, 7/25/06)(Reuters, 7/25/06)
2006 Jul 28, Sudanese
government forces and allied militias attacked bases of a new rebel
alliance in Darfur despite a ceasefire in the violent west.
(Reuters, 7/29/06)
2006 Jul, In Sudan 8 Sudanese
aid workers were killed this month in attacks across Darfur.
(SFC, 8/9/06, p.A3)
2006 Aug 7, The only rebel
leader to have signed onto a peace deal for Darfur was sworn in as a
senior aide to the Sudanese president as international aid groups
said the fighting in the war-torn region has intensified.
(AP, 8/7/06)
2006 Aug 8, Chad and Sudan
agreed to reopen their borders and resume diplomatic relations that
they severed in a dispute four months ago.
(AP, 8/9/06)
2006 Aug 19, In Sudan 2 African
Union peacekeepers from Rwanda were killed and 3 were wounded when
their convoy was ambushed in the Darfur region.
(AP, 8/19/06)
2006 Aug 23, Sudan's ruling
party rejected a proposed Security Council resolution to transfer
peacekeeping duties in conflict-wracked Darfur to a UN force, saying
it would violate national sovereignty.
(AP, 8/24/06)
2006 Aug 26, A Sudanese court
charged reporter Paul Salopek (44) with espionage. He was detained
by pro-government forces in Darfur on Aug 6. Salopek was on
freelance assignment for National Geographic magazine.
(SSFC, 8/27/06, p.A19)
2006 Aug 30, In Sudan riot
police fired teargas and beat a journalist in central Khartoum on as
opposition party supporters gathered to demonstrate against a recent
rise in petrol and sugar prices.
(AP, 8/30/06)
2006 Aug 31, The UN Security
Council passed a resolution that would give the United Nations
authority over peacekeepers in Darfur as soon as Sudan's government
gives its consent, which it has so far refused to do.
(AP, 8/31/06)
2006 Aug, In Khartoum, Sudan,
the $4 billion Alsunut residential and office project began to take
shape on 160 acres at the convergence of the Blue and White Niles.
The public-private partnership between the government and DAL Group
included 63 towers, with half their office space already sold to
local and foreign companies.
(Econ, 8/5/06, p.42)
2006 Sep 1, Human rights
activists and African Union officials said the Sudanese government
has launched a major offensive against rebels in war-torn Darfur.
(AP, 9/1/06)
2006 Sep 2, Sudan's president
ordered the release of an envoy of Slovenia's president who was
convicted of espionage in the war-torn region of Darfur and
sentenced to two years in prison. Tomo Kriznar, the Slovenian
president's envoy to Darfur, was arrested in July and convicted on
Aug. 14 by a court in the North Darfur capital of el-Fasher.
(AP, 9/2/06)
2006 Sep 4, Sudan said it would
allow African troops to remain in Darfur only under African Union
control and accused Washington of attempting "regime change" in
Khartoum by trying to bring in a UN force.
(Reuters, 9/4/06)
2006 Sep 6, Sudanese security
forces in Khartoum fired tear gas and beat demonstrators with sticks
in a crackdown on protests against price increases for basic goods,
after thwarting similar protests a week ago. In Khartoum the
beheaded body of Mohammed Taha Mohammed Ahmed, editor-in-chief of
the independent daily Al-Wifaq, was recovered, a day after he was
kidnapped by gunmen. He had been accused of insulting Islam. A group
claiming to be al-Qaida's branch in Sudan said that it killed the
chief editor. In 2007 ten people were sentenced to death for the
murder and beheading of Ahmed.
(Reuters, 9/6/06)(AP, 9/7/06)(AP, 9/13/06)(AP,
11/10/07)
2006 Sep 8, Sudan's President
Omar al-Bashir agreed to release American journalist Paul Salopek
and his Chadian assistants after meeting with New Mexico Gov. Bill
Richardson.
(AP, 9/9/06)
2006 Sep 9, Sudan authorities
confiscated all copies of the independent al-Sudani newspaper, the
latest move in a resurgence of censorship since the beheading of a
journalist last week. Paul Salopek was released from a prison in the
war-torn Darfur region where he was held for more than a month on
espionage charges.
(Reuters, 9/10/06)
2006 Sep 17, Peace activists
around the world staged a day of action to highlight the "forgotten
war" in Darfur where tens of thousands of people have been killed
and more than 2 million left homeless.
(AP, 9/17/06)
2006 Sep 19, Sudan's Pres. Omar
Hassan al-Bashir, on the sidelines of the UN General assembly, said
his country would never allow UN peacekeepers into Darfur and
charged that the West wanted to dismember his country in order to
help Israel. He agreed that the 7,000 AU peacekeepers could stay.
(Reuters, 9/19/06)(Econ, 9/23/06, p.51)
2006 Sep 20, The African Union
(AU) agreed to extend the mandate of its peacekeepers in Sudan's
troubled Darfur region for three months until December 31 after
receiving promises of financial and logistical support from the
United Nations and Arab states.
(AP, 9/20/06)
2006 Sep 25, A spokesman for
the AU said the African Union will add 4,000 troops to its extended
Darfur peacekeeping mission, bringing the number of police and
soldiers in western Sudan to 11,000. The UN got its first pledges of
troops for a proposed peacekeeping force in Sudan's Darfur region at
a meeting of 49 potential contributing nations.
(AP, 9/25/06)(Reuters, 9/25/06)
2006 Sep 25, California Gov.
Arnold Schwarzenegger signed two bills to bar the state's massive
pension funds from investing in companies in Sudan and to indemnify
the University of California system from liability from divesting
its investments in the country.
(Reuters, 9/25/06)
2006 Sep 26, The UN and Sudan
discussed the deployment of UN military advisers to reinforce
African Union peacekeepers in Darfur, in a possible compromise in
their standoff over the war-torn region.
(Reuters, 9/26/06)
2006 Sep 29, The UN Security
Council allowed UN experts, who have recommended sanctions on top
Sudanese officials, to continue monitoring atrocities and arms
embargo violations in Darfur.
(AP, 9/29/06)
2006 Oct 4, Sources said fresh
inter-rebel fighting in Sudan has forced 10,000 Darfuris to seek
refuge near a camp of African Union forces monitoring a
widely-ignored truce.
(AP, 10/4/06)
2006 Oct 5, The US called
emergency UN Security Council consultations after Sudan warned
nations considering troops for Darfur that their action was a
"prelude to an invasion."
(AP, 10/5/06)
2006 Oct 7, Sudanese soldiers
crossed the border into eastern Chad to fight a group of Darfur
rebels, leaving more than 300 people injured.
(AP, 10/8/06)
2006 Oct 10, The Sudanese
government and eastern rebels signed a power sharing agreement in
the Eritrean capital Asmara after months of peace talks. Under
Eritrean mediation, Khartoum and the Eastern Front signed a
ceasefire agreement on June 19 and pledged to work for a
comprehensive settlement of their dispute.
(AFP, 10/10/06)
2006 Oct 10, The World Food
Program (WFP) said nearly a quarter of a million people in Sudan's
Darfur region cannot access U.N. food rations due to fighting.
(AP, 10/10/06)
2006 Oct 13, President Bush
signed a law imposing sanctions against people responsible for
genocide and war crimes in Sudan. He also signed a ports security
bill that contained language barring the electronic settling of
gambling debts.
(Reuters, 10/13/06)(WSJ, 10/14/06, p.A1)
2006 Oct 14, The Sudanese
government signed a peace deal with a group of rebels from eastern
Sudan, ending a deadly strife that has been overshadowed by the
conflict in the country's western Darfur region.
(AP, 10/14/06)
2006 Oct 16, Egypt's President
Hosni Mubarak and Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi held talks on how to
resolve the Darfur crisis in Sudan without intervention from outside
Africa.
(AFP, 10/16/06)
2006 Oct 17, A former Janjaweed
fighter in London recounted to the BBC how the Sudanese government
has actively supported the militia that is accused of genocide
against non-Arab ethnic groups in Darfur.
(AFP, 10/18/06)
2006 Oct 18, Local and UN
officials said Sudanese Janjaweed militia and Chadian rebels have
attacked at least 10 villages in south-east Chad in the past
fortnight, killing over 100 people and displacing more than 3,000.
In southern Sudan unknown gunmen killed 38 civilians in at least
five attacks. At least 50 soldiers from the former rebel Sudan
People's Liberation Army drowned in southern Sudan after two
steamboats collided on the Nile.
(Reuters, 10/18/06)(Reuters, 10/19/06)
2006 Oct 20, The UN refugee
agency said it had received reports of at least 38 civilians killed
in attacks in southern Sudan and was suspending its operation
helping Sudanese refugees return from neighboring Uganda.
(AP, 10/20/06)
2006 Oct 21, Uganda's president
traveled to southern Sudan to bolster faltering talks between his
government and rebels aimed at ending a brutal 19-year conflict in
northern Uganda.
(AP, 10/21/06)
2006 Oct 22, The Sudanese
government ordered the chief UN envoy to leave the country within
three days after he wrote that the Sudanese army had suffered
serious losses in fighting with rebels in northern Darfur.
(AP, 10/22/06)
2006 Oct 26, Mo Ibrahim, a
self-made Sudanese millionaire, offered African politicians an
annual prize worth $5 million if they avoid being seduced by power
and corruption. The prize would be presented to former leaders who
had demonstrated excellence in government. Ibrahim founded Celtel
International, an African cell phone network. He sold Celtel for
$3.3 billion in 2005.
(Reuters, 10/26/06)(AP, 10/27/06)
2006 Oct 28, Chad accused
Sudan's air force of bombarding four towns along its eastern
frontier and said its armed forces were ready to repel further
aggression.
(Reuters, 10/28/06)
2006 Oct 31, Attacks in West
Darfur, Sudan, killed at least 63 people, half of them children.
Some 300 to 500 Arab militiamen on horseback raided at least eight
villages as well as the Hajlija IDP camp.
(AP, 11/3/06)
2006 Nov 1, US President George
W. Bush renewed US economic sanctions on Sudan for one year and left
open the door to imposing new ones linked to the violence in Darfur.
(AFP, 11/1/06)
2006 Nov 3, Sudanese President
Omar al-Bashir said that his government will not relent on its
rejection of UN peacekeeping troops for Darfur. Rebels accused
Khartoum of remobilizing Arab militia after suffering two military
defeats on the Sudan-Chad border.
(AP, 11/3/06)
2006 Nov 10, A Norwegian
refugee group said it is closing down its humanitarian operations
for nearly 300,000 people in Darfur because it is impossible to work
in the Sudanese region.
(AP, 11/10/06)
2006 Nov 11, Sudanese armed
forces deliberately attacked civilians in western Darfur killing 11,
including a woman burnt to death in her home. African Union sources
later claimed 30 people were killed and 40 injured, blaming
Khartoum-backed Janjaweed militia.
(Reuters, 11/13/06)(AFP, 11/24/06)
2006 Nov 13, Senegal’s
President Abdoulaye Wade received a letter from Sudan President Omar
al-Bashir that accepted some sort of UN intervention.
(AP, 11/14/06)
2006 Nov 13, The UN said it has
pledged about $77 million in personnel and equipment to help the
overwhelmed African Union force in Darfur as Sudan blocks the world
body from sending its own peacekeepers to the war-torn region.
(AP, 11/13/06)
2006 Nov 16, UN
Secretary-General Kofi Annan worked with key African, Arab, European
leaders in Ethiopia to break the deadlock over worsening violence in
Sudan's Darfur region. Leaders agreed in principle to a joint
African Union-United Nations peacekeeping force for Darfur. UN
humanitarian chief Jan Egeland arrived in Darfur to find security so
bad he could not visit the camps outside el-Geneina town housing
tens of thousands of displaced Darfuris.
(Reuters, 11/16/06)(AP, 11/16/06)(AP, 11/16/07)
2006 Nov 17, Sudan reversed its
long-standing opposition to allowing UN peacekeepers within its
borders, agreeing in principle to a plan that will permit an
international force to bolster African troops in Darfur, one of the
world's bloodiest conflict zones. A former southern rebel soldier
killed 5 policemen in the Jabal Awliaa area, 30 kilometers (19
miles) south of Khartoum.
(AP, 11/17/06)(Reuters, 11/17/06)
2006 Nov 17, UN aid bodies said
torrential rains and floods have hit up to 1.8 million people in the
Horn of Africa, driving tens of thousands from their homes and
threatening to trigger epidemics. Torrential rains have pounded the
Horn of Africa this month, bringing misery to large parts of Kenya,
Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan and Eritrea.
(AP, 11/17/06)
2006 Nov 18, Sudanese Foreign
Minister Lam Akol told reporters "We did not agree to the deployment
of hybrid United Nations-African Union forces in Darfur, as was
declared by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan after the Addis Ababa
consultative meeting." He said the Sudanese delegation agreed only
on UN technical units to back up the AU forces in Darfur.
(AP, 11/18/06)
2006 Nov 19, Darfur rebels said
the Sudanese government has launched a major offensive in North
Darfur despite an agreement to hold new talks among all parties to
the conflict.
(AP, 11/19/06)
2006 Nov 20, Sudan’s President
Omar al-Bashir's government hailed a new agreement with the UN over
peacekeepers in Darfur as a diplomatic breakthrough, but said
serious differences remain over the force's makeup and command.
(AP, 11/20/06)
2006 Nov 21, Arab and African
leaders in Libya agreed to work together to end the crisis in the
Darfur region of Sudan.
(AP, 11/22/06)
2006 Nov 22, Sudanese President
Omar al-Beshir told Britain and the UN that he still rejects the
deployment of UN troops in war-torn Darfur.
(AFP, 11/23/06)
2006 Nov 23, In Sudan 6
policemen were killed and 7 wounded in an attack by unidentified
rebels on a police camp in South Darfur state.
(AFP, 11/24/06)
2006 Nov 26, In Sudan the
National Redemption Front said its fighters had seized the Abu Jabra
oil field on the edge of South Darfur and Southern Kordofan.
Sudanese military said its forces had repelled the attack and were
in full control of the field.
(AP, 11/27/06)
2006 Nov 27, In Sudan fighting
began in the southern town of Malakal and escalated into full trench
warfare between the northern Sudanese Armed Forces and the SPLA.
Hundreds of people may have been killed in the heaviest fighting
between Sudan's former north-south foes since they signed a peace
deal last year.
(Reuters, 11/30/06)
2006 Nov 30, Sudan's president
rejected a proposal to send UN peacekeepers to Darfur to boost a
beleaguered 7,000-member African Union force, crushing hopes for a
quick solution to the violence spreading across central Africa.
(AP, 11/30/06)
2006 Dec 2, A UN official said
days of fighting between former rebels and government forces killed
more than 150 people and wounded at least 400 in a southern Sudanese
town.
(AP, 12/2/06)
2006 Dec 4, In Sudan militias
entered El Fasher, the main town in the Darfur region and started
looting the market. Militias there fought members of a former rebel
group in clashes which the rebels said left up to seven people dead.
(AP, 12/4/06)(Reuters, 12/4/06)
2006 Dec 6, Sudanese newspapers
reported that Salva Kiir, Sudan's first vice president, demanded the
arrest of two pro-Khartoum generals involved in deadly clashes in
the southern town of Malakal last month. Pro-government janjaweed
militiamen in the Darfur region killed 2 students in El Fasher, a
day after another student was killed. Rebel groups massed nearby in
preparation for a possible attack against the forces.
(AP, 12/6/06)(AP, 12/7/06)
2006 Dec 8, President George W.
Bush and visiting South African President Thabo Mbeki pressed for
urgent deployment of international peacekeepers in violence-torn
Darfur.
(AFP, 12/8/06)
2006 Dec 9, In Sudan militiamen
on horseback ambushed a refugee convoy in Sirba in western Darfur,
killing 22 civilians. The governor of West Darfur said the attack
was carried out by rebel groups who refused to sign the May peace
agreement.
(AFP, 12/10/06)
2006 Dec 11, Official sources
said the Sudanese government has approved a budget of 11.7 billion
dollars for 2007 and is targeting a growth rate of 10%. Rebels in
Sudan's western region of Darfur said a government warplane killed
eight civilians, mostly children, in a northern village.
(AP, 12/11/06)(Reuters, 12/12/06)
2006 Dec 15, In Kenya 11
African heads of state attending the 2nd International Conference on
the Great Lakes Region signed a landmark $2 billion
(1.5-billion-euro) security and development pact to forestall fresh
violence in the area.
(AFP, 12/15/06)
2006 Dec 15, The US and the EU
stepped up calls for Sudan to let international troops in to support
African Union forces in Darfur amid growing talk of sanctions on
Khartoum.
(AP, 12/15/06)
2006 Dec 16, The African Union
(AU) said the situation in Sudan's troubled Darfur region was
worsening due to the return of re-armed Janjaweed militia and
Khartoum's resolve to use military force.
(AP, 12/16/06)
2006 Dec 18, Sudan's justice
minister said he was ready to cooperate with a UN fact-finding team
due to investigate human rights abuses in war-torn Darfur.
(AFP, 12/18/06)
2006 Dec 19, The UN evacuated
71 aid workers from the largest refugee camp in Darfur after gunmen
looted their compounds, leaving some 130,000 refugees virtually
without humanitarian help.
(AP, 12/19/06)
2006 Dec 20, The Sudanese army
killed 200 rebels while repelling an attack in Darfur, the deadliest
single military operation reported in the war-torn region since
fighting started there four years ago. The army also said that 20 of
its troops were wounded during the fighting.
(AFP, 12/21/06)
2006 Dec 21-2006 Dec 22,
Fighting between Darfur rebels and government forces near the town
of Kutum killed 7 people and insurgents shot down 2 army helicopters
in the area.
(Reuters, 12/24/06)
2006 Dec 26, President Omar
al-Bashir said in the letter to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan that
Sudan is ready to immediately implement two recent agreements
endorsing a three-step UN plan to strengthen the beleaguered
7,000-strong African Union force in Darfur.
(AP, 12/27/06)
2006 Dec 29, Sudanese military
planes bombed two rebel positions in the north of Darfur just days
after the head of the African Union's peacekeeping force visited the
area to urge the rebels to join a cease-fire agreement. The African
Union peacekeeping mission in Sudan called for a halt to such
attacks.
(AP, 12/31/06)
2006 Dave Eggers authored “What
Is the What: The Autobiography of Achak Deng.” Deng, a Sudanese
“lost boy,” managed to escape to Ethiopia and work his way to Kenya
and ultimately America in 2001. Eggers’ novel is based on interviews
with Deng. In 2010 Deng returned to his home in Marial Bai, South
Sudan.
(SSFC, 12/24/06, p.M1)(Econ, 2/5/11, p.58)
2006 The largest American
embassy in Africa was under construction in Khartoum.
(Econ, 12/9/06, p.29)
2006 The population of southern
Sudan was about 12 million. Over 40% of its oil money was earmarked
for military expenditure.
(Econ, 12/9/06, p.28)
2007 Jan 2, A UN official said
the UN will investigate a report of allegations of sexual abuse and
child rape by peacekeepers operating in southern Sudan.
(AP, 1/2/07)
2007 Jan 4, Sudan described the
alleged sexual abuse of children by UN peacekeepers in south Sudan
as "outrageous" and said it would launch its own investigation into
the affair.
(AP, 1/4/07)
2007 Jan 5, Sudanese aircraft
carried out strikes on Bamina and Gadir in North Darfur state near
the border with Chad, endangering a fragile ceasefire.
(AFP, 1/9/07)
2007 Jan 10, Sudan and rebel
groups, prodded by New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, agreed on a
60-day ceasefire, plus diplomatic efforts by the UN and African
Union, to end the conflict in Darfur.
(AFP, 1/11/07)
2007 Jan 12, A Darfur rebel
group denied that it agreed to a cease-fire with the Sudanese
government during a meeting this week with New Mexico Gov. Bill
Richardson.
(AP, 1/12/07)
2007 Jan 16, Rebels said
Sudanese government planes bombed Darfur rebel areas despite a
declared truce.
(AP, 1/16/07)
2007 Jan 21, Darfur rebels
accused the Sudanese government of bombing its areas for two days,
killing at least 17 civilians, in an attempt to delay a conference
of rebel leaders.
(AP, 1/21/07)
2007 Jan 22, The EU threatened
Sudan with sanctions if it refused to allow UN peacekeepers into
war-torn Darfur, but rights groups and analysts said the warning was
not enough to stop the killings.
(AP, 1/22/07)
2007 Jan 24, A hijacker seized
a Sudanese passenger plane carrying 103 people and forced the pilot
to fly to the Chadian capital, N'Djamena, where he surrendered. The
gunman wanted the plane to be flown to Britain but when told there
was insufficient fuel agreed to go to the capital of neighboring
Chad. He said he wanted to draw attention to the Darfur conflict.
(AP, 1/24/07)
2007 Jan 26, Darfur rebels said
they would refuse peace talks and would fight African Union
peacekeepers on the ground if Sudanese President Omar Hassan
al-Bashir became chairman of the pan-African body. In southern Sudan
gunmen killed an Indian peacekeeper and wounded 2 others.
(Reuters, 1/26/07)(AP, 1/27/07)
2007 Jan 26, Officials said
Jody Williams, the US anti-landmine campaigner and Nobel Peace Prize
winner, will lead a team of United Nations investigators to probe
killings, rapes, destruction of villages and mass flight in Darfur.
(AP, 1/26/07)
2007 Jan 30, In Sweden former
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and Darfur human rights activist
Mossaad Mohamed Ali won the Olof Palme Prize for their work to
protect human rights.
(AP, 1/30/07)
2007 Feb 1, Radhika
Coomaraswamy, the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General
for Children and Armed Conflict, said child soldiers are
increasingly being used in the war-torn region of Darfur, even as
their use is on the decline elsewhere in Sudan.
(AP, 2/1/07)
2007 Feb 2, Chinese President
Hu Jintao offered Sudan assistance for the peaceful resolution of
the Darfur conflict but ignored Western pressure to make future aid
conditional on the progress made. Jintao agreed on closer economic
cooperation with Sudan after sealing talks with a series of trade
agreements. Jintao told Sudan's leader he must give the United
Nations a bigger role in trying to resolve the conflict in Darfur.
(AFP, 2/2/07)
2007 Feb 7, The Washington Post
reported that President George W. Bush has approved plans for the US
Treasury Department to block US commercial bank transactions
connected to Sudan's government, including those involving oil
revenue.
(AFP, 2/7/07)
2007 Feb 15, A summit of
African leaders opened in Cannes on the French Riviera. The crisis
in Darfur and violence in Guinea overshadowed the summit, as well as
perennial issues of poverty, development and AIDS. France won
agreement from three involved African nations (Sudan, Chad and
Central African Republic) that they would not support armed rebel
movements on each other's territories.
(AP, 2/15/07)(AP, 2/15/07)
2007 Feb 15, A US federal judge
ordered a trial for a suit seeking $105 million from Sudan for aid
to al-Qaeda in the USS Cole bombing that killed 17 in 2000.
(WSJ, 2/16/07, p.A1)
2007 Feb 16, In Sudan heavy
fighting took place between the Targem and Rezegat Maharia tribes in
South Darfur state. Unconfirmed reports suggested that between 70 to
100 tribesmen were killed and 14 injured.
(Reuters, 2/19/07)
2007 Feb 21, At a regional
meeting in Libya the leaders of Sudan and Chad said they agreed to
redouble efforts to end violence spilling over their border from
Darfur.
(Reuters, 2/21/07)
2007 Feb 26, Sudan rejected the
legitimacy of the International Criminal Court in pressing charges
over the conflict in Darfur, still ravaged by war and famine four
years after the violence erupted.
(AP, 2/26/07)
2007 Feb 27, The International
Criminal Court's prosecutor in Netherlands named Ahmed Muhammed
Harun, a former Sudanese junior minister, and Ali Mohammed Ali
Abd-al-Rahmann (aka Ali Kushayb), a janjaweed leader, as suspects in
war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Darfur region. Sudan
rejected the legitimacy of the ICC, insisting it would try Darfur
war criminals.
(Reuters, 2/27/07)(AFP, 2/27/07)(Econ, 7/19/08,
p.55)
2007 Feb 28, Iranian President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made his first visit to Khartoum, for talks with
his Sudanese opposite number Omar al-Beshir.
(AP, 2/28/07)
2007 Mar 5, In Sudan gunmen
killed two African Union peacekeepers and critically wounded a third
in the western Darfur region.
(AP, 3/7/07)
2007 Mar 6, Sudan said it will
try three Sudanese for crimes committed in Darfur, including a
member of the country's security forces who is being sought by an
international war crimes court.
(AP, 3/6/07)
2007 Mar 14, A US judge in
Virginia ruled that Sudan should pay damages to the families of 17
sailors killed in the October 2000 bombing of the U.S.S. Cole.
(Reuters, 3/14/07)
2007 Mar 19, Sudan's Pres.
Bashir denied his government was involved in widespread human rights
abuses in Darfur, where an estimated 200,000 people have been killed
in what the US says is the first genocide of this century. Amnesty
International said 2 Sudanese women have been sentenced to death by
stoning for adultery after a trial in which they had no lawyer and
which used Arabic, not their first language. Sadia Idriss Fadul was
sentenced on Feb 13 and Amouna Abdallah Daldoum on March 6 and their
sentences could be carried out at any time.
(Reuters, 3/19/07)(Reuters, 3/20/07)
2007 Mar 22, Sudan temporarily
suspended 52 non-governmental organizations working in Darfur as the
new UN humanitarian chief began his first visit to the country,
hoping to win aid groups better access to the region.
(AP, 3/22/07)
2007 Mar 24, In Sudan 11 people
were killed including 2 policemen and eight members of Darfur's
former rebel Sudanese Liberation Movement (SLM) in Omdurman,
Khartoum’s twin city. Abdel Shafee Jomaa Arabi, a senior rebel
commander, was killed in an ambush in Darfur.
(AFP, 3/24/07)(AFP, 3/26/07)
2007 Mar 25, European leaders
called for new international sanctions on Sudan over its treatment
of civilians in Darfur, where the new UN humanitarian chief warned
that humanitarian efforts were at risk of collapse.
(AP, 3/25/07)
2007 Mar 28, Sudan and the UN
signed an agreement to guarantee humanitarian access to refugees in
Darfur. UN chief Ban Ki-moon tried to persuade President Omar
al-Bashir to accept UN peacekeepers in Darfur, hours after al-Bashir
flatly rejected the deployment.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 30, Authorities
arrested a man armed with a knife who hijacked a Sudan Airways plane
while flying from Libya to Sudan.
(AP, 3/30/07)
2007 Mar 31, In western Sudan
at least 62 people were killed and 21 wounded in an attack on an
Arab tribe in the Darfur region.
(AFP, 4/1/07)
2007 Apr 1, Unidentified gunmen
killed five African Union soldiers guarding a "water point" near the
Sudan’s border with Chad in the deadliest attack on the peacekeepers
since their deployment in 2004. The attackers fled the scene after
AU troops killed three of them in an exchange of fire.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, In Sudan 53 people
were killed in a gruesome pair of minibus accidents north of
Khartoum.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 6, A Chinese
delegation arrived in Sudan's troubled Darfur region for a 4-day
visit. They met officials and visited camps for the internally
displaced.
(AP, 4/8/07)
2007 Apr 9, A Sudanese army
spokesman said 17 Sudanese soldiers were killed in clashes with
Chadian troops inside Sudanese territory.
(Reuters, 4/9/07)
2007 Apr 9, China urged Sudan
to be more flexible on a plan put forward by former UN chief Kofi
Annan to bolster peacekeeping operations in the war-torn western
region of Darfur.
(AFP, 4/9/07)
2007 Apr 10, South African
President Thabo Mbeki arrived in Khartoum to join the international
push for UN peacekeepers in Darfur, amid fears of a regional
spillover after clashes between Sudan and Chad. Officials said the
UN, the African Union and the Sudanese government have reached
agreement to beef up the African force in Sudan's violence-wracked
Darfur region with UN troops, police and equipment.
(AP, 4/10/07)
2007 Apr 11, At least 40
civilians were killed and 25 wounded in an attack believed to have
be carried out by the Janjaweed militia in the war-torn Darfur
region.
(AFP, 4/16/07)
2007 Apr 13, A landmine killed
nine Sudanese army soldiers and wounded 11 on Sudan's eastern border
with Ethiopia.
(AP, 4/14/07)
2007 Apr 14, In Sudan
unidentified gunmen killed a Ghanaian military officer in the
African Union's peacekeeping force in the Darfur region and hijacked
his car within yards of the AU mission's headquarters. The dead
officer was the ninth peacekeeper slain this month, raising to 18
the number of AU soldiers killed since the mission deployed in 2004.
(AP, 4/15/07)
2007 Apr 15, The official Saudi
news agency reported that Sudan has signed a joint agreement with
the UN and the African Union that defines their respective roles in
Darfur.
(AP, 4/16/07)
2007 Apr 16, Foreign Minister
Lam Akol said Sudan will accept UN attack helicopters in its Darfur
region as part of a support package for the African Union force
struggling to maintain peace in its vast west. US Deputy Secretary
of State John Negroponte said the janjaweed militia, accused of
widespread atrocities in Darfur, is actively supported by the
Sudanese government.
(Reuters, 4/16/07)
2007 Apr 19, A Sudanese rebel
group said government aircraft destroyed a village in northern
Darfur in an air strike.
(Reuters, 4/19/07)
2007 Apr 19, British aerospace
engine maker Rolls-Royce said that it will withdraw from Sudan,
citing "increasing international humanitarian concerns" in the
violence-scarred region of Darfur.
(AP, 4/19/07)
2007 Apr 21, Eritrean President
Issaias Afeworki arrived in Sudan determined to kick-start talks to
end the violence in Darfur.
(AFP, 4/21/07)
2007 Apr 23, A top Sudanese
government official offered a two-month halt in military operations
in strife-torn Darfur to allow for rebel groups to join the peace
process.
(AP, 4/23/07)
2007 Apr 25, The UN food agency
said Sudanese authorities were holding up to 100,000 tons of sorghum
meant for Darfur, alleging that it is genetically modified.
Laboratory tests had shown it was not genetically modified.
(Reuters, 4/26/07)
2007 Apr 28, Actors and
musicians including Elton John, George Clooney, Bob Geldof and Mick
Jagger called on world leaders to take "decisive action" over
atrocities in Darfur. Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi urged African,
Arab and Western diplomats to work with Sudanese rebels to find an
immediate solution to the crisis in Sudan's troubled Darfur region.
(AP, 4/28/07)
2007 Apr 29, Protests took
place around the world to demand that world leaders act to prevent
further bloodshed in Darfur on the fourth anniversary of the
conflict's start.
(AP, 4/29/07)
2007 Apr 30, The Sudanese armed
forces vowed to "crush" a coalition of rebel groups in Darfur for
killing an officer whose helicopter had landed in north Darfur after
a technical failure.
(Reuters, 4/30/07)
2007 May 2, The International
Criminal Court in the Hague said it has issued arrest warrants
for the Sudanese government's humanitarian affairs minister and a
janjaweed militia leader suspected of committing war crimes in
Darfur.
(AP, 5/2/07)
2007 May 3, African neighbors
Sudan and Chad signed a Saudi-brokered reconciliation deal in Saudi
Arabia, requiring both sides to cooperate with the United Nations to
stabilize Darfur and the adjacent region in Chad.
(AP, 5/3/07)
2007 May 5, In southern Sudan
an attack by one tribe left 54 members of another tribe dead, mainly
women.
(AP, 8/24/07)
2007 May 8, Amnesty Int’l. said
in a report that China and Russia are supplying arms to Sudan that
are being used to fuel the violence in the Darfur region in
violation of a UN arms embargo. China and Russia quickly rejected
the report and Sudan's government said it was "not justified." China
confirmed it would send military engineers for a planned UN
peacekeeping force to Sudan's Darfur region.
(AP, 5/8/07)
2007 May 10, China, criticized
for not pushing its close ally Sudan to resolve the Darfur crisis,
said that it had appointed a special representative on African
affairs to focus on the issue.
(AP, 5/10/07)
2007 May 14, EU foreign
ministers gave the green light for a 40-million euro aid package to
the African Union peacekeeping force in the troubled Sudanese
province of Darfur.
(AP, 5/14/07)
2007 May 18, The UN accused
Sudan government forces of direct involvement in recent
machine-gunning of Darfur villages that left at least 100 dead.
(WSJ, 5/19/07, p.A1)
2007 May 21, US Democratic
presidential hopeful Joseph Biden called for US troops to help quell
the violence in Sudan's Darfur region, drawing a strong rebuke from
Sudan's UN envoy.
(AP, 5/21/07)
2007 May 26, Egyptian
Lieutenant Colonel Ihab Ahmed, a UN peacekeeper, died after he was
shot during a robbery at his residence in El Fasher. Ahmed, part of
a small group of reinforcements sent to Darfur, became the UN's
first casualty since its arrival in the region.
(AP, 5/26/07)
2007 May 29, President Bush
ordered new US economic sanctions to pressure Sudan's government to
halt the bloodshed in Darfur.
(AP, 5/29/07)
2007 Jun 1, The UN refugee
agency said hundreds of women and children fled by foot and on
donkeys from Darfur to the neighboring Central African Republic
after their town was attacked by planes and helicopters. The
refugees said their town of Dafak, in southern Darfur, was attacked
repeatedly by janjaweed militia from May 12 to May 18 and that their
homes had been bombarded by airstrikes.
(AP, 6/1/07)
2007 Jun 1, The African Union
objected to a proposal for a 23,000-strong AU-U.N. force to help end
the bloodshed in Sudan's troubled Darfur region because it would
give the United Nations command and control.
(AP, 6/2/07)
2007 Jun 3, In Libya African
leaders sought to reconcile differences between neighbors Chad and
Sudan over Darfur and boost Somalia's embattled transitional
government at a regional summit.
(AFP, 6/3/07)
2007 Jun 6, The UN and African
Union chief executives resolved a dispute over command of a proposed
joint military force to help end bloodshed in Darfur, but the deal
still must be approved by their organizations' security councils and
Sudan's government.
(AP, 6/6/07)
2007 Jun 12, Sudan agreed to a
"hybrid" UN-AU force of between 17,000 and 19,000 troops and an
additional 3,700 police. Some diplomats feared conditions may be
attached.
(Reuters, 6/13/07)
2007 Jun 13, Sudan’s foreign
ministry said Sudan has formally rejected an international
conference on Darfur to be held in Paris this month because it was
not consulted beforehand.
(AP, 6/13/07)
2007 Jun 14, Sudan’s press
reported that 4 people were killed and at least 10 wounded when
police dispersed residents in the Kijbar region of north Sudan
protesting a dam project which they say will destroy their
community.
(AFP, 6/14/07)
2007 Jun 21, China's special
envoy on Darfur said his country will seriously consider sending
troops for a peacekeeping mission in the war-torn Sudanese region
and insisted Beijing is doing its best to help solve the conflict.
(AP, 6/21/07)
2007 Jun 23, Sudan’s oil
production stood at 480,000 barrels per day with proven reserves at
1.6 billion barrels.
(Econ, 6/23/07, p.54)
2007 Jun 27, Majzub al-Khalifa,
a close adviser to Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir tasked with
handling the Darfur crisis, was killed in a road crash.
(AFP, 6/27/07)
2007 Jun 28, In Sudan China's
No. 1 oil company, CNPC, and Indonesia's PT Pertamina agreed to
co-develop a Sudanese offshore oil block, ignoring international
efforts to isolate Sudan over the crisis in its Darfur region.
(AP, 7/1/07)
2007 Jul 10, Sudan’s head of
the civil defense authority said flash floods across central and
eastern Sudan have killed 20 people and destroyed 15,000 houses, and
predicted worse weather conditions to come.
(Reuters, 7/10/07)
2007 Jul 12, Sudan’s Interior
Ministry said flash floods across central and eastern Sudan have
killed 30 people and destroyed 25,000 houses.
(AFP, 7/12/07)
2007 Jul 13, Andrew Natsios,
the US envoy to Sudan, accused the country's government of resuming
bombing civilian positions in its troubled Darfur region, and warned
of a "disturbing" trend of Arab groups resettling in the area.
(AP, 7/13/07)
2007 Jul 14, Sudan arrested 14
alleged plotters including retired army officers. The next day the
interior ministry accused an opposition leader of heading a plot to
overthrow the regime by creating armed chaos that would lead to
international intervention.
(AFP, 7/15/07)
2007 Jul 15, UN and African
Union representatives gathered in Tripoli to evaluate Darfur.
(AP, 7/15/07)
2007 Jul 19, Sudan’s head of
civil defense said more than 50 people have been killed and 20
injured in the worst floods in living memory which have partially or
completely destroyed 18,000 homes.
(Reuters, 7/19/07)
2007 Jul 21, Sudanese President
Omar al-Bashir, implicated by many in the international community in
Darfur's genocide, visited the troubled region for the first time in
the four-year conflict there.
(AP, 7/21/07)
2007 Jul 22, Egyptian police
shot and killed a Sudanese woman (28) and seriously wounded four
others on the Sinai Peninsula as they tried to sneak into Israel.
They were among 27 Darfur refugees caught by border guards in the
desert after paying 700 dollars (500 euros) to a Bedouin smuggler.
(AP, 7/22/07)(AFP, 7/24/07)
2007 Jul 23, The European Union
took the first step towards sending forces to Chad and the Central
African Republican to help the United Nations protect refugees
trapped in the violent region bordering Darfur.
(AP, 7/23/07)
2007 Jul 25, Sudanese papers
reported that another 16 people died in clashes between the two
tribes when Aballa men fell on a band of Torjum, killing nine.
(AFP, 7/31/07)
2007 Jul 27, Sudan said it
would appeal a US ruling ordering it to pay $7.9 million in
compensation to the families of the 17 sailors killed in the October
2000 bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen. The bombing was carried out
by two Yemeni militants with Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network who
had trained in Sudan. US federal Judge Robert Doumar ruled in
mid-March that Sudan should be held accountable for the attack, and
on July 25 ruled that it must pay compensation to the families.
(AP, 7/27/07)
2007 Jul 31, A senior Sudanese
official said floods and heavy rains have caused 23,000 mudbrick
homes to collapse and killed at least 62 people across Sudan this
month. In southern Darfur Mahria Arab tribesmen attacked Terjem
Arabs killing over 60 Terjem. Conflict between Arab tribes was on
the increase and included clashes between the Habanniya and Salamat
tribes.
(AP, 7/31/07)(SFC, 9/3/07, p.A16)
2007 Aug 1, Rebels captured the
town of Adila, where Sudanese troops were stationed to protect the
only railway linking Darfur to the capital of Khartoum. Some 100
(Sudanese) soldiers or janjaweed were killed in the fighting.
(AP, 8/10/07)
2007 Aug 1, Denmark, France and
Indonesia offered to contribute to a joint UN-African Union mission
for Darfur, a 26,000-strong force expected to be made up mostly of
peacekeepers from Africa with backup from Asian troops. Sudan
accepted a UN resolution approving a joint African Union-UN
peacekeeping force in Darfur.
(AP, 8/1/07)(AFP, 8/1/07)
2007 Aug 3, In Tanzania
Darfur's fractious rebel groups gathered for talks aimed at
hammering out a united front, following UN approval of a beefed up
peacekeeping mission in the Sudanese region.
(AP, 8/3/07)
2007 Aug 5, Darfur's fractious
rebel groups held a third day of reconciliation talks in Tanzania in
a bid to present a united front at future peace talks with Khartoum.
(AP, 8/5/07)
2007 Aug 6, In Tanzania
Darfur's rebel groups concluded four days of talks by agreeing on a
common platform to soon enter final peace negotiations with the
Sudanese government.
(AFP, 8/6/07)
2007 Aug 7, Darfur rebel
commanders shot down a government MiG 29 plane they say was bombing
civilian villages in their areas in Sudan's Darfur region.
(Reuters, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 9, The International
Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies more than doubled
its Sudan floods appeal to almost 5.5 million Swiss francs (4.6
million dollars, 3.3 million euros) after flood waters rose above
levels set in 1988.
(AP, 8/9/07)
2007 Aug 10, The Sudanese Media
Centre said security forces have handed 33 suspects accused of
trying to overthrow the government to the justice ministry for
investigation.
(Reuters, 8/10/07)
2007 Aug 10, Malawi said it
will deploy 800 troops to Darfur in Sudan to serve in the future
United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force.
(AFP, 8/10/07)
2007 Aug 11, A security
official said disarmament has finally started in south Sudan's state
of Eastern Equatoria under a 2005 peace deal now it has been made
possible by the departure of Ugandan rebels.
(Reuters, 8/12/07)
2007 Aug 17, Saudi King
Abdullah ordered two aid packages worth 20 million dollars each be
dispatched to Sudan and Mauritania to help the impoverished African
countries hit by severe floods.
(AFP, 8/17/07)
2007 Aug 19, In Sudan armed
raiders killed a policeman and wounded four others in an attack on a
refugee camp in Darfur.
(Reuters, 8/20/07)
2007 Aug 19, Israel said it
would expel refugees from Sudan's war torn Darfur region, touching
off hot debate over whether the Jewish state, founded after the Nazi
genocide, has a duty to take in people fleeing persecution.
(AP, 8/19/07)
2007 Aug 21, Sudanese forces
surrounded and attacked Darfur's most volatile camp to flush out
rebels they say are behind recent attacks on police.
(AP, 8/21/07)
2007 Aug 23, Sudan summoned the
envoy of the European Commission and the Canadian charge d'affaires
and informed them they were considered persona non grata because
they interfered in Sudanese affairs. The UN chief called on the
Sudanese military to remove troops remaining in southern Sudan,
expressing disappointment that a July 9 deadline was not met as
called for in a 2005 peace deal.
(AFP, 8/24/07)(AP, 8/24/07)
2007 Aug 23, Rwanda's exiled
opposition groups dismissed as insulting the appointment of General
Kerenzi Karake, a Rwandan general, as deputy chief of a planned
peace force for Sudan's war-torn Darfur region.
(AFP, 8/23/07)
2007 Aug 25, Sudan said it will
allow an EU envoy it ordered out of the country to remain until his
tenure expires next month, following an EU apology.
(AP, 8/25/07)
2007 Aug 27, A Sudanese
criminal court dismissed the case against nine people on trial in
connection with the beheading of Mohammed Taha, a prominent
journalist, and brought formal charges against 10 other defendants.
CARE’s country director Paul Barker said the Sudanese government's
Humanitarian Aid Commission had given him 72 hours to leave the
country without giving reasons for the decision.
(AP, 8/27/07)(Reuters, 8/27/07)
2007 Aug 29, JEM and Sudan
Liberation Movement (SLM) attacked an army base in the Kordofan
region next to Darfur, which they said was the logistical and supply
centre for ongoing attacks in South Darfur. The rebels said 15
soldiers were killed. The government later reported that 41 people
were killed in the Kordofan region. Officials said floods across
Sudan have killed 101 people, spread disease and destroyed
livelihoods by wiping out agricultural crops.
(Reuters, 8/29/07)(Reuters, 8/30/07)(Reuters,
9/1/07)
2007 Aug 30, Darfur rebels
accused the Sudanese government of bombing South Darfur, the latest
attack in an aerial campaign that has driven thousands of people
from their homes over the past month.
(Reuters, 8/30/07)
2007 Sep 3, UN Secretary
General Ban Ki-moon arrived in Sudan in a bid to jumpstart the peace
process in strife-torn Darfur ahead of a massive joint UN-African
Union peacekeeping operation.
(AFP, 9/3/07)
2007 Sep 5, Interior Minister
Meir Sheetrit said Israel will grant citizenship to some of the
estimated 300 refugees from Sudan's violence-ridden Darfur region
who have already arrived.
(AP, 9/5/07)
2007 Sep 9, Southern Sudanese
officials said government troops have agreed to end their siege of
61 south Sudanese soldiers, resolving a stand-off that risked
undermining the north-south peace deal.
(Reuters, 9/9/07)
2007 Sep 10, Sudanese
government forces resumed air strikes in Darfur with an attack on a
town that killed more than a dozen civilians.
(AP, 9/10/07)
2007 Sep 14, Sudan's President
Omar al-Bashir said his government is ready to implement a
cease-fire with rebel forces at the start of peace talks over the
conflict in Darfur, scheduled for next month in Libya.
(AP, 9/14/07)
2007 Sep 21, The Red Cross
warned that a massive aid effort is needed to cope with floods in 18
countries across Africa that have already affected at least 1.5
million people and killed at least 270 in Ghana, Kenya, Somalia,
Sudan, Togo, Uganda and other countries.
(AFP, 9/21/07)
2007 Sep 22, To date 144
countries had ratified the UN Convention Against Torture. Holdouts
included Sudan, North Korea, Myanmar, Zimbabwe and India.
(Econ, 9/22/07, p.72)
2007 Sep 24, A group of UN
experts monitoring Darfur said that serious human rights violations
appeared to be continuing in the strife-torn western Sudanese
region.
(AP, 9/24/07)
2007 Sep 25, Darfur rebel
leader Khalil Ibrahim said he would carry on fighting during
upcoming peace talks until a final settlement is reached to end the
conflict in western Sudan.
(AP, 9/25/07)
2007 Sep 25, The UN Security
Council unanimously passed a French resolution endorsing sending a
European Union-UN force to Chad and the Central African Republic to
protect civilians reeling from a spillover of the Darfur conflict.
(AP, 9/25/07)
2007 Sep 29, In Sudan a large
force of rebels stormed an African Union peacekeeping base in
Haskanita, Darfur, killing 12 soldiers and wounding 8 others in the
biggest attack on the mission so far. More than 50 AU peacekeepers
and support personnel were missing in action. In 2009 the
International Criminal Court (ICC) said fighters commanded by Darfur
rebel chief Bahar Idriss Abu Garda brutally murdered 12 African
peacekeepers before looting their camp. In 2010 Abdallah Banda
Abakaer Nourain and Saleh Mohammed Jerbo Jamus, suspected in the
deadly attack, voluntarily surrendered in the Netherlands to the
International Criminal Court to face war crimes charges.
(AP, 9/30/07)(Reuters, 10/8/07)(AFP,
10/19/09)(AP, 6/16/10)
2007 Oct 1, Sudan's Pres. Omar
Hassan al-Bashir, during talks with members of a visiting group of
elder statesmen, promised to pay $300 million in compensation to the
country's war-torn Darfur region, tripling a previous pledge. This
was made public 2 days later by former US President Jimmy Carter,
one of the visiting elders.
(Reuters, 10/3/07)
2007 Oct 1, The African Union
began probing an unprecedented attack on one of its bases in Sudan's
war-ravaged Darfur that left 10 peacekeepers dead and 40 missing,
vowing to punish those responsible.
(AP, 10/1/07)
2007 Oct 2, A group of elder
statesmen, including former President Carter and Nobel peace
laureate Desmond Tutu, began a tour of Darfur to promote a political
solution to the region's conflict.
(AP, 10/2/07)
2007 Oct 4, Prominent world
figures led by former President Carter and Desmond Tutu of South
Africa said they were shocked by the suffering in Darfur and
criticized Sudan's government in exceptionally harsh terms.
(AP, 10/4/07)
2007 Oct 4, Ethiopia pledged
5,000 troops to a future UN-African Union peacekeeping mission for
Darfur.
(AP, 10/4/07)
2007 Oct 6, A UN inspection
team found the Darfur town of Haskanita, under the control of
Sudanese troops, burned down. The destruction of the town was in
apparent retaliation for the Sep 29 rebel attack on an African Union
peacekeeping base in which 10 AU troops were killed. 7,000 residents
were forced to flee the area.
(Reuters, 10/7/07)(WSJ, 10/8/07, p.A1)
2007 Oct 8, Sudan said it will
host hundreds of Palestinian refugees who have been stranded in
terrible conditions on Iraq's border with Syria and Jordan.
(Reuters, 10/8/07)
2007 Oct 8, Sudanese government
troops and allied militia attacked a town belonging to the only
Darfur rebel faction to sign a 2006 peace deal. The assault killed
at least 45 people in the Darfur town of Muhajiriya, where bodies
littered the streets amid burned out buildings. The Sudan Liberation
Army (SLA) said five SLA soldiers were killed and eight injured. A
key Darfur rebel leader accused the Sudanese army of burning
Haskanita in the troubled region, killing up to 100 people in
retaliation for an attack on African Union troops.
(Reuters, 10/8/07)(Reuters, 10/9/07)
2007 Oct 11, Southern Sudan's
former rebels suspended participation in the central government,
accusing it of failing to abide by a peace deal in a dispute that
threatens a rare success in the troubled nation.
(AP, 10/11/07)
2007 Oct 14, Former rebels from
south Sudan delivered a letter to Khartoum detailing their demands
for resolving a crisis sparked by the southerners' pullout from the
unity government.
(AP, 10/14/07)
2007 Oct 15,
Representatives of seven Darfur rebel groups met in south
Sudan to try to reach a common negotiating position ahead of peace
talks with the government.
(Reuters, 10/15/07)
2007 Oct 15, European Union
foreign ministers gave their final approval to deploy a 3,000-strong
EU peacekeeping force for one year to help refugees and displaced
people living along Darfur's borders with Chad and the Central
African Republic.
(AP, 10/15/07)
2007 Oct 16, In Sudan 2 truck
drivers working for the UN's World Food Program were killed in an
ambush near the South Darfur town of Ed Daien. A 3rd was killed on
Oct 12.
(AP, 10/17/07)
2007 Oct 17,
Sudan's former southern rebels said they would rejoin the
national government to work through a stalemate on implementing a
2005 peace deal which ended Africa's longest civil war.
(AP, 10/17/07)
2007 Oct 18,
Crisis talks between Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir and
southern leader Salva Kiir ended without agreement on getting his
former rebels to rejoin the unity government they quit a week ago.
(AFP, 10/18/07)
2007 Oct 21,
Sudanese government officials said around 50 people have been
killed in three days of tribal clashes in the central region of
Kordofan.
(AP, 10/21/07)
2007 Oct 21,
Thousands of British Muslims gathered for a charity peace
concert dubbed "Muslim Live 8" to raise money for victims of Sudan's
long-running Darfur conflict.
(AP, 10/21/07)
2007 Oct 23,
A new Bin Laden tape called for foreign forces to be driven
from Darfur. The Justice and Equality Movement, one of the leading
Darfur rebel groups, attacked the Defra oil field in Sudan’s
Kordofan region and abducted 2 foreign workers. A rebel chief gave a
one-week ultimatum for foreign oil companies to cease operating in
the zone.
(SFC, 10/24/07, p.A3)(AP, 10/25/07)
2007 Oct 27, Sudan's government
and some rebel groups began talks in Libya to end 4-1/2 years of
conflict in Darfur. Sudan's government committed to a cease-fire in
Darfur, but mediators and journalists outnumbered the few rebels who
did not boycott the UN-sponsored negotiations, reducing hopes for an
end to the fighting. According to 2 rebel factions Sudan’s
government attacked the Jabel Moun area along the Chad-Sudan border.
(Reuters, 10/27/07)(AP, 10/28/07)(Reuters,
10/29/07)
2007 Oct 28, UN-brokered peace
talks ground to a halt, with officials saying there could be no key
steps until the fighters decided how to negotiate with the Sudanese
government.
(AP, 10/28/07)
2007 Nov 2, Sudan’s President
Omar al-Beshir reached agreement with southern leader Salva Kiir,
who is also first vice president, that all provisions of the
Comprehensive Peace Agreement would now be implemented by the end of
the year.
(AFP, 11/3/07)
2007 Nov 6, Sudanese President
Omar al-Beshir met with South African President Thabo Mbeki in Cape
Town for talks on the situation in war-torn Darfur and political
upheaval in Khartoum.
(AP, 11/6/07)
2007 Nov 7, The UN said the
governor of South Darfur ordered the UN humanitarian director to
leave the state, which has been the scene of recent fighting. South
Darfur's Governor Ali Mahmood Mohammed said in a letter that Wael
Al-Haj Ibrahim, a Canadian, "was not complying with the Humanitarian
Act," but he didn't elaborate.
(AP, 11/7/07)
2007 Nov 12, A Darfur rebel
group freed five workers, including two foreigners, taken hostage in
a rare attack on a Sudanese oil installation almost three weeks ago.
(AFP, 11/12/07)
2007 Nov 13, Six breakaway
factions from one of Darfur's biggest rebel groups and two other
insurgent forces said they had united under one banner, in a rare
but tentative show of unity in the troubled region.
(Reuters, 11/13/07)
2007 Nov 17, Sudan’s President
Omar al-Beshir ordered the reopening of auxiliary training camps to
prepare for war and refused to accept certain countries from sending
peacekeepers to Darfur. Beshir said the "boots of those who attacked
the prophet Mohammed would never trample on Sudanese land". He was
referring to Swedes and Norwegians who want to participate in a
UN-African Union hybrid force set to deploy to Darfur. Beshir also
said Sudan would not allow Nepal or Thailand to send troops to
Darfur, although he agreed with the UN for engineering troops to
arrive from China and Pakistan.
(AFP, 11/17/07)
2007 Nov 18, Two Sudanese
journalists from the independent Al-Sudani newspaper were jailed
after refusing to pay a fine for an article about the arrest of
other journalists.
(AP, 11/18/07)
2007 Nov 22, The World Health
Organization said an outbreak of Rift Valley Fever in Sudan has
killed 164 people.
(AP, 11/22/07)
2007 Nov 23, Sudan's Pres. Omar
al-Beshir said he would not accept non-African troops in a combined
United Nations/African Union peacekeeping force in Darfur, apart
from Chinese and Pakistani technical units already committed.
(Reuters, 11/23/07)
2007 Nov 24, More than 100
Chinese engineers arrived in Sudan's war-torn Darfur as part of the
vanguard for a joint African Union-UN peacekeeping mission to be in
place next year. Rebels demanded Beijing pull its peacekeepers out
of Darfur, just hours after a unit of Chinese army engineers
arrived.
(AFP, 11/24/07)(AP, 11/25/07)
2007 Nov 25, In Sudan Gillian
Gibbons (54), a British teacher, was put under detention for
allegedly insulting Islam's prophet by allowing children to call a
teddy bear Mohammed. She was arrested because of a complaint under
Article 125 of the penal code, which provides punishment for
publicly insulting or degrading any religion, its rites, beliefs and
sacred items or humiliating its believers. On Nov 28 Sudan charged
Gibbons with inciting religious hatred.
(AFP, 11/26/07)(AP, 11/27/07)(AP, 11/28/07)
2007 Nov 29, Gillian Gibbons,
the British teacher arrested in Sudan on Nov 25 for insulting Islam
by allowing her students to name a teddy bear "Muhammad," was
sentenced to 15 days in prison and deportation. She avoided the more
serious punishment of 40 lashes. Gibbons was pardoned after spending
more than a week in custody; she then left the country.
(AP, 11/30/07)(AP, 11/29/08)
2007 Nov 30, Thousands of
Sudanese, many armed with clubs and knives, rallied in a central
square and demanded the execution of a British teacher convicted of
insulting Islam for allowing her students to name a teddy bear
"Muhammad."
(AP, 11/30/07)
2007 Dec 2, Defense lawyers
said Sudan has authorized the release of Mubarak al-Fadil, a
high-profile opposition leader detained for more than four months.
Fadil is the leader of the opposition Umma Party for Renewal and
Reform and the cousin of former PM Sadig al-Mahdi.
(AP, 12/2/07)
2007 Dec 3, Sudan's president
pardoned Gillian Gibbons, the British teacher jailed for insulting
Islam after allowing her students to name a teddy bear Muhammad.
Gibbons arrived back in England the next day.
(AP, 12/3/07)(AP, 12/4/07)
2007 Dec 4, UN human rights
experts said Sudanese forces and allied militia have killed several
hundred civilians in ground attacks and aerial bombardments on
villages in Darfur in the past six months.
(Reuters, 12/4/07)
2007 Dec 11, Darfur rebel group
the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) said it had attacked and
taken over a Chinese-run oilfield in central Sudan.
(AP, 12/11/07)
2007 Dec 12, North and south
Sudanese leaders said they had resolved almost all their differences
and that the former rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement would
soon rejoin the unity cabinet.
(AP, 12/12/07)
2007 Dec 16, Darfur rebels said
they had inflicted a crushing defeat on Sudan's army in West Darfur
in an overnight battle during which they captured 29 soldiers, 32
vehicles and heavy weaponry.
(Reuters, 12/16/07)
2007 Dec 24, Southern army
officials said militias supported by Khartoum's army have attacked
southern Sudanese soldiers near the north-south border killing
dozens of people.
(AP, 12/24/07)
2007 Dec 27, South Sudanese
former rebels rejoined the national government, two months after
walking out because of disputes over the implementation of a peace
deal that ended two decades of war.
(AFP, 12/27/07)
2007 Dec 29, Sudan accused
Chadian aircraft of bombing its western Darfur region in what it
called "repeated aggressions" by its western neighbor. a Sudanese
foreign ministry statement said 3 Chadian war planes bombed two
areas in West Darfur on December 28.
(AFP, 12/30/07)
2007 Dec 30, Local media
reported dozens of people have been killed in fighting between Arab
tribesmen and ex-rebel south Sudanese forces along the line
separating north and south Sudan.
(AFP, 12/30/07)
2007 Dec 31, In Sudan the
African Union transferred authority to a new joint peacekeeping
force with the UN in Darfur. An AU official said Ethiopia and Egypt
will each send 850 troops early in the new year to serve with a
joint UN-AU force in the Darfur region.
(AP, 12/31/07)(Reuters, 12/31/07)
2007 Dec 31, President George
W. Bush signed into a law a measure aimed at allowing states, local
governments, mutual funds and pension funds to divest from Sudan
businesses, particularly its oil sectors.
(Reuters, 12/31/07)
2007 M.W. Daly authored
“Darfur’s Sorrow: A History of Destruction and Genocide.
(Econ, 8/18/07, p.75)
2008 Jan 1, In Sudan an
American diplomat and his driver were shot to death in Khartoum.
John Granville (33), an official for the US Agency for International
Development, was being driven home at about 4 a.m. when another
vehicle cut off his car and opened fire before fleeing the scene. A
group calling itself Ansar al-Tawhid later claimed responsibility
for the murder. On Feb 9 Sudanese security forces arrested two
suspects in the murder. On Sep 20 five Sudanese Islamists admitted
in filmed statements their role in murdering Granville and his
driver. They were formally charged on Feb 5, 2009. On June 24 four
Islamists were sentenced to death. A 5th man was sentenced to 2
years in prison for providing a weapon.
(AP, 1/1/08)(AP, 1/2/08)(AFP, 1/5/08)(AP,
2/10/08)(AP, 9/21/08)(AP, 2/5/09)(AFP, 6/24/09)
2008 Jan 2, Darfur rebels in
Sudan said they had taken a town around Geneina, the main city of
west Darfur which they claim to have surrounded.
(AFP, 1/2/08)
2008 Jan 3, South Sudanese
officials said North Sudanese troops have missed a third deadline to
fully redeploy from the south following over two decades of
north-south civil war that ended in 2005.
(AP, 1/3/08)
2008 Jan 4, Fresh fighting
erupted between southern Sudanese forces and Khartoum-backed Arab
tribesmen near key oil areas of the country, former southern rebels
said, further denting hopes of an end to north-south hostilities.
(AP, 1/4/08)
2008 Jan 7, Armed men opened
fire on a UN/African Union supply convoy in Sudan's war-torn Darfur
region, the first attack on the newly formed joint peacekeeping
mission. On Jan 10 Sudan admitted that its troops had opened
fire on a joint UN/African Union peacekeeping convoy in Darfur
saying the attack was the result of a "shared mistake."
(Reuters, 1/8/08)(Reuters, 1/10/08)
2008 Jan 9, Norway and Sweden
dropped plans to send some 400 troops to the UN peacekeeping force
in Darfur because of opposition by Sudan.
(WSJ, 1/10/07, p.A1)
2008 Jan 14, A rebel chief said
Sudanese warplanes have been bombing rebel positions around the town
of Geneina for the past three days in a bid to break the siege on
the West Darfur state capital. Local media said gunmen stormed a
Darfur prison, setting free at least 90 detainees, as sporadic
violence continued to erupt throughout the western Sudanese region.
A UN official in South Darfur said the attack appeared to have been
conducted by fighters from the Salamat tribe of nomadic Arabs, who
escaped with several of the detainees also believed to be Salamat.
The Salamat and other Darfur nomadic tribes are among the groups
suspected of belonging to the janjaweed.
(AFP, 1/14/08)(AP, 1/14/08)
2008 Jan 15, A southern
official said in the local press that troops from northern Sudan are
hiding out in bushes of south Sudan in defiance of a peace deal
requirement to withdraw.
(AFP, 1/15/08)
2008 Jan 21, Sudan confirmed
that it has appointed Musa Hilal, the suspected head of a Sudanese
militia accused of murder, rape and other atrocities in Darfur, to a
senior government post. President Omar al-Bashir dismissed
allegations against the man as untrue.
(AP, 1/21/08)
2008 Jan 22, According to
anti-Khartoum Sudanese rebels armed militias backed by Sudan's
government killed 21 people in an attack on Sureif Judad, a village
in West Darfur.
(Reuters, 1/27/08)
2008 Jan 28, The EU launched
its long-awaited peacekeeping force for Chad and the Central African
Republic to help protect hundreds of thousands of refugees from
strife-torn Darfur.
(AFP, 1/28/08)
2008 Feb 3, Chadian forces
backed by tanks and helicopter gunships struggled to repel a rebel
assault on the capital, and insurgents claimed to have trapped the
president in his palace. Chadian rebels, reportedly backed by
Sudanese military aircraft, launched an attack on the eastern town
of Adre, which borders on Sudan's Darfur region.
(AP, 2/3/08)(AFP, 2/3/08)
2008 Feb 5, UN officials said
Ethiopia and Bangladesh have offered to jump-start the UN
peacekeeping mission in Darfur by loaning it helicopters to fly
troops and supplies around the vast region in western Sudan.
(AP, 2/5/08)
2008 Feb 7, Chadian President
Idriss Deby Itno issued a "solemn call" for a European peacekeeping
force for Darfur refugees, to deploy as soon as possible. The
president also said he was "ready to pardon" six French aid workers
convicted in December of trying to kidnap more than 100 children
they said were orphans from Darfur.
(AP, 2/7/08)(AFP, 2/7/08)
2008 Feb 4, Ugandan rebels from
the Lord's Resistance Army killed 136 people and looted property
during an attack in and around Kajo-Keji in southern Sudan. In March
officials said Sudanese renegades frustrated with not being absorbed
into the military -- and not Ugandan rebels initially suspected --
were behind the attacks in south Sudan.
(AFP, 2/8/08)(AFP, 3/15/08)
2008 Feb 8, The Sudanese
military said it bombed 3 towns in West Darfur while striking at
rebel forces. Rebels said Sudanese government aircraft, army and
militia attacked towns in West Darfur state, causing heavy civilian
casualties. A rebel chief said Sudanese troops backed by Janjaweed
militia left at least 150 dead and wounded in the assault. A
Sudanese employee of the International Committee of the Red Cross
(ICRC) was killed in Darfur. On March 20 the UN accused the Sudanese
army of looting towns and raping girls and women during the attacks
on Sirba, Sileia and Abu Suruj. The attacks killed at least 115
people and caused some 30,000 to flee their homes.
(AP, 2/8/08)(AFP, 2/8/08)(AFP, 2/12/08)(SFC,
3/21/08, p.A11)
2008 Feb 9, Sudan and the
African Union-UN peacekeeping mission for Darfur signed an agreement
determining how the joint force will operate, capping weeks of
drawn-out negotiations.
(AP, 2/10/08)
2008 Feb 10, The UN refugee
agency said up to 12,000 "terrified" refugees from Sudan's Darfur
region have fled across the border to neighboring Chad after the
latest air strikes by the Sudanese military and thousands more may
be on their way.
(AP, 2/10/08)
2008 Feb 11, Chad's PM Nouradin
Koumakoye demanded that the international community remove refugees
who have fled to Chad from Sudan's Darfur region.
(AP, 2/11/08)
2008 Feb 12, The EU resumed
deployment of a much-awaited peacekeeping force for two countries
neighboring Sudan's troubled Darfur region.
(AP, 2/12/08)
2008 Feb 19, Sudan's army
clashed with Darfur rebels in the mountainous Jabel Moun area in a
government offensive to reclaim the West Darfur area from insurgents
who took up arms five years ago.
(AP, 2/19/08)
2008 Feb 26, The deadly
conflict in Darfur entered its sixth year with no solution in sight,
as Khartoum continued to resist the full deployment of a
peacekeeping force amid a fresh wave of bombings.
(AP, 2/26/08)
2008 Feb 27, In Sudan
unidentified gunmen attacked a village in Darfur, killing about 20
civilians. A Darfur rebel group blamed pro-government militiamen for
the dawn raid.
(AP, 2/28/08)
2008 Feb 29, The UN refugee
agency said that 3,000 refugees from Darfur have arrived in Chad in
the last week, bringing the total number to over 13,000 in February
alone.
(AFP, 2/29/08)
2008 Mar 1, At least 69 nomads
and nine soldiers were killed were killed in clashes with forces
from the ex-rebel Sudan People's Liberation Army in southern Sudan.
(AFP, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 3, The UN in Sudan
accused a rebel group of blocking access to a mountainous area in
Darfur where 20,000 people are trapped after fighting between
government and rebels.
(Reuters, 3/3/08)
2008 Mar 4, In southern Sudan
activists warned that the 2006 arrival of White Nile Petroleum
Company (WNPOC), a consortium led by Malaysia's Petronas, in Unity
State threatens the Sudd wetlands, the world's largest maze of
swamps, lagoons and tributaries. Villagers said thousands were
forcefully evicted to make way for the low-sulphur crude oil
venture. They lost ancestral homes, died from contamination and saw
livelihoods jeopardized.
(AFP, 3/4/08)
2008 Mar 4, France pinned the
blame on Sudanese forces for a shooting near the border with Chad
that left one French soldier wounded and another missing and asked
Sudanese authorities for help in locating the missing soldier. Sgt.
Gilles Pollin’s remains were formally identified Mar 7 and flown to
Paris from Khartoum.
(AP, 3/4/08)(AP, 3/7/08)
2008 Mar 4, Ugandan troops
clashed with rebels from the Lord's Resistance Army inside
neighboring Sudan.
(AFP, 3/6/08)
2008 Mar 6, Journalists and a
security official said Sudanese authorities have reimposed daily
censorship of newspapers after they published reports accusing the
government of backing Chadian rebels.
(Reuters, 3/6/08)
2008 Mar 13, Chad accused Sudan
of sending anti-government rebels across their border into its
territory as international mediators struggled to broker a fresh
peace accord between the two neighbors. The presidents of Chad and
Sudan signed a non-aggression pact, vowing not to support rebel
attacks against each other, many of which were launched from
troubled Darfur.
(AP, 3/13/08)(AFP, 3/14/08)
2008 Mar 13, A human rights
group said Chinese sales of assault rifles and other small arms to
its ally Sudan have grown rapidly during the Darfur conflict despite
a UN arms embargo.
(Reuters, 3/13/08)
2008 Mar 13, A deployment of
100 Sudanese soldiers arrived in Comoros, ahead of a likely African
Union-backed operation against the rebel island of Anjouan.
(AFP, 3/14/08)
2008 Mar 18, Darfur rebels said
they had fought off a major assault from Sudanese government forces
in the troubled region, inflicting casualties and pushing troops
back to West Darfur's capital.
(Reuters, 3/18/08)
2008 Mar 22, In southern Sudan
two World Food Program (WFP) drivers on their way to the oil-rich
Abyei state were stabbed to death by six assailants.
(Reuters, 3/26/08)
2008 Mar 25, In Sudan a World
Food Program (WFP) driver was shot dead and his assistant seriously
wounded in South Darfur state.
(Reuters, 3/26/08)
2008 Mar 26, The African
Union-UN mission said 5 civilians were killed and more than a dozen
others injured when an international peacekeeping vehicle crashed
into a bus in Darfur.
(AFP, 3/26/08)
2008 Apr 6, Angry Sudanese
border guards killed one civilian and wounded three others in a
market after opening fire indiscriminately in Darfur's political
capital.
(AFP, 4/7/08)
2008 Apr 8, The UN refugee
agency unveiled a new partnership with Internet giant Google to help
track refugees from Iraq to Darfur and raise public awareness of its
work.
(AP, 4/8/08)
2008 Apr 9, In Sudan gunmen
attacked police from the African Union and UN peacekeeping force
(UNAMID) in Darfur for the first time, pistol whipping one officer
in the back of the neck. UNAMID police do not carry weapons and this
particular patrol was on duty without protection.
(AFP, 4/10/08)
2008 Apr 11, In Moldova a
Sudanese-owned transport plane laden with fuel crashed shortly after
takeoff from an airport near the capital and burst into flames,
killing all 8 people on board.
(AP, 4/12/08)
2008 Apr 12, In Sudan the
Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) clashed with Sudanese armed
forces in West Darfur near the Sudan-Chad border. Both sides claimed
they had inflicted heavy casualties.
(Reuters, 4/13/08)
2008 Apr 21, In Sudan gunmen
killed a second driver delivering food aid for the UN's World Food
Program in the Darfur region, where banditry has forced vital
rations to be halved.
(AFP, 4/24/08)
2008 Apr 22,
In Sudan counting started in a census seen as a vital step
towards holding democratic elections after a landmark 2005
north-south peace deal. In southern Sudan ethnic clashes broke out
that also targeted equipment and facilities used in the nationwide
census. Later reports said some 95 people were killed.
(AP, 4/22/08)(AFP, 4/25/08)
2008 Apr 27, In Sudan China’s
state-owned China Water and Electric Corp (CWE) and Sino-Hydro
signed a 400-million dollar (255-million euro) deal to raise the
height of Sudan's oldest dam, in the southern Blue Nile state.
(AFP, 4/27/08)
2008 Apr 30, The UN Security
Council voted unanimously to extend the UN peacekeeping mission in
southern Sudan and called for demarcation of the contested oil-rich
border region between the north and south.
(AP, 5/1/08)
2008 May 2, South Sudan's
defense minister, Lieutenant General Dominic Dim Deng, was killed in
a plane crash along with 23 other people, most of them senior
members of the southern former rebel leadership.
(AFP, 5/2/08)(AP, 5/3/08)
2008 May 4, In Sudan government
bombs hit a primary school and a busy market place in Darfur,
killing at 12 people, including 6 children. Darfur rebels said three
other areas were also bombed: Ein Sirro and Jabel Medop in North
Darfur and an area in West Darfur near rebel-held Jabel Moun.
(Reuters, 5/5/08)(AP, 5/6/08)
2008 May 7, World Bank figures
indicated that donor countries and organizations had pledged some
$4.8 billion to aid Sudan. Norway, the host of a donors’ conference,
pledged $500 million. The EU promised $435 million and Japan
promised to double its contribution to $200 million.
(WSJ, 5/8/08, p.A8)
2008 May 10, Sudanese soldiers
clashed with Darfur rebels of the Justice and Equality Movement
(JEM) in the north of the capital Khartoum where a curfew has now
been imposed. Officials later said more that 200 people were killed
in the weekend fighting. The rebels had traveled from Chad in 191
land cruisers and pick-up trucks. On May 27 an official Egyptian
newspaper claimed that Sudanese forces searching the rebel JEM
movement found modern Iranian weapons with them and that authorities
had seized large amounts of ammunition and Iranian equipment.
(AFP, 5/10/08)(AP, 5/13/08)(Econ, 5/17/08,
p.59)(AFP, 5/27/08)
2008 May 11, Sudan severed
diplomatic ties with Chad, accusing its neighbor of backing a first
ever Darfur rebel assault on Khartoum, and partly lifted a curfew
amid its clampdown on remaining rebels.
(AFP, 5/11/08)
2008 May 12, Sudan arrested its
leading fundamentalist Islamic ideologue, accusing him of aiding a
Darfur rebel attack on the capital. Hassan Turabi was arrested after
dawn at his home in Khartoum and at least 10 other members of his
Popular Congress Party members were detained in a government sweep
across the city. Authorities released al-Turabi and four members of
his party after detaining them for several hours.
(AP, 5/12/08)(AP, 5/12/08)
2008 May 12, Chad closed its
border with Sudan and put a halt to bilateral trade, a minister
said, a day after Sudan severed diplomatic ties with Chad.
(AP, 5/12/08)
2008 May 14, In Sudan clashes
erupted in Abyei between the northern-based national army and former
guerrillas from the south. Arab Misseriya nomads, some armed by the
northerners, and the southern Ngok Dinka, protected by the SPLM,
held a historic animosity in the area over land and water. The UN
mission (UNMIS) there did little more than protect the local UN
base.
(Econ, 5/24/08, p.66)(Econ, 11/22/08, p.33)
2008 May 15, In Sudan thousands
of civilians fled clashes between former north-south civil war foes
in the oil-rich central town of Abyei. The SPLM said more than $1
billion in oil revenues from Abyei has been taken by the ruling
National Congress Party rather than shared with the south as the
peace deal prescribes.
(Reuters, 5/15/08)
2008 May 20, In Sudan deadly
fighting raged between rival forces in Abyei, a flashpoint oil
district between north and south whose status remains contested
three years after the end of civil war. 22 government troops died in
fighting that threatened the peace process.
(AP, 5/20/08)(AFP, 5/21/08)
2008 May 21, Dozens of men on
horseback armed with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades
ambushed Nigerian peacekeepers serving with the joint UN-African
Union force in Darfur. No casualties were reported.
(AP, 5/23/08)
2008 May 27, UN
Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said the UN will investigate
allegations by a leading children's charity that UN peacekeepers are
involved in widespread sexual abuse of children. The report by Save
the Children UK was based on field research in southern Sudan, Ivory
Coast and Haiti.
(AP, 5/27/08)
2008 May 28, In Sudan a Ugandan
policeman serving with the joint UN-African Union peacekeeping force
in the western Darfur region was found dead riddled with bullets.
(AFP, 5/29/08)
2008 Jun 4-2008 Jun 5, In South
Sudan more than 20 people were killed, including soldiers and
several children, in Ugandan rebel attacks near the border with
Congo. The Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) guerrillas had targeted the
villages of Nabanga and Yamba.
(AFP, 6/7/08)
2008 Jun 5, Sudan said it was
banning US companies from working with international peacekeepers in
Darfur and would not renew a contract held by a unit of US defense
firm Lockheed Martin Corp.
(Reuters, 6/5/08)
2008 Jun 8, The leaders of
Sudan's northern and southern halves signed an agreement to settle a
dispute over the oil-rich Abyei region that, if implemented, could
stop the nation's slide back into civil war.
(AP, 6/8/08)
2008 Jun 10, A Sudan Airways
plane carrying 214 people veered off a runway and burst into flames
after landing at Khartoum International Airport, killing at least 30
people.
(SFC, 6/11/08, p.A2)(AP, 6/12/08)
2008 Jun 15, The EU threatened
to impose sanctions against Sudanese who do not cooperate in
bringing those accused of war crimes in Darfur to the international
court.
(AFP, 6/16/08)
2008 Jun 21, A Sudanese
official said Sudan is grounding its national carrier Sudan Airways
from June 23 for at least a month for breaking civil aviation rules,
mainly over administration. On June 23 the Civil Aviation Authority
agreed to a one month reprieve.
(AP, 6/21/08)(AFP, 6/24/08)
2008 Jun 22, Sudanese media
said leaders of north and south Sudan have agreed to submit a
dispute over the oil rich Abyei region to international arbitration
in The Hague.
(AP, 6/22/08)
2008 Jun 27, In Sudan a small
cargo plane crashed mid-flight, killing 7 crew members, including 5
foreigners, in the third fatal aviation accident to blight the
African country in the past two months. There was one survivor.
Gunmen killed a Ugandan driver contracted to deliver aid for the
World Food Program in Sudan, in the 7th such killing in the country
in three months.
(AFP, 6/28/08)(AP, 6/28/08)(AFP, 6/29/08)
2008 Jun 30, In Sudan a cargo
plane crashed shortly after takeoff from Khartoum's airport, killing
all four Russian crew members aboard. The plane hit an electricity
pole shortly after takeoff and then crashed into an empty field.
(AP, 6/30/08)
2008 Jul 7, Sudan's parliament
approved a new electoral law, a crucial step towards scheduled
national elections and a democratic transition laid out in peace
arrangements after a 21-year civil war.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 8, In Sudan about two
hundred gunmen on horseback and in SUVs ambushed peacekeepers from a
joint UN-African Union force in the Darfur region. Five Rwandan
soldiers and two police officers, one from Ghana and the other from
Uganda, were killed in fierce gunbattles that lasted more than two
hours.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 8, Sudan's army
spokesman claimed Ethiopian forces had attacked a police base 17
kilometers (11 miles) inside Sudanese territory, killing 19 people,
including one police officer. Ethiopia denied the accusations.
(AFP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 12, The Arab League
said it will hold crisis talks on Sudan after reports the
International Criminal Court may seek Sudanese President Omar
al-Beshir's arrest, amid fears for peace efforts in Darfur. It would
mark the first-ever bid by the ICC, based in The Hague, to charge a
sitting head of state. The African Union said that plans by the ICC
could jeopardize peace efforts in Darfur.
(AFP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 13, In Sudan thousands
of protesters chanting "Down, Down USA!" rallied in Khartoum after
reports that the International Criminal Court (ICC) may seek the
arrest of Sudan's president for alleged war crimes. A stampede among
crowds of people attending a military graduation ceremony killed 17
people at the al-Merriekh Stadium in Omdurman, the twin city of
Khartoum. The dead were mostly women and children with 3 dozen
others injured.
(Reuters, 7/13/08)(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 14, The prosecutor of
the International Criminal Court filed genocide charges against
Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, accusing him of masterminding
attempts to wipe out African tribes in Darfur with a campaign of
murder, rape and deportation. The filing marked the first time
prosecutors at the world's first permanent, global war crimes court
have issued charges against a sitting head of state.
(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 15, China voiced
concern over an International Criminal Court prosecutor's decision
to seek an arrest warrant for Sudan's president on charges of
genocide in the African country's war-torn Darfur region.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 16, In Sudan a
peacekeeper with the United Nations-African Union was shot and
killed in Darfur. The peacekeeper, believed to be a Nigerian company
commander, died while on patrol near a peacekeeping camp.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 17, A new company of
Chinese engineers deployed to Sudan's war-torn western region of
Darfur, boosting the number of UN-led peacekeeping troops to 8,000.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 18, Senegal’s
President Abdoulaye Wade said Sudan President Omar al-Beshir has
agreed to restore relations with Chad, more than two months after
Khartoum severed ties accusing Ndjamena of backing Darfur rebels.
(AFP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 19, The Arab League
criticized the International Criminal Court's prosecutor for seeking
the arrest of Sudan's president on genocide charges, saying
diplomacy should be given a priority to solve the conflict in
Darfur.
(Reuters, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 21, The African Union
urged the UN Security Council to put on hold the International
Criminal Court's move to indict Sudanese President Omar Hassan
al-Bashir over war crimes in Darfur.
(Reuters, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 23, In Sudan
government planes bombed Karbala, a Darfur village, while Pres.
Bashir was addressing cheering crowds in the nearby city of
el-Fasher. according to a rebel faction 3 people were killed and 8
injured.
(Reuters, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, Sudan threatened
to expel peacekeepers from Darfur if President Omar al-Beshir is
indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court.
(AFP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 26, Sudan’s army
attacked a rebel police post in North Darfur, killing four troops,
before conducting search operations in nearby villages according the
Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM). Sudan's army initially denied the
report. On July 29 Khartoum said rebels of Minni Arcua Minnawi's
Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) attacked a convoy on that road and
the police responded, killing four of them and injuring two.
(Reuters, 7/27/08)(Reuters, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 31, Sudanese courts
sentenced another 22 alleged Darfur rebels to death over an
unprecedented attack on the capital last May in which more than 222
people were killed.
(AFP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, Fourteen of the UN
security council's 15 members voted in favor of Resolution 1828 to
extends the mandate of the joint UN-African Union peacekeeping force
in Darfur (UNAMID) for one year from this day, when it had been set
to expire. The United States abstained in the vote because language
added to the resolution noting concern that any indictment of Beshir
might jeopardize the Darfur peace process.
(AFP, 8/1/08)
2008 Aug 7, The US Olympic team
chose Lopez Lomong, one of the "Lost Boys" of Sudan, to carry the
flag at the Olympic opening ceremony, throwing the spotlight on
China's much-criticized policy on Darfur.
(AFP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 8, In Beijing, China,
the 29th Olympic Games, costing an estimated 40 billion dollars and
shrouded by political controversies, burst into life with a
spectacular opening ceremony. Actress activist Mia Farrow began
Web-casting her own "Darfur Olympics" from a refugee camp on the
barren Sudan-Chad border, aiming to shame China into using its
influence with Khartoum to end the Darfur conflict.
(AP, 8/8/08)(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 11, President George
W. Bush said he used talks with China's leaders during the Beijing
Olympics to press them to use their influence with Sudan to help end
the humanitarian crisis in Darfur.
(Reuters, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 12, Sudan's army began
a massive operation to wipe out rebel bases in Darfur's far north.
The army attacked with more than 200 vehicles in Wadi Atron, near
the Sudanese-Libyan border and took control of areas which had for
years been under the control of rebels who want more autonomy for
the region. North Darfur is part of Sudan's oil Block 12A operated
by a consortium led by the Saudi Arabian company al-Qahtani. Chinese
companies dominate Sudan's budding oil sector which produces more
than 500,000 barrels per day of crude.
(Reuters, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 17, A Sudanese court
sentenced to death a top Darfur rebel and seven others, bringing to
38 the number condemned to hang over an unprecedented attack on
Khartoum that killed more than 222 people.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 19, Turkey's President
Abdullah Gul urged Sudanese leader Omar al-Bashir, during talks at a
summit of African leaders, to act responsibly and to end the
suffering in the devastated Darfur region.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 20, In Turkey Sudan's
indicted president denied that his regime is orchestrating genocide
in the troubled western region of Darfur, and offered hope for an
end to the violence and the dawn of reconciliation by promising free
and fair elections next year.
(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 25, Deadly clashes
broke out when Sudanese security forces thrust into Kalma, one of
the largest camps for displaced people in South Darfur, leaving at
least 33 and as many as 70 people dead.
(AFP, 8/25/08)(AP, 8/26/08)(SFC, 8/28/08, p.A9)
2008 Aug 26, Sudanese hijackers
commandeered the Boeing 737 jetliner, which was carrying 95
passengers and crew, soon after it took off from the southern Darfur
town of Nyala, not far from a refugee camp that the Sudanese
military attacked a day earlier.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 26, A Maltese fishing
trawler rescued the migrants. Authorities said the survivors first
told the fishermen that 10 people were missing, but later said as
many as 70 people from Somalia, Eritrea and Sudan made the sea
voyage with them.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 27, Two hijackers, who
commandeered a jetliner from Sudan's Darfur region and diverted it
to a remote desert airstrip in southern Libya, surrendered after a
22-hour standoff.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Sep 6, Sudanese forces
launched ground and air attacks on two rebel bases in North Darfur,
killing an unknown number of people.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 7, A Darfur rebel
group says it has successfully repelled a government assault in
North Darfur, but the Sudanese government denies it carried out any
operations in the area.
(AP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 12,The Sudanese
government army and Janjaweed militias launched new attacks in a
mountainous area of south Darfur according to rebel claims made the
next day. UN boss Ban Ki-moon welcomed the establishment of an Arab
League panel led by Qatar that will work with the African Union and
United Nations to sponsor peace talks in Sudan's Darfur region.
(AFP, 9/12/08)(AFP, 9/13/08)
2008 Sep 13, In Sudan an army
spokesman said troops had entered the North Darfur area to arrest
armed bandits.
(Reuters, 9/14/08)
2008 Sep 14, In Sudan Minni
Minnawi, a leader of the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) faction turned
presidential advisor after signing the peace deal with Khartoum,
said his forces had came under attack at their base at Kolge in the
east Jebel Marra region.
(AFP, 9/14/08)
2008 Sep 15, Darfur rebels said
they were fighting back against attacking government troops for a
fourth day, the latest in a series of battles in Sudan's war-torn
western region.
(AP, 9/15/08)
2008 Sep 18, Rebels said
Sudanese aircraft bombed Darfur rebel positions in the latest
offensive in the war-torn region, with the UN reporting wounded
government troops in the area.
(AP, 9/18/08)
2008 Sep 19, Masked kidnappers
in Egypt seized 19 hostages including German, Italian and Romanian
tourists in a remote desert area near the Sudanese and Libyan
borders. The kidnappers demanded $15 million in ransom. On Sep 29
Egyptian and Sudanese forces rescued the captives near the
Sudanese-Chadian border.
(Reuters, 9/22/08)(AP, 9/29/08)
2008 Sep 24, Sudanese forces
were laying siege to a remote desert hideout where bandits held 19
people captive, including European tourists, but said they did not
plan to storm the area. Negotiations were continuing with the
kidnappers, who have reportedly demanded a ransom of up to 15
million dollars.
(AFP, 9/24/08)
2008 Sep 25, Pirates seized the
530-foot, Ukrainian cargo vessel, MV Faina, with 21 people aboard
off eastern Somalia. Russia's navy soon sent a warship to Somalia's
coast a day after pirates seized the Ukrainian vessel loaded with 33
tanks, ammunition and 3 Russian crew members. The ITAR-Tass news
agency said the military equipment had been sold to Kenya. It was
later reported that the arms were destined for southern Sudan and
that Kenya’s cooperation would be rewarded in the future with cheap
oil. The shipped was released on Feb 5, 2009, following a ransom of
$3.2 million.
(AP, 9/26/08)(SFC, 9/27/08, p.A5)(Econ, 10/4/08,
p.49)(AP, 2/5/09)
2008 Sep 28, Sudanese forces
engaged a group of kidnappers in a gunbattle in northwest Sudan who
had been sent out to get gas and food. Six kidnappers were killed in
the fight, and two captured. The two told the authorities where the
rest of the kidnappers and their captives were hiding. The
kidnappers were believed to be armed desert tribesmen. Kidnappers
released the 19-member European tour group, abducted on Sep 19, into
one car near the Sudanese-Chadian border. The group drove some 200
miles before encountering Egyptian special forces and returning
safely to Cairo.
(AP, 9/29/08)(AP, 9/30/08)
2008 Sep 29, US warships and
helicopters surrounded a hijacked cargo ship loaded with Sudan-bound
tanks and other arms to keep the weapons from falling "into the
wrong hands." The shipment of 33 Russian-designed tanks, rifles and
ammunition on the Ukrainian-operated Faina was headed for Sudan, not
Kenya as previously claimed by Kenyan officials. Somali pirates
demanded a $20 million ransom.
(AP, 9/29/08)(SFC, 9/29/08, p.A12)
2008 Sep 29, In Sudan a
helicopter contracted to UN-led peacekeepers crashed in the Darfur
region, killing two people with two more feared dead.
(AP, 9/29/08)
2008 Oct 5-2008 Oct 17, Arab
militia attacked at least 15 Sudanese villages. Aid workers and a
rights watchdog later said the violence near Muhagariya, a south
Darfur flashpoint has displaced 12,000 people and killed more than
40 civilians.
(AP, 10/25/08)
2008 Oct 6, A Nigerian UN
peacekeeper was killed when up to 60 gunmen ambushed a patrol in
Sudan's war-torn western region of Darfur.
(AFP, 10/7/08)
2008 Oct 7, The UN refugee
agency said at least 5,000 people have fled violence in northeastern
Congo and sought shelter in neighboring Sudan over the last two
weeks due to ferocious attacks by rebels of the Lord's Resistance
Army from neighboring Uganda.
(AP, 10/7/08)
2008 Oct 7, Former Guantanamo
detainee Mustafa Ibrahim Mustafa Al Hassan arrived in the Sudanese
capital of Khartoum and vowed to campaign for the release of the
roughly 255 inmates remaining at the US military prison.
(AP, 10/9/08)
2008 Oct 9, According to the
Sudanese army 15 people were killed when Darfur rebels attacked a
local government convoy with military escort in the far west of the
region.
(AFP, 10/10/08)
2008 Oct 11, In Sudan Abu Bakr
Kadu, a Sudan Liberation Movement-Unity commander, said 23 civilians
had died after Janjaweed Arab militia assaulted villages over 3 days
in the Muhagiriya area of southern Darfur. He also said 28 Janjaweed
were killed.
(AFP, 10/12/08)
2008 Oct 13, Sudanese officials
disclosed the arrest of Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-al-Rahman (aka Ali
Kushayb), a Janjaweed militia leader who was charged by the Int’l.
Criminal court in 2007 for crimes against humanity.
(SFC, 10/14/08, p.A6)
2008 Oct 16, Sudanese President
Omar al-Beshir launched his "people's initiative" for peace in
Darfur with an elaborate ceremony attended by regional dignitaries
but no rebels involved in fighting.
(AFP, 10/16/08)
2008 Oct 18, In southern Sudan
unknown assailants kidnapped nine Chinese oil workers.
(AP, 10/19/08)
2008 Oct 27, In central Sudan
kidnappers killed 4 Chinese oil workers out of nine they had been
holding hostage for more than a week. A local leader in troubled
South Kordofan state, where the hostages were abducted and killed,
said the Chinese died as a result of fighting between the Sudanese
army and the kidnappers. The next day 3 bodies and 3 wounded were
flown to Khartoum. A 4th body was found on Oct 29. The last 2 were
reported found Oct 31, one alive and one dead.
(AFP, 10/28/08)(AFP, 10/29/08)(AP,
10/29/08)(Reuters, 10/31/08)
2008 Oct 29, In Sudan gunmen
opened fire on a group of South African peacekeepers guarding a well
in Darfur, killing one and seriously wounding another.
(AP, 10/30/08)
2008 Nov 2, Ahmed Al-Mirghani
(67) former head of Sudan’s last democratically elected government
(1986-1989), died in Egypt. In 1989 a military coup led by current
President Omar al-Bashir unseated him.
(AP, 11/3/08)
2008 Nov 4, Sudanese
journalists launched a mass hunger strike, and three independent
newspapers stopped work for three days in the country's biggest
organized media protest against draconian censorship.
(AP, 11/4/08)
2008 Nov 8, Sudanese security
banned two newspapers from publishing after they protested against
draconian censorship measures and arrests of journalists.
(AFP, 11/8/08)
2008 Nov 9, Troubled neighbors
Chad and Sudan exchanged ambassadors, six months after diplomatic
ties were ruptured over tit-for-tat accusations of support for armed
rebels.
(AFP, 11/9/08)
2008 Nov 12, Sudanese President
Omar Hassan al-Bashir, facing a possible indictment by the
International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes in Darfur,
announced a ceasefire in the region.
(Reuters, 11/12/08)
2008 Nov 16, Sudanese and rebel
forces traded accusations that the other is initiating a new wave of
fighting in the ravaged Darfur region just days after the government
had offered a cease-fire.
(AP, 11/16/08)
2008 Nov 17, Sudanese police
detained more than 60 journalists for around three hours and
instructed them to go to court for protesting against draconian
censorship.
(AFP, 11/17/08)
2008 Nov 20, The International
Criminal Court prosecutor requested arrest warrants for rebels in
Sudan's Darfur region, accusing them of storming an African Union
camp and killing 12 peacekeepers in Sep, 2007.
(Reuters, 11/20/08)
2008 Nov 26, Sudanese police
demolished about 10,000 homes in a shanty town south of Khartoum,
using tear gas to disperse protesting residents.
(AFP, 11/27/08)
2008 Nov 29, In Qatar French
President Nicolas Sarkozy told Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir to
take action to end the conflict in Darfur.
(AFP, 11/29/08)
2008 Dec 13, Sudanese officials
said thousands have fled the volatile oil town of Abyei after fresh
north-south fighting has reignited tensions over the contested area.
(AP, 12/13/08)
2008 Dec 14, Uganda, southern
Sudan and Congo launched an offensive against the Lord's Resistance
Army bases based in eastern Congo in an attempt to end one of the
continent's longest and most brutal wars.
(AP, 12/15/08)
2008 Dec 15, Peacekeepers in
Sudan said as many as 250 people have died in separate tribal
clashes in remote parts of Sudan's south Darfur region over the last
week.
(AP, 12/15/08)
2008 Dec 22, A Sudanese
official said at least 18,000 Eritrean and Somali refugees have
arrived in Sudan since the start of the year, and the government is
struggling to provide them with aid.
(Reuters, 12/22/08)
2008 Dec 29, In Sudan Lt.
Commander Pape Lamine Ndiaye, a Senegalese military officer, died
after being shot in Darfur on Dec 27, whilst serving with the AU
peacekeeping force.
(AFP, 12/31/08)
2008 Halima Bashir and Damien
Lewis authored “Tears of the Desert: One Woman’s True Story of
Surviving the Horrors of Darfur.” Dr. Bashir (30), was gang-raped in
2004 by Sudanese soldiers after speaking out about atrocities in
Darfur.
(Econ, 8/16/08, p.80)(Reuters, 10/6/10)
2008 Craig Walzer compiled and
edited “Out of Exile: Narratives from the Abducted and Displaced
People of Sudan.”
(SSFC, 12/14/08, Books p.1)
2008 Jok Madut Jok,
Sudanese-born associate professor of history at Loyola Marymount
University in Los Angeles, returned to southern Sudan and built the
Marol Academy in his home village. In October, 2010, Southern Sudan
announced that Jok is joining the Ministry of Culture and Heritage
as undersecretary.
(AP, 11/6/10)
2008 The ICC issued an arrest
warrant for Ahmed Haroun, Sudan’s Minister of Humanitarian Affairs,
on 51 charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity allegedly
committed in Sudan's western Darfur region in 2003 and 2004.
(AP, 1/28/09)
2008 Qatar and Sudan set up a
joint venture for investments in Sudan, which focused on developing
agricultural land.
(Econ, 5/23/09, p.62)
2009 Jan 5, President George W.
Bush authorized the immediate use of US aircrafts to transport
supplies to the international peacekeeping force in Darfur.
(AP, 1/6/09)
2009 Jan 8, Darfur rebels
accused Sudan's army of bombing their positions over the last 24
hours, breaking a period of relative calm in the country's violent
west.
(Reuters, 1/8/09)
2009 Jan 13, Sudanese army
planes bombed near Muhajiriya in south Darfur, targeting rebels who
had rejected a 2006 peace agreement and the unconditional ceasefire
declared by Bashir last year.
(AP, 1/14/09)
2009 Jan 14, Sudanese security
officers arrested iconic opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi (76) two
days after he urged the head of state to surrender to the
International Criminal Court. Al-Turabi was freed on March 9.
(AP, 1/14/09)(Reuters, 3/9/09)
2009 Jan 15, The US Air Force
began airlifting heavy machinery to Rwandan troops serving in an
international mission in Darfur, the first time the new US Africa
Command has undertaken a large-scale peacekeeper support operation.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 18, The UN-African
Union peacekeeping mission said rebels from the Justice and Equality
Movement have taken control of Muhajaria town in the western Sudan
region of Darfur.
(AP, 1/19/09)
2009 Jan 22, Sudanese troops
battled with rebels in southern Darfur, and the fighting killed five
rebels and two soldiers.
(AP, 1/22/09)
2009 Jan 24, Sudanese
government planes bombed a key town in south Darfur, a week after it
was seized by Darfuri JEM rebels. The next day peacekeepers said the
bomb attack killed and wounded civilians.
(Reuters, 1/24/09)(Reuters, 1/25/09)
2009 Jan 26, Sudanese warplanes
bombed Darfur rebel positions near the key town of El-Fasher ahead
of an expected ground offensive.
(AFP, 1/26/09)
2009 Jan 27, Sudanese armed
forces waged air strikes and artillery attacks on rebels in two key
areas of Darfur for a second day.
(AFP, 1/27/09)
2009 Jan 27, The UN refugee
agency said thousands of Congolese civilians have fled across the
border to South Sudan to escape rebels of the Lord's Resistance
Army.
(AP, 1/27/09)
2009 Jan 28, A Sudanese man,
Mohammed el-Sari, was jailed for 17 years on charges of trying to
help the International Criminal Court investigate a minister
suspected of war crimes in Darfur. He was arrested in June accused
of trying to solicit information about special police in Darfur, men
trained and paid by the government and supervised by current
Minister of Humanitarian Affairs Ahmed Haroun.
(AFP, 1/28/09)
2009 Jan 31, Sudan’s state
media reported that a US aid group has been thrown out of the Darfur
region after officials found thousands of Arabic-language bibles
stacked in its office. The Texas-based Thirst No More website
described its work in Darfur as focused on repairing and drilling
water wells and makes no mention of evangelism or other faith-based
work.
(Reuters, 1/31/09)
2009 Jan, In northeast Sudan
Israel carried out an attack in which at least 30 people were
killed, to stop weapons being transported to Gaza during its
offensive against Hamas. Reports from Sudan quoted a lone survivor
of the attack as saying two planes flew over the convoy then came
back and shot up the "four or five" trucks. Israeli aircraft or
drones destroyed 23 lorries carrying Iranian arms destined for
Hamas. On May 25 Sudan’s Defense Minister Gen. Abdul-Rahim Hussein
told parliament that the airstrikes killed 56 smugglers and 63
people they were trying to transport across the border to Egypt,
including Somali and Ethiopian migrants.
(Reuters, 3/27/09)(Econ, 4/4/09, p.50)(AP,
5/26/09)
2009 Feb 1, In Sudan a
spokeswoman for the UN mission known as UNAMID said the has
government asked peacekeepers to clear out of the town of Muhajeria.
She said Sudan wants to launch an offensive against rebels from the
Justice and Equality Movement, a Chad-backed rebel group that has
held the south Darfur town since mid-January.
(AP, 2/1/09)
2009 Feb 10, A Sudanese
government delegation met Darfur rebels from the Justice and
Equality Movement in the Qatari capital for their first peace
contacts since 2007.
(AFP, 2/10/09)
2009 Feb 14, Egyptian Foreign
Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit held talks with Sudanese President Omar
al-Beshir amid reports that the International Criminal Court has
decided to issue a warrant for his arrest..
(AFP, 2/14/09)
2009 Feb 17, The Sudanese
government and Darfur's most powerful rebel group signed an
declaration to conduct future peace negotiations, but failed to
agree on a hoped-for cease-fire after a week of talks.
(AP, 2/17/09)
2009 Feb 17, Sudanese writer
Tayeb Salih (b.1929), one of the most respected Arab novelists of
the 20th century, died in London where he spent most of his life.
His books included the classic "Season of Migration to the North"
(1966) about a Sudanese man's experiences of life and love in
Britain in the 1960s.
(AFP, 2/18/09)
2009 Feb 18, Sudanese forces
bombed rebel positions in Darfur, with the ink barely dry on a deal
between Khartoum and the strongest rebel group that was hailed as a
turning point in efforts to end the six-year conflict. The next day
the Sudanese army said that it was an allied armed group that fought
Darfur rebels the previous day, not government troops.
(AP, 2/18/09)(AFP, 2/19/09)
2009 Feb 21, Sudan's justice
minister said Sudan will free 24 Darfur prisoners as part of a
goodwill agreement with rebels, even as fresh reports of violence
came in from the battle-scarred region. Two Sudanese working for
Aide Medicale Internationale, a French humanitarian group in Darfur,
were shot dead in an attack that also left four people wounded. A
gang of 24 men on horses and camels ambushed the workers on a road
between Kurunji and Khor Abeshe in South Darfur.
(Reuters, 2/21/09)(AFP, 2/23/09)
2009 Feb 24, In Sudan fighting
erupted in the key southern city of Malakal. Some 50 people were
killed and another 100 wounded in 2 days of fighting.
(AFP, 2/27/09)
2009 Feb 26, Sudan’s President
Omar al-Beshir, who faces a possible arrest warrant for alleged war
crimes in Darfur, said he wanted to hold "free" elections soon to
guarantee stability.
(AFP, 2/26/09)
2009 Mar 1, In Sudan Riek
Machar, the vice president of the southern Sudan government, said
clashes last week between militia and local government troops in
Malakal killed at least 57 people and wounded nearly 100.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 3, Sudanese President
Omar al-Beshir inaugurated a massive hydro-electric project that has
displaced tens of thousands and is the largest to be built along the
Nile in 40 years.
(AP, 3/3/09)
2009 Mar 4, The International
Criminal Court at The Hague issued an arrest warrant for Sudanese
President Omar al-Bashir on charges of war crimes and crimes against
humanity in Darfur. He is the first sitting head of state the court
has ordered arrested. The French medical aid organization Doctors
Without Borders (MSF) said it was pulling staff out of Darfur after
the Sudanese government ordered them to leave. Sudan ordered at
least 10 humanitarian groups expelled from Darfur.
(AP, 3/4/09)(AFP, 3/4/09)
2009 Mar 6, A UN spokesman said
its human rights office will examine whether Sudan's decision to
expel aid groups constitutes a breach of basic human rights and
possibly a war crime. UN agencies warned that Sudan's decision to
expel 13 international aid groups will leave more than a million
people without food or health care and could threaten thousands of
lives.
(AP, 3/6/09)(AFP, 3/6/09)
2009 Mar 8, Sudan's Pres. Omar
al-Bashir threatened to kick out more aid groups and expel diplomats
and peacekeepers during his first trip to the beleaguered Darfur
region after an international court indicted him on war crimes.
(AP, 3/8/09)
2009 Mar 9, In Sudan 4 soldiers
from the joint UN-African Union peacekeeping force in the war-torn
Darfur region have been wounded in an ambush.
(AFP, 3/10/09)
2009 Mar 11, In Sudan armed men
abducted three international aid workers and two Sudanese guards in
the Darfur region, a week after the government ordered aid groups
expelled in response to an international arrest warrant for Sudan's
president on war crimes charges. The abducted workers were from the
Belgian branch of Doctors Without Borders and they were seized from
their offices in the Saraf Umra area.
(AP, 3/12/09)
2009 Mar 13, A spokeswoman for
Doctors Without Borders says 35 of its foreign staff are leaving
Darfur after the abduction of three colleagues.
(AP, 3/13/09)
2009 Mar 14, In Sudan 3 foreign
aid workers kidnapped in Darfur were freed and were returning to
Khartoum with an official who said they were abducted in response to
the international arrest warrant issued for the Sudanese president.
(AP, 3/15/09)
2009 Mar 16, Sudan's Pres. Omar
al-Bashir he wants all international aid groups out of the country
within a year, insisting they can drop off supplies "at airports or
seaports" and let Sudanese organizations take care of it.
(AP, 3/16/09)
2009 Mar 16, Amr Moussa
(b.1936), former Egyptian Foreign Minister and head of the Arab
League, said AL countries will not carry out an International
Criminal Court request to arrest Sudan's president on charges of war
crimes in Darfur.
(AP,
3/17/09)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amr_Moussa)
2009 Mar 17, In Sudan a
UN/African Union peacekeeper was killed in an ambush in Darfur.
(AP, 3/17/09)
2009 Mar 17, US Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton said Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir
will be responsible for "every single death" caused by the expulsion
of 13 foreign aid groups from Sudan.
(Reuters, 3/17/09)
2009 Mar 18, Defiant Sudanese
Pres. Omar al-Bashir rallied Arab supporters in Darfur by saying no
war crimes court or the UN Security Council can touch even "an
eyelash" on him despite an international order for his arrest.
(AP, 3/18/09)
2009 Mar 18, US Pres. Barack
Obama named retired Air Force general Scott Gration as his special
envoy to Sudan to confront what Washington sees as a "horrendous"
situation in Darfur.
(AFP, 3/18/09)
2009 Mar 20, In Sudan the
Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), a major rebel group in Darfur,
said it had decided to end peace talks with the Sudanese government
until it lets back aid groups expelled from the troubled region.
(AP, 3/20/09)
2009 Mar 23, Sudan's president
traveled to Eritrea, choosing one of Africa's most politically
isolated nations for his first trip abroad since an international
court sought his arrest on charges of war crimes in Darfur. Adam
Khater (39), the Fellowship for African Relief's Darfur director,
was shot to death at his home in the town of Kongo Haraza, near
Sudan's border with Chad.
(AP, 3/23/09)(AP, 3/24/09)
2009 Mar 25, Egypt, one of the
strongest US allies in the Middle East, welcomed Sudan's president
despite an international warrant seeking his arrest on charges of
war crimes in Darfur. Egypt is not an ICC signatory and both it and
the Arab League have backed al-Bashir.
(AP, 3/25/09)
2009 Mar 25, Sudanese officials
said at least 2 people were killed when attackers set fire overnight
to a camp for the internally displaced in Darfur, destroying
hundreds of shelters. A spokesman for the Darfur rebel group Justice
and Equality Movement (JEM) put the toll at three dead and three
injured and blamed a pro-government militia for the attack.
(AFP, 3/25/09)
2009 Mar 26, Sudan's president
Omar al-Bashir visited his third country in four days, this time
touching down in Libya, the latest country to welcome the leader
who's wanted by an international court on war crimes.
(AP, 3/26/09)
2009 Mar 29, Sudan's Pres. Omar
al-Bashir, who is sought by an international court on charges of war
crimes in Darfur, received a warm welcome in Qatar, where he will
attend this week's Arab League summit.
(AP, 3/29/09)
2009 Mar 31, The US Government
Accountability Office released a report saying 4 countries
designated a terrorism sponsors received $55 million from a US
supported program promoting the peaceful use of nuclear energy under
the IAEA’s Technical Cooperation program. Between 1997 and 2007 Iran
received over $15 million, $14 million went to Syria, while Sudan
and Cuba received over $11 million each.
(WSJ, 3/31/09, p.A3)
2009 Mar, Adam Osman Mohammed
(32) was gunned down in his home in front of his wife and
four-year-old son just days after arriving in his village in south
Darfur. In August, 2008, he was flown to Khartoum under the
Britain’s assisted voluntary return program, in which refugees are
paid to go back to their country of origin.
(www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2009/03/424417.html)
2009 Mar, In Southern Sudan
hundreds of women and children were killed in the Jonglei province.
Some local put the totals at over 700.
(Econ, 4/11/09, p.47)
2009 Apr 1, Sudanese President
Omar Hassan al-Bashir arrived in Saudi Arabia for a brief
pilgrimage, his latest trip abroad in defiance of an international
arrest warrant against him.
(Reuters, 4/1/09)
2009 Apr 2, In Sudan new US
special envoy Scott Gration told journalists he had come to "look,
learn and listen" and hoped for its friendship and cooperation,
indicating a shift in tone by Washington under President Barack
Obama.
(Reuters, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 4, In Sudan armed men
in the Darfur kidnapped two aid workers Claire Dubois of France and
Canadian Stephanie Jodoin, of Aid Medicale International (AMI). They
were seized from their compound in the south Darfur settlement of Ed
el Fursan. Both women were released on April 29.
(AFP, 4/5/09)(Reuters, 4/12/09)(AP, 4/30/09)
2009 Apr 15, A Sudanese court
condemned 10 rebels from the Darfur rebel Justice and Equality
Movement to death for an unprecedented attack on Khartoum in May,
2008, which killed more than 220 people.
(AFP, 4/15/09)
2009 Apr 16, In Sudan US
Senator John Kerry said after talks with senior officials that
Khartoum would allow some foreign aid to be restored in its western
Darfur region but that it was not sufficient.
(Reuters, 4/17/09)
2009 Apr 19, In Sudan 21 people
were killed when a bus they were travelling in collided with a truck
about 25 miles south of Khartoum.
(AFP, 4/19/09)
2009 Apr 20, A south Sudan
district official said weekend clashes left more than 170 people
dead as armed fighters from the Murle ethnic group in remote Akobo
county in eastern Jonglei state attacked Lou Nuer villages.
(AFP, 4/20/09)
2009 Apr 21, Sudanese President
Omar al-Beshir arrived in Ethiopia, on his sixth foreign trip since
an international arrest warrant for alleged war crimes was issued
against him.
(AFP, 4/21/09)
2009 Apr 22, A Sudanese court
sentenced 11 members of the Darfur rebel Justice and Equality
Movement (JEM) to death and acquitted five others for an
unprecedented 2008 attack on Khartoum. A district official said the
death toll from clashes between rival ethnic groups in south Sudan
has risen to 250 people, with dozens of children also abducted.
(AFP, 4/22/09)
2009 Apr 26, A Sudanese court
sentenced another 11 Darfur rebels to death for a 2008 attack on
Khartoum, raising to 82 the number of Justice and Equality Movement
fighters ordered hanged for the raid.
(AFP, 4/26/09)
2009 Apr 30, The UN Security
Council extended for another year the mandate of UN peacekeepers in
southern Sudan who monitor compliance with a peace deal that ended
Sudan's two-decade-long civil war.
(Reuters, 4/30/09)
2009 May 5, Sudan denied
accusations by the government of Chad that its forces had launched
an attack against the neighboring African state.
(AFP, 5/5/09)
2009 May 5, H.H Sheikh Sultan
Bin Tahnoun Al Nahyan, Chairman of the Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority
(ADTA), announced the official launch of Al Ain Wildlife Park and
Resort at the Intercontinental Hotel in Abu Dhabi. Sudan had
recently signed a leasing agreement with an Al Ain National Wildlife
for some 6,180 square miles of southeastern wilderness to be
developed as a safari site with semi-permanent tented camps
and top-class hotels.
(www.ameinfo.com/155601.html)(Econ, 7/11/09,
p.46)
2009 May 6, Senior Sudanese aid
official Hassabo Mohammed Abdelrahman said that Khartoum was ready
to allow foreign aid groups to operate in Darfur but ruled out the
return of the 13 aid agencies kicked out in March.
(AFP, 5/7/09)
2009 May 7, Sudanese President
Omar al-Beshir named Ahmed Harun, who is wanted for war crimes in
Darfur, as governor of disputed south Kordofan province,
transferring him from his post as a state minister. In 2007 the ICC
issued a warrant for Harun on 51 charges of war crimes and crimes
against humanity allegedly committed in Sudan's western Darfur
region in 2003 and 2004.
(AFP, 5/8/09)
2009 May 7, A UN peacekeeper
was shot dead and his car stolen by unknown gunmen in the South
Darfur state capital Nyala.
(AFP, 5/8/09)
2009 May 8, South Sudanese
gunmen killed up to 49 people from a rival tribe, most of them women
and children, in one of a string of attacks that have raised fears
for elections in the region. Fighters from the Lou Nuer tribe raided
the village of Torkeij, home to the Nuer Jikany, in the region's
Upper Nile state, in apparent revenge for cattle thefts.
(Reuters, 5/11/09)
2009 May 8, South Sudanese
gunmen killed dozens of people from a rival tribe, most of them
women and children, in one of a string of attacks that have raised
fears for elections in the region. Fighters from the Lou Nuer tribe
raided the village of Torkej, home to the Nuer Jikany, in the
region's Upper Nile state, in apparent revenge for cattle thefts.
Some 71 people were killed in Torkej.
(Reuters, 5/11/09)(Econ, 6/13/09, p.49)
2009 May 11, In Sudan armed men
on camel and horseback shot dead three Sudanese policemen in an
ambush in the war-ravaged western region of Darfur.
(AFP, 5/12/09)
2009 May 16, Sudan accused Chad
of mounting a second series of air strikes on its territory and said
the conflict between the African neighbors must be resolved
politically.
(AFP, 5/16/09)
2009 May 17, In Sudan rebels of
Darfur's Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) said they had seized a
town in North Darfur after a clash with government forces.
(AP, 5/18/09)
2009 May 17, The International
Criminal Court said Bahr Idriss Abu Garda, a Sudanese rebel leader,
has turned himself in to face war crimes charges for an attack that
killed 12 African Union peacekeepers in Darfur in September 2007.
(AP, 5/17/09)
2009 May 17, Chad said its air
force had completed raids on "mercenaries" inside Sudan, announcing
its aircraft had destroyed seven groups of fighters while ground
forces had captured 100 prisoners on the border.
(Reuters, 5/17/09)
2009 May 21, Sudan announced
the results of a nationwide census seen as crucial to prepare
constituencies for elections next year, but which former southern
rebels said they would reject. The census showed Sudan to have a
total population of 39,154,490, with 8,260,490 or 21 percent living
in the south.
(AFP, 5/21/09)
2009 May 24, In Sudan raiders
attempted but failed to overrun the army base at Umm Baru, close to
the Chadian border in north Darfur. The next day an army spokesman
said 20 Sudanese soldiers were killed in the fierce fighting and
that 43 rebels had died.
(Reuters, 5/25/09)(AFP, 5/25/09)
2009 May 26, In Sudan scores of
policemen and nearly 200 tribesmen were killed when 3,000 armed Arab
tribesmen on horseback attacked security forces in the oil-producing
Southern Kordofan region.
(Reuters, 5/26/09)(Reuters, 5/29/09)
2009 May 28, In Sudan Darfur's
most active rebel group said it intends to free 60 Sudanese troops
as a "sign of goodwill" ahead of Qatari-brokered peace talks with
Sudan's government.
(AFP, 5/28/09)
2009 May 30, Former Sudanese
President Gaafar al-Nimeiry (b.1930) died after a period of illness.
He took power in a coup in 1969 and brought Islamic rule to Sudan.
He spent 16 stormy years as Sudan's leader until he was ousted in
April 1985 by a military coup and granted political asylum in Egypt.
(Reuters, 5/30/09)
2009 Jun 1, China's special
envoy to Darfur met with Sudan's President Omar al-Beshir and
pledged three million dollars in humanitarian aid for the volatile
region. Liu Guijin "greeted the president for the beginning of talks
in Doha between the JEM and the government."
(AFP, 6/2/09)
2009 Jun 8, Sudan passed an
amended version of a media bill that sparked protests in Khartoum
last month, but the new version failed to allay the fears of many
Sudanese journalists.
(AP, 6/8/09)
2009 Jun 10, Sudan’s President
Omar al-Beshir inaugurated a new plant that he said will begin
producing ethanol from sugar cane with a target of 200 million
liters in two years. Former rebels who fought a devastating 22-year
civil war in south Sudan began laying down their arms as the UN’s
biggest demobilization program stepped up a gear.
(AFP, 6/10/09)
2009 Jun 12, At least 40 south
Sudanese soldiers and civilians were killed when tribal fighters
ambushed boats carrying UN food aid, the latest in a string of
ethnic attacks threatening a fragile peace deal.
(Reuters, 6/14/09)
2009 Jun 26, Canadian citizen
Abousfian Abdelrazik, accused by the UN of being linked to al Qaeda,
flew out of Sudan after a court order ended his six-year exile in
Khartoum. Abdelrazik was born in Sudan and gained Canadian
citizenship in 1995 after entering the country as a refugee. He
returned to Sudan in 2003 to visit his sick mother and was arrested
and held by Sudanese authorities on two occasions.
(Reuters, 6/26/09)
2009 Jun 28, In Sudan 6 people
were killed in weekend tribal clashes between Nuba and Misseriya
tribesmen in Sudan's South Kordofan region, which borders Darfur.
(AFP, 6/29/09)
2009 Jul 1, Darfur rebels
signed an accord with one of Sudan's main opposition parties in
Cairo, agreeing to push for a new transitional government, a move
that will infuriate Khartoum.
(Reuters, 7/3/09)
2009 Jul 2, African heads of
state meeting in Libya discussed a drastic new decision against the
International Criminal Court that would in practice give Sudan's
president impunity from prosecution for war crimes by the ICC, a
draft document at the AU summit showed. Leaders also struggled to
overcome divisions on a proposed "African government", as Libyan
leader Moamer Kadhafi pressed for a powerful new continental
authority.
(AP, 7/2/09)(AFP, 7/2/09)
2009 Jul 3, In Sudan gunmen
kidnapped an Irish and Ugandan women from the office of the Irish
aid group Goal in the North Darfur city of Kutum. A Sudanese
watchman was also seized before being released later. Arab tribes
supported by the government were implicated. Sharon Commins (33) and
her Ugandan colleague, Hilda Kuwuki (42), were released on Oct 18.
(AFP, 7/4/09)(AP, 10/18/09)(AFP, 10/24/09)
2009 Jul 3, Sudanese police
arrested 13 women in a raid on a Khartoum cafe for wearing trousers
in violation of the country's strict Islamic law. 10 of them were
flogged inside a Khartoum police station. One of those arrested,
journalist Lubna Hussein, said she is challenging the charges, which
can be punishable by up to 40 lashes.
(AP, 7/13/09)(AP, 7/21/09)
2009 Jul 3, In Libya
peacekeepers in Somalia and the war crimes warrant for Sudan's
president dominated the final day of an African Union summit, after
a late-night compromise on a new regional authority. Africa's
leaders agreed to denounce the International Criminal Court and
refuse to extradite Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir, who has been
indicted for crimes against humanity in Darfur.
(AFP, 7/3/09)(AP, 7/3/09)
2009 Jul 8, A senior UN
official said fighting between tribes in southern Sudan has
increasingly targeted women and children and likely killed more than
1,000 people since January.
(AP, 7/8/09)
2009 Jul 13, Uganda said it
would arrest Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir if he enters the
country, an unusual stance after a summit of African leaders
denounced the international arrest warrant against al-Bashir.
(AP, 7/13/09)
2009 Jul 16, The Chadian rebel
Union of Forces of Resistance (UFR) claimed the Chadian air force
attacked two villages in the southeastern Chadian region of Tissi.
Rebels claimed some 50 had been killed some 100 wounded. Sudan
accused Chad of launching air raids on its western region of Darfur.
(AFP, 7/16/09)
2009 Jul 18, Sudanese rebels
set free 60 captured government soldiers and policemen in north
Darfur. The detainees had been held by the Justice and Equality
Movement following recent armed clashes.
(AP, 7/18/09)
2009 Jul 19,
Sudan said it was committed to peace with neighboring Chad after
accusing it of bombing its western Darfur region last week, but also
warned it would not be held back if threatened.
(AFP, 7/19/09)
2009 Jul 22, An international
arbitration panel awarded the Sudanese government control over
almost all major oil reserves in a disputed region of Sudan that
erupted into violence last year between state forces and former
southern rebels.
(AP, 7/22/09)
2009 Jul 29, A Sudanese court
adjourned the case of Lubna Ahmed al-Hussein, a woman journalist
facing 40 lashes for wearing "indecent" trousers. 10 women had
already been whipped on July 3 for similar offences against Islamic
law. "I wish to resign from the UN, I wish this court case to
continue," Hussein told a packed courtroom before the judge
adjourned the case to August 4.
(AFP, 7/29/09)
2009 Jul 30, The UN Security
Council unanimously extended the mandate for the joint UN-African
Union peacekeeping mission which has been slowly deploying in
Sudan's conflict-torn Darfur region.
(Reuters, 7/30/09)
2009 Jul 31, Turkey's navy
commandos aboard a frigate captured seven pirates in the Gulf of
Aden off Somalia's coast. Turkish commandos had captured five other
pirates in a similar operation in the Gulf of Aden a week ago.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Aug 2, In southeast Sudan
armed tribesmen attacked a fishing village where hundreds of
displaced people were camped near a river, leaving at least 185
people, most of them women and children, dead in the worst violence
in three months.
(AP, 8/3/09)
2009 Aug 4, Sudanese police
fired tear gas and beat women protesting outside a Sudanese court
during the trial of a female journalist accused of violating the
Islamic dress code by wearing trousers in public. The judge
adjourned Lubna Hussein's trial for a month to seek clarification
from Sudan's foreign ministry.
(AP, 8/4/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Sudan clashes
between rival militias broke out in the southern oil-rich Unity
state, the latest to hit a region still recovering from two decades
of civil war.
(AFP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 19, In Sudan former
enemies from the north and south signed a deal aimed at bolstering
the 2005 peace deal that ended a 22-year civil war, the African
continent's longest.
(AP, 8/20/09)
2009 Aug 27, In Sudan Martin
Luther Agwai, the outgoing military commander of the joint
UN-African Union (UNAMID) peacekeeping force in the western Sudan
region, said there is no more war in Darfur. Agwai defended his
soldiers against persistent criticism of their effectiveness,
insisting they have ended the massacres that long plagued the
Sudanese region. The Nigerian officer will be replaced next week by
Rwandan Patrick Nyamvumba.
(AFP, 8/27/09)
2009 Aug 28, In southern Sudan
the Lou-Nuer tribe attacked a village of the Dinka tribe in Twic
East County, leaving 46 people dead and 15 in critical condition.
The attackers wore new military uniforms and were using new machine
guns, but did not provide their identity.
(Reuters, 8/29/09)(AP, 9/1/09)
2009 Aug 29, In Sudan an armed
group kidnapped two foreign civilians working for the joint
UN-African Union peacekeeping mission in Darfur. The UNAMID workers,
a Nigerian man and a Zimbabwean woman, were released on Dec 13.
(AP, 8/29/09)(AFP, 12/13/09)
2009 Sep 4, In southern Sudan
heavily armed fighters attacked an ethnic Dinka settlement in
Bony-Thiang, north of the state capital Malakal, killing 20 people.
Angry Dinka groups then launched a retaliatory raid on the nearby
Shilluk village of Bon, killing five people including a woman and
two children.
(AFP, 9/5/09)
2009 Sep 7, A Sudanese judge
convicted Lubna Hussein, a woman journalist, for violating the
public indecency law by wearing trousers outdoors and fined her
$200, but did not impose a feared flogging penalty. Hussein said she
will not pay a penny while still in court custody, wearing the same
trousers that had sparked her arrest.
(AP, 9/7/09)
2009 Sep 7, UK-based
Global Witness said they had found serious discrepancies in reports
of Sudan's oil revenues which could mean Khartoum's government was
underpaying its strife torn south by hundreds of millions of
dollars.
(Reuters, 9/7/09)
2009 Sep 8, Sudanese journalist
Lubna Ahmed Hussein, who spent a day in jail for refusing to pay a
fine for wearing "indecent trousers," vowed on her release to keep
up the battle against the law. The UN’s human rights office said
Sudan's conviction Hussein for indecency for wearing trousers
violates international law and is emblematic of wider gender
discrimination in the Islamic country.
(AFP, 9/8/09)(Reuters, 9/8/09)
2009 Sep 18, In Sudan Darfur
rebels accused Sudanese government forces of attacking their
positions over the last 2 days, weeks after a senior peacekeeper
said the region was no longer in a state of war.
(Reuters, 9/19/09)
2009 Sep 20, The Sudanese army
said it has cleared several more areas of rebel control in North
Darfur province ahead of peace talks set for October. Rebels denied
the government claims. In southern Sudan Lou Nuer tribesman attacked
the village of Duk-Padiet in Jonglei state killing around 102
people, including 51 civilians and 23 attackers.
(AP, 9/20/09)(AFP, 9/21/09)
2009 Sep 27, Sudan’s President
Omar al-Beshir announced the immediate lifting of state censorship
on the press, meeting a key demand of the media ahead of Sudan's
first elections in almost 25 years.
(AFP, 9/27/09)
2009 Sep 27, In Venezuela Pres.
Hugo Chavez proposed that South American and African nations unite
to create a cross-continental mining corporation to keep control of
their resources. Chavez made diplomatic inroads in Africa at a
summit of South American and African leaders where he offered
Venezuela's help in oil projects, mining and financial assistance.
Venezuela signed agreements to work together on oil projects with
South Africa, Mauritania, Niger, Sudan and Cape Verde.
(Reuters, 9/27/09)(AP, 9/28/09)
2009 Sep 28, In Sudan a
Nigerian peacekeeper was killed and two Kenyan colleagues were
wounded in the troubled Darfur region when armed men ambushed their
convoy.
(Reuters, 9/29/09)
2009 Sep 30, Amnesty
International said tens of thousands of women who fled unrest in
Darfur face the daily threat or rape and violence in refugee camps
in neighboring Chad.
(AP, 9/30/09)
2009 Oct 2, In southern Sudan
fighting broke out in an oil-rich area between forces loyal to an
ex-warlord and the state’s governor.
(AP, 10/2/09)(AFP, 10/3/09)
2009 Oct 3-2009 Oct 4, In
southern Sudan 16 people were killed in clashes between forces loyal
to an ex-warlord and the governor's guards in oil-rich Unity State.
At least 23 people were killed and more than a thousand fled their
homes in ethnic clashes over the weekend.
(AFP, 10/5/09)
2009 Oct 11, Four Sudanese who
face the death penalty for killing a US diplomat dismissed their
defense team, denounced the trial as political and labeled the
United States murderers of Muslims. John Granville (33), who worked
for the US Agency for International Development, and his driver,
Abdelrahman Abbas Rahama (39), were killed Jan 1, 2008.
(Reuters, 10/11/09)
2009 Oct 12, A Sudanese court
sentenced 4 Islamists to death for a 2nd time for the murder of a US
diplomat John Granville and his driver in Khartoum last year. The
sentencing came after the mother of John Granville, who worked with
the US Agency for Int’l. Development (USAID), and the wife of driver
Abdel Rahman Abbas both demanded the men be executed.
(AFP, 10/12/09)
2009 Oct 16, A top southern
Sudanese official said former enemies in north and south Sudan have
reached agreement on details for a key referendum on the south’s
full independence. Clashes broke out in the remote border region
between southern Sudan and north-west Kenya. At least three Kenyan
soldiers were reported killed in cross border raids. An officer was
killed when security forces tracked down raiders in south Darfur,
shooting dead two of the attackers in an exchange of fire. Two
officers were killed a day earlier as up to four men raided a
guesthouse in the south Darfur town of Kass.
(AFP, 10/16/09)(AFP, 10/17/09)(Reuters, 10/17/09)
2009 Oct 17, In western Sudan 3
peacekeepers were wounded, two of them seriously, when their vehicle
came under fire in the Darfur region.
(AFP, 10/17/09)
2009 Oct 18, In Sudan Irish
national Sharon Commins and Ugandan Hilda Kawuki, who worked for
Irish charity GOAL, were freed. They had been kidnapped on July 3 at
gunpoint. The Irish Times newspaper reported on Oct 24 that a
150,000-euro (225,000-dollar) ransom was paid to secure the release
of two aid workers in the western Darfur region.
(AFP, 10/24/09)
2009 Oct 19, US President
Barack Obama unveiled a new policy on Sudan and warned Khartoum of
more US pressure if it failed to respond to his fresh incentives to
stop "genocide" and "abuses" in Darfur.
(AFP, 10/19/09)
2009 Oct 21, A Sudanese cargo
plane crashed shortly after takeoff from Sharjah International
Airport north of Dubai, killing the 6-member crew but causing no
other casualties on the ground.
(AP, 10/21/09)
2009 Oct 22, A Sudanese court
sentenced two women to 20 lashes for dressing "indecently." Judge
Hassan Mohammed Ali said: "The two women wore trousers and no
headscarf. The court therefore finds them guilty according the
public order laws." Last year nearly 43,000 women were detained for
indecent clothing offences in Khartoum region, where five million
people live.
(AFP, 10/22/09)
2009 Oct 22, In Sudan gunmen
kidnapped Gauthier Lefevre (35), a French staff member working for
the International Committee of the Red Cross, in the western Darfur
region. The kidnappers soon demanded a three-million-euro ransom.
Lefevre was released on March 18, 2010.
(AP, 10/22/09)(AFP, 10/27/09)(AP, 3/18/10)
2009 Oct 27, President Barack
Obama formally renewed US sanctions on Sudan under his new strategy
of keeping up pressure while offering incentives to the Khartoum
government. Robert Cabelly (61), a former State Department employee
and US lobbyist, was charged with violating Sudanese sanctions
regulations, acting as an unregistered agent of a foreign power,
money laundering, passport fraud and making false statements.
(Reuters, 10/27/09)(AP, 10/28/09)
2009 Oct 27, A UN official said
more than 300,000 children under the age of five die of preventable
diseases each year in Sudan, almost a third of them before they
reach the age of one month.
(AFP, 10/28/09)
2009 Nov 3, The British
government said survivors of the Darfur conflict will no longer be
deported from Britain, after concerns about a deterioration in
conditions in the Sudanese capital. The Home Office said asylum
seekers will have the right to remain in Britain for up to five
years, or until the situation improves in Sudan.
(AFP, 11/3/09)
2009 Nov 6, The aid agency
Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) warned that
Southern Sudan is facing a "serious outbreak" of the deadly kala
azar tropical disease. Kala azar, or visceral leishmaniasis, is a
neglected tropical disease contracted by the bite of a sand fly,
endemic in some parts of southern Sudan. Without treatment, almost
all victims die within one to four months. If treatment is received
on time, some 95% can recover.
(AFP, 11/6/09)
2009 Nov 6, Turkey rebuffed an
EU call to reconsider its decision to allow Sudanese President Omar
al-Beshir, who is accused of war crimes in Darfur, to attend a
summit in Istanbul. Turkey has not signed the Rome Statute which set
up the ICC and has said previously the ICC arrest warrant for Beshir
could hurt moves to end the conflict in Darfur.
(AFP, 11/6/09)
2009 Nov 6, A UN report said 2
Iranian businessmen working at a Dubai-based firm were linked to
video surveillance devices sold to Sudan and used in unmanned drones
in Darfur in violation of a UN arms embargo.
(Reuters, 11/6/09)
2009 Nov 8, Turkey said that
Sudan's internationally indicted leader, President Omar al-Bashir,
will not attend the Nov 9 Istanbul summit of the 57-nation
Organization of the Islamic Conference.
(AP, 11/9/09)
2009 Nov 9, In eastern Chad a
French Red Cross staff member was abducted by several armed men,
close to the border with Sudan. Laurent Maurice was freed in Sudan
on Feb 6.
(AFP, 11/10/09)(AP, 2/7/10)
2009 Nov 10, Nigerian football
star Stephen Worgu (20) was fined and sentenced to 40 lashes in
Sudan after being convicted of drunk driving in Khartoum. Worgu said
he was stopped by police driving home late from dinner at a friend's
house in August. No tests were done but officers told the court they
had smelled the home-brewed spirit aragi on his breath.
(Reuters, 11/12/09)
2009 Nov 11, In Sudan 11 people
were killed in fighting in southern Jonglei state in clashes between
the Dinka and Shilluk ethnic groups.
(AFP, 11/12/09)
2009 Nov 16, In southern Sudan
47 people were killed in ethnic clashes in the Lakes state region.
The violence followed an attack a day earlier in which five were
killed and a minister in the semi-autonomous south’s government was
wounded in Central Equatoria state. It was all a continuation of
traditional cattle raids, but with the use modern automatic weapons.
(AFP, 11/18/09)
2009 Nov 18, Egyptian fans were
attacked after Algeria won a make-or-break World Cup qualifying game
in the Sudanese capital Khartoum, and offices of Egyptian companies
in Algeria were ransacked after a matchup in Cairo over the weekend.
(AP, 11/19/09)
2009 Nov 18, Qatar hosted what
it billed as the ceremonial launch of Darfur peace talks, but
neither Sudanese government nor rebel representatives took part.
(AFP, 11/18/09)
2009 Nov 21, In Sudan Silva
Kashif (16), a girl from south Sudan, was arrested convicted and
lashed 50 times after a Khartoum judge ruled her knee-length skirt
was indecent. Her mother, Jenty Doro, later said she planned to sue
the police who made the arrest and the judge who imposed the
sentence, as her daughter was underage and a Christian.
(Reuters, 11/27/09)(AFP, 11/28/09)
2009 Dec 4, In Sudan gunmen
killed three Rwandan soldiers in an ambush in the northern town of
Saraf Umra in the western Darfur region.
(AP, 12/5/09)
2009 Dec 5, In Sudan's Darfur
region 2 Rwandan peacekeepers were shot dead and one wounded, in the
second deadly attack on their contingent in 24 hours. The next day a
former Darfur rebel group captured 3 gunmen who allegedly killed the
5 Rwandan peacekeepers.
(Reuters, 12/5/09)(AFP, 12/8/09)
2009 Dec 7, In Sudan southern
protesters torched offices of the ruling party after Khartoum police
arrested 3 southern leaders and dozens of protesters in a crackdown
against a pro-reform demonstration. Pagan Amum, Yassir Arman and
Abbas Gumma from the former rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement
(SPLM) were freed after a few hours.
(AFP, 12/7/09)
2009 Dec 10, In Sudan gunmen in
Nyala, western Darfur, shot and killed Hassan Tageddine Hassan
al-Helw of the ruling National Congress Party along with 2 others in
his car.
(AP, 12/11/09)
2009 Dec 14, Sudanese police
fired tear gas, used water cannons and rounded up dozens of
opposition supporters in a bid to halt a pro-democracy rally outside
parliament.
(AFP, 12/14/09)
2009 Dec 15, Sudanese officials
said up to 48 opposition supporters will face charges for taking
part in a banned rally close to parliament calling for democratic
reforms.
(AP, 12/15/09)
2009 Dec 20, Sudan’s Parliament
passed a new law curbing the powers of the intelligence services,
although former southern rebels and some opposition parties rejected
the move as not going far enough.
(AFP, 12/20/09)
2009 Dec 21, The UN accused the
Ugandan-based Lord's Resistance Army of killing, mutilating and
raping villagers in Sudan and Congo in what may have been crimes
against humanity.
(AP, 12/21/09)
2009 Dec 24, A delegation
headed by Chadian Foreign Minister Moussa Faki Mahamat met Sudanese
Omar al-Beshir and helped restore trust between the neighbors.
(AFP, 12/25/09)
2009 Dec 27, Sudan, angling to
become Africa's leading exporter of ethanol, sent out its first
shipment of the bio-fuel to the Netherlands. Kenana's plant, located
in the White Nile State south of Khartoum, was built by the
Brazilian ethanol supplier Dedini.
(AFP, 12/28/09)
2009 Dec 29, Sudan's parliament
adopted a key law, setting up a planned referendum on southern
independence after northern and southern leaders overcame a dispute
that had threatened a 2005 peace deal.
(AFP, 12/30/09)
2009 Dec 31, In Sudan 17 people
were killed when armed civilians ambushed south Sudanese soldiers
trying to disarm tribes following heavy fighting in the
semi-autonomous region.
(AP, 1/6/10)
2009 In southern Sudan over
2,500 were killed and 400,000 displaced mostly after cattle raids
between tribes.
(Econ, 5/8/10, p.50)
2010 Jan 2, In southern Sudan
armed Nuer tribesmen killed at least 139 members of a rival tribe in
an attack in Tonj, one of the most remote parts of the oil-producing
south.
(Reuters, 1/7/10)
2010 Jan 11, Sudanese President
Omar Hassan al-Bashir retired as commander-in-chief of the army, in
what sources said was a procedural move before the first multi-party
elections in 24 years.
(Reuters, 1/11/10)
2010 Jan 13, Sudanese forces
clashed with rebels in a key area of the troubled western region of
Darfur.
(AFP, 1/13/10)
2010 Jan 16, Sudanese warplanes
and artillery pounded insurgents in the troubled western region of
Darfur.
(AFP, 1/16/10)
2010 Jan 18, In southern Sudan
clashes began in the troubled southern state of Jonglei leaving 9
people dead.
(AFP, 1/22/10)
2010 Jan 19, Sudan's Pres.
Bashir said he would support the country's oil-producing south if it
chose independence in a looming referendum, in his closest
acknowledgement of the possibility of separation. A Sudanese court
sentenced another two Darfur rebels to death for a deadly 2008
attack, raising to 105 the number of Justice and Equality Movement
fighters ordered hanged for the raid.
(AP, 1/19/10)(AFP, 1/20/10)
2010 Jan 21, In southern Sudan
clashes continued for a 4th day in the troubled southern state of
Jonglei leaving 15 more people dead.
(AFP, 1/22/10)
2010 Jan 22, Belgian scientists
said nearly 80 percent of the 300,000 conflict-related deaths in
Darfur were due to diseases like diarrhea, not violence.
(Reuters, 1/22/10)
2010 Jan 23, In Sudan a
military spokesman said at least 24 people have been killed in
clashes in the troubled southern Sudanese state of Jonglei in recent
days.
(AFP, 1/23/10)
2010 Jan 26, Sudan's former PM
Sadiq al-Mahdi vowed to put an end to "totalitarianism" and resolve
the conflict in Darfur by taking power at elections in April.
(AFP, 1/26/10)
2010 Feb 2, UN and Sudanese
officials said almost half the population of south Sudan is facing
food shortages because of conflict and drought, a fourfold rise in
the numbers needing aid since last year.
(Reuters, 2/2/10)
2010 Feb 3, At The Hague
appeals judges said the International Criminal Court was wrong when
it decided that Sudan's Pres. Omar al-Bashir can't be charged with
genocide in Darfur. The unprecedented ruling could lead al-Bashir's
indictment with humanity's worst crime.
(AP, 2/3/10)
2010 Feb 4, In Sudan 16 people
were killed in clashes between south Sudan troops and cattle herders
from the northern Messeria tribe in the southern Unity state.
(AFP, 2/6/10)
2010 Feb 9, In Sudan militias
raided a Darfur refugee camp, shooting dead two people and injuring
at least 10. The raid followed the murder of a militia member's
relative who appeared to be searching the camps in Kass, South
Darfur for the suspect.
(AP, 2/10/10)
2010 Feb 10, In Sudan Mohamed
Musa (23), a Darfuri student, was abducted in Khartoum and later
found dead. Fellow students later said they had seen his body, that
his hands were burned, his head and body beaten, cut and swollen and
his clothes soaked in blood.
(AP, 2/15/10)
2010 Feb 16, In Sudan gunmen
attacked a police convoy outside Nyala in south Darfur, wounding
seven Pakistani police officers serving with the UN-AU force. 2
people were soon arrested in connection with an ambush.
(AP, 2/18/10)
2010 Feb 20, Darfur's most
heavily armed rebel group, the Justice and Equality Movement, said
that it had signed a framework agreement with the Sudanese
government in Chad that provides for a ceasefire. Sudanese President
Omar Hassan al-Bashir was due to sign the same agreement with JEM
leader Khalil Ibrahim in Qatar on Feb 23, watched by diplomats and
the presidents of Chad and Eritrea.
(AFP, 2/20/10)(Reuters, 2/23/10)
2010 Feb 21, In southern Sudan
weekend fighting between armed clan members and soldiers killed at
least 30 people over the last 24 hours. After the attempt to seize
weapons, the armed Gok Dinka, a sub-clan of the Dinka, the south's
largest tribe, carried out a spate of attacks on an army base in
Cueibet town.
(Reuters, 2/23/10)
2010 Feb 23, Darfur's most
powerful rebel group and the Sudanese government signed a truce in
Cairo after a year of internationally sponsored negotiations,
raising hopes the bloody seven-year conflict could draw to a close.
According to the framework agreement, JEM would take part in the
government's executive, judicial and legislative branches.
(Reuters, 2/23/10)(AP, 2/24/10)(SFC, 2/24/10,
p.A2)
2010 Feb 25, In Sudan the head
of the most heavily armed Darfur rebel group ordered the release of
50 Sudanese government personnel following the signing of a peace
deal. The move followed the government's release a day earlier of 57
fighters of the rebel Justice and Equality Movement, some 50 of whom
had been condemned to death for their part in an unprecedented
assault on Khartoum in 2008. A Darfur rebel group accused the
Sudanese army of attacking its positions a day earlier, the same day
that the president declared the Darfur war over. Aid workers said
100,000 people had fled the surge of fighting.
(AFP, 2/25/10)(Reuters, 2/25/10)
2010 Feb 26, In Sudan rebels
and UN officials said heavy fighting between government forces and a
rebel group in central Darfur led a French-aid group to suspend its
activities. A government offensive on the rebel Sudan Liberation
Army's (SLA) stronghold in Jebel Marrah began two weeks ago, but
fighting intensified in the last few days, with confirmed reports of
aerial bombardments in Deribat, a town of 50,000, and two other
surrounding areas.
(AP, 2/26/10)
2010 Mar 1, A UN source said
hundreds of civilians were feared to have died last week in a surge
of fighting between the Sudanese army and rebels in the turbulent
Darfur region.
(Reuters, 3/1/10)
2010 Mar 2, South Sudan’s 17
rival political parties signed an election code of conduct,
committing themselves to ensure upcoming polls in April are free and
fair.
(AFP, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 3, In western Sudan 11
people died in fighting between the Misseriya and Nuwayba tribes in
the Darfur region.
(AFP, 3/7/10)
2010 Mar 6, In western Sudan 10
people were killed in renewed clashes between the Misseriya and
Nuwayba tribes in the Darfur region.
(AFP, 3/7/10)
2010 Mar 9, In Switzerland a
senior Google executive welcomed a US decision to relax restrictions
on exporting Internet communications services to Iran, Sudan and
Cuba.
(AP, 3/9/10)
2010 Mar 17, In southern Sudan
at least 13 people were killed in fighting between northern nomads
and the southern army.
(AFP, 3/19/10)
2010 Mar 18, Sudan's government
and a collection of Darfur rebel groups signed a cease-fire, opening
the way for political negotiations ahead of a full peace agreement.
Government representative Ghazi Salah Eddin Atabani and rebel leader
Al-Tijani Al-Sissi signed the truce in Doha, Qatar. Al-Sissi's
Liberation and Justice Movement is an umbrella organization that
includes several small Darfur rebel groups that recently united to
negotiate with the government.
(AP, 3/18/10)
2010 Mar 20, In Sudan 19
members of the Misseriya tribe and six from the rival Nuwayba tribe
were killed as fighting broke out. More than 20 people were wounded.
(AFP, 3/23/10)
2010 Mar 21, In Cairo, Egypt an
international donors conference raised $850 million in pledges for
projects intended to ensure the safe return of more than 2.7 million
people displaced during the war in Darfur. The one-day conference
was organized by the 57-nation Organization of The Islamic
Conference and included representatives from the US, European
nations, UN agencies and aid groups.
(AP, 3/21/10)(AP, 3/22/10)
2010 Mar 27, In Sudan Darfur
rebels allegedly shot down 2 Sudanese army helicopters in the latest
reports of fighting that have marred faltering peace talks between
Khartoum and other insurgents. Sudan's army said two of its
helicopters crashed after developing technical problems.
(Reuters, 3/29/10)
2010 Mar 30, The International
Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think-tank, said Sudanese President
Omar al-Beshir has long been working to ensure next month's
elections are rigged, making the eventual winner illegitimate.
(AFP, 3/31/10)
2010 Mar 31, Southern Sudan's
main political party withdrew its candidate from the country's
upcoming presidential election and said it will not contest
parliamentary and local polls in Darfur, a move that erodes the
credibility of Sudan's first multiparty election in decades.
(AP, 4/1/10)
2010 Apr 10, The border between
Chad and Sudan reopened seven years after the Darfur conflict forced
its closure, in another sign of improved relations between the
former foes.
(AFP, 4/14/10)
2010 Apr 11, The Sudanese
people began voting in a 3-day election that will decide whether
President Omar al-Bashir wins another term despite his indictment on
charges he committed international war crimes in Darfur. Voters were
left with few alternatives after al-Bashir's main challengers
boycotted the race, claiming it was not fair. In addition to the
president, the country was also electing a national parliament,
local governors and parliaments and president of the semiautonomous
government of South Sudan. 4 peacekeepers with the joint UN-African
Union force (UNAMID) in the western Sudanese region of Darfur went
missing. The 4 peacekeepers were released on April 26.
(AP, 4/11/10)(AFP, 4/12/10)(AFP, 4/26/10)
2010 Apr 12, Observers urged
Sudan to extend voting in its first open elections in 24 years after
thousands of ballots were cast incorrectly and polling faced serious
delays in many areas of Africa's largest country.
(Reuters, 4/12/10)
2010 Apr 13, Sudanese trickled
into polling stations following a two-day extension of the vote
aimed at making up for a chaotic start to the country's first
competitive election in over two decades.
(AFP, 4/13/10)
2010 Apr 14, Sudan's ruling
party said it would invite opposition groups to join the government
if it won elections, in an apparent bid to heal rifts over fraud
accusations and faltering peace deals.
(Reuters, 4/14/10)
2010 Apr 15, Sudanese voters
cast ballots on the last day of landmark elections. Sudan's ruling
party said that the southern army had killed 9 people, including at
least 5 of its officials, stoking tensions during voting in the
first open elections in 24 years. Commission official Abel Alier
said on April 26 that al-Bashir had garnered 68% of over 10 million
valid ballots.
(Reuters, 4/15/10)(AP, 4/26/10)
2010 Apr 17, International
monitors said that Sudan's first multiparty elections in more than
two decades failed to meet international standards, an assessment
that diminishes hopes the voting would set the nation on the road to
peace and democracy. Preliminary results from the presidential race
showed incumbent Omar al-Bashir had won between 88% and 94% of votes
counted after his most credible challengers dropped out of the race
in protest.
(AP, 4/17/10)
2010 Apr 23, In Sudan an
announcement that Unity state incumbent Taban Deng had retained his
post in this month's election was followed by protests in the state
capital Bentiu that left two people shot dead by police and a third
wounded. Supporters of Deng's main rival Angelina Teny, wife of
south Sudan's vice president Riek Machar, were accused of trying to
wreck a local radio station. The National Election Commission also
announced that Beshir's ruling National Congress Party had won the
posts of governor in North Darfur and West Darfur, with results for
South Darfur yet to be released.
(AFP, 4/23/10)
2010 Apr 25, In Sudan clashes
continued for a 4th day in Darfur between Arab nomads and south
Sudan's army along the country's volatile north-south border. Local
tribal officials reported more than 50 Arab nomads were killed in
the fighting with soldiers from the southern Sudan's People
Liberation Army.
(AP, 4/25/10)
2010 Apr 28, In Sudan around
2,000 people gathered in El Fasher, capital of North Darfur, after
discovering that the scheme had collapsed. Police used tear gas to
break up a protest by hundreds of investors who lost money in a
Ponzi scheme that stretched across Sudan's strife-ridden Darfur
region and beyond.
(Reuters, 4/29/10)
2010 Apr 30, In south Sudan at
least seven people were killed after men said to be affiliated with
a defeated candidate in regional elections attacked an army base.
(AFP, 4/30/10)
2010 May 1, In Sudan the
Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), Darfur’s main rebel group,
warned that the government has brought the Darfur peace process to
an end by launching a military offensive.
(AFP, 5/2/10)
2010 May 2, In Sudan gunfire
broke out and ambulance sirens wailed as hundreds of angry victims
of a failed pyramid scheme protested in the Darfur region. Police
opened fire as the protesters tried to march on the house of the
state governor. At least 3 people died in the clashes.
(AFP, 5/2/10)(Reuters, 5/5/10)
2010 May 3, Darfur's most
powerful rebel group said it was suspending peace talks with Sudan's
government, accusing Khartoum of attacking villages and military
positions in breach of a ceasefire. In South Sudan a renegade army
general said he had taken command of a body of soldiers and demanded
the removal of the man who beat him in recent elections. South
Sudan's army accused George Athor of masterminding an attack on one
of its bases on April 30 and plotting further assaults after he lost
in the race to become governor of the oil-producing south's Jonglei
state last week.
(AP, 5/3/10)(Reuters, 5/3/10)
2010 May 5, Sudan’s justice
minister said police investigating an investment scam in the Darfur
region have collected bounced checks and receipts for up to $27
million and arrested 58 people. The south Sudan armed forces said
clashes over livestock between members of two large tribes killed 26
people in the south Sudan state of Warrap.
(Reuters, 5/6/10)(AFP, 5/6/10)
2010 May 6, In southern Sudan
government troops clashed with soldiers loyal to renegade General
George Athor, leaving 53 dead and ending hopes of a negotiated end
to his mini revolt.
(Reuters, 5/7/10)
2010 May 7, In Sudan gunmen
killed two Egyptian peacekeepers and wounded three more in an ambush
on their convoy in south Darfur. Police soon arrested two men in the
South Darfur area of Edd al Fursan and were hunting down the rest of
a seven-man bandit gang blamed for the attack.
(AP, 5/7/10)(Reuters, 5/10/10)
2010 May 12, The UN
peacekeeping mission in Sudan said Clashes between rival Arab tribes
have claimed 107 lives since March in Darfur, warning of a buildup
of government and rebel troops in the region.
(AFP, 5/12/10)
2010 May 14, In Sudan
government troops killed 108 fighters from the rebel Justice and
Equality Movement in the Jebel Moon area of western Darfur.
Government forces also battled JEM rebels near Nyala in south Darfur
where 27 police and 33 rebels were killed. Forces loyal to a
renegade south Sudanese general clashed with government troops for
the fourth time in two weeks, leaving at least five soldiers dead.
(AP, 5/15/10)(Reuters, 5/14/10)
2010 May 14, Four African
countries (Ethiopia, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda) signed a new treaty
on the equitable sharing of the Nile waters despite strong
opposition from Egypt and Sudan, who have the lion's share of the
river waters. The new agreement, the Nile Basin Cooperative
Framework, is to replace a 1959 accord between Egypt and Sudan that
gives them control of more than 90 percent of the water flow.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit warned at the weekend
that Cairo's water rights were a "red line" and threatened legal
action if a partial deal is reached.
(AFP, 5/14/10)
2010 May 15, Sudanese
authorities arrested Islamist opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi and
closed his newspaper, sparking a furious reaction from the country's
opposition. A coalition of 17 opposition parties, including the
heavyweight Umma party, signed a statement condemning Turabi's
arrest as a "violation against freedoms and democratic
transformation and the constitution."
(AFP, 5/16/10)(Econ, 6/5/10, p.54)
2010 May 18, A female American
aid worker, Flavia Wagner (35), and two Sudanese colleagues were
ambushed and abducted by gunmen in Abu Ajura, South Darfur state. On
Aug 30 the foreign ministry said police had freed Wagner in the Abu
Agora area south of Nyala.
(AFP, 5/18/10)(AFP, 8/30/10)
2010 May 19, Chadian
authorities at Ndjamena airport refused entry to Khalil Ibrahim and
a number of other JEM members who had arrived from the Libyan
capital Tripoli. Chadian authorities confiscated their passports and
refused to let them into Chadian territory and ordered them to go
back to Libya. Khalil and his delegation had planned to head to
Darfur through Chad.
(AP, 5/19/10)
2010 May 20, In Sudan Darfur's
most militarized rebel group (JEM), said it had killed 200 Sudanese
government troops in the western region over the previous 2 days,
but the army denied the toll in the latest fighting to cloud
troubled peace talks.
(AFP, 5/21/10)
2010 May 21, In southern Sudan
President Salva Kiir was sworn in eight months ahead of a scheduled
referendum on whether the south will secede from the north. The
south and the northern government, led by Sudanese President Omar
al-Bashir, must still negotiate how the two regions will share oil
revenues and divide access to the Nile River waters before the
referendum.
(AP, 5/21/10)
2010 May 26, The International
Criminal Court reported Sudan to the UN Security Council for
refusing to arrest a government minister and a militia leader
suspected of war crimes in Darfur. Judges at the court say that
Khartoum has refused to hand over Humanitarian Affairs Minister
Ahmed Harun and Janjaweed militia leader Ali Kushayb. The court
ordered the men arrested in 2007 on 51 charges of crimes against
humanity and war crimes.
(AP, 5/26/10)
2010 May 27, Sudan's president
was sworn in on for another five-year term after an election marred
by boycotts and fraud allegations, the only head of state to be
re-elected while facing an international arrest warrant for war
crimes.
(AP, 5/27/10)
2010 May 28, Sudan's autonomous
southern government announced, during a visit by UN relief chief
John Holmes, that it had earmarked $35 million (€28 million) to
fight food shortage.
(AP, 5/28/10)
2010 May 30, Sudan’s President
Omar al-Beshir dissolved the government four days after he was sworn
in for a new term, ahead of the formation of a fresh cabinet
line-up.
(AFP, 5/30/10)
2010 May 31, In southern Sudan
renegade general George Athor said 3 top officers who quit south
Sudan's army over alleged fraud in national elections are
coordinating attacks in the oil-producing region, but the army
played down the threat.
(Reuters, 6/1/10)
2010 May, Clashes in west
Sudan's Darfur region cost almost 600 lives this month, the highest
monthly death toll since peacekeepers were deployed in 2008.
(AFP, 6/7/10)
2010 Jun 2, Sudanese security
forces beat up and arrested several leaders of a doctors' syndicate
which had called for strike action.
(AFP, 6/3/10)
2010 Jun 2, South Sudan army
forces clashed with insurgents in Unity state leaving 9 people dead
including one soldier and eight men loyal to renegade commander
Galwak Gai.
(AFP, 6/3/10)
2010 Jun 6, In Sudan a tribal
leader said clashes between rival Arab tribes in the western region
of Darfur killed 41 people in three days. Fighting broke out on June
3 when "members of the Rezeigat tribe attacked a village west of the
town of Kass" in South Darfur.
(AFP, 6/7/10)
2010 Jun 8, A report by the
European Coalition on Oil in Sudan (ECOS) charged that a consortium
led by Swedish Lundin Petroleum is partly to blame for war
crimes committed in Sudan between 1997 and 2003.
(AFP, 6/8/10)
2010 Jun 10, In Sudan 4
Islamists sentenced to hang for the 2008 New Year's murder of US
diplomat John Granville and his driver in Khartoum escaped the Kober
prison in Khartoum.
(AFP, 6/11/10)
2010 Jun 15, South Sudan's army
clashed with forces loyal to renegade militia leader George Athor, a
day after flushing him out of his hideout in the region's Jonglei
oil state. At least 20 people were killed in fresh fighting between
rival Sudanese tribes in western Darfur.
(Reuters, 6/16/10)(AFP, 6/15/10)
2010 Jun 18, In western
Sudan 50 people were killed as rival Arab tribes clashed for the
third time this month in the Darfur region.
(AFP, 6/19/10)
2010 Jun 21, In Sudan more than
two dozen gunmen attacked Rwandan peacekeepers in the ravaged Darfur
region, killing three of them in an hour-long fire fight.
(AP, 6/21/10)
2010 Jun 21, Sweden's public
prosecutor opened a criminal investigation into allegations that
Swedes working for a consortium of oil companies during the Sudanese
civil war may have been complicit in human rights abuses.
(Reuters, 6/21/10)
2010 Jun 22, In Sudan 2 German
humanitarian workers were abducted when unknown gunmen swooped on
the offices of the THW group in south Darfur. Fighting between
government troops and rebels of the Justice and Equality Movement
killed 50 people and wounded 101 in Sudan's Darfur region. The
release of the German aid workers was announced on July 27.
(AFP, 6/23/10)(AP, 7/27/10)
2010 Jun 23, British-based risk
consultancy Maplecroft said African nations led by Mauritania,
Somalia and Sudan have the most precarious water supplies in the
world.
(Reuters, 6/23/10)
2010 Jun 27, In Ethiopia water
minister of Egypt and Sudan said they will not be forced into
signing a new deal on the sharing of the Nile's waters. Ethiopia,
Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda inked a framework in March, 2010,
replacing a 1929 colonial-era treaty between Egypt and Britain which
gave Cairo veto power over upstream projects. A two-day meeting
concluded of regional water ministers concluded with Egypt handing
over the body's chair to Ethiopia.
(AFP, 6/27/10)
2010 Jun 28, Sudan said will
close its border crossings with Libya next month as it ramps up
security on the frontier in response to banditry. Leaders from the
Misseriya and Rizeigat groups signed a reconciliation deal in the
West Darfur town of Zalingei, raising hopes for an end to fighting
that has killed more than 200 people since March.
(AFP, 6/29/10)(Reuters, 6/29/10)
2010 Jul 1, Sudanese opposition
leader Hassan Turabi said his 45-day detention and the shuttering of
his party newspaper are proof that the country's historic elections
haven't changed the regime's "oppressive" ways. Turabi was arrested
in May after sharply criticizing Sudan's historic multiparty
elections, saying they were marred by "shameful" fraud.
(AP, 7/1/10)
2010 Jul 6, Sudan intelligence
services imposed press censorship, which was lifted in September,
six months ahead of a key referendum on independence for south
Sudan.
(AFP, 7/6/10)
2010 Jul 7, Sudanese prisoner
Ibrahim al Qosi (50), accused of guarding Osama bin Laden and
helping him escape US forces in Afghanistan, pleaded guilty at
Guantanamo, giving the Obama administration its first conviction in
the controversial war crimes court.
(Reuters, 7/7/10)
2010 Jul 8, In France exiled
Darfur rebel leader Abdelwahid Nur announced his decision to join
peace talks brokered by Qatar.
(AFP, 7/9/10)
2010 Jul 9, South Sudan's army
killed seven militia fighters in a raid on their camps. Youths led
an SPLA division to two hideouts used by a militia loyal to Akol's
SPLM- DC (Democratic Change) party in Upper Nile.
(Reuters, 7/11/10)
2010 Jul 10, Northern and
southern Sudanese leaders said they would consider forming a
confederation or a common market if southerners chose to declare
independence in an upcoming referendum.
(Reuters, 7/10/10)
2010 Jul 11, In Sudan
peacekeepers said a total of 221 people died in tribal fighting and
other violence in Sudan's Darfur in June, as the region's two main
rebel groups continued to shun peace talks.
(Reuters, 7/11/10)
2010 Jul 12, The International
Criminal Court charged Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir with three
counts of genocide in Darfur, a move that will pile further
diplomatic pressure on his isolated regime.
(AP, 7/12/10)
2010 Jul 15, In Sudan aid
officials said the government has issued expulsion orders against
two top relief officials in Darfur after the International Criminal
Court charged President Omar al-Beshir with genocide over the
seven-year conflict there. When the ICC issued a warrant for
Beshir's arrest for the other charges in March last year, the
Sudanese government expelled 13 relief organizations from Darfur.
Three journalists working for the opposition Rai al-Shaab newspaper
were handed jail terms ranging from two to five years for publishing
"false reports."
(AFP, 7/15/10)
2010 Jul 15, Sudanese police
said at least 33 people have been killed and several others were
missing following powerful floods in eastern Sudan.
(AFP, 7/15/10)
2010 Jul 16, The Sudanese army
said it inflicted a series of defeats on Darfur's most powerful
rebel group, killing and capturing hundreds in a series of clashes
over the past few days. General Al-Tayeb al-Musbah Osman told the
state news agency that the army killed at least 300 members of the
rebel Justice and Equality Movement and captured another 86. The
army said 75 of its troops were also killed.
(AP, 7/17/10)
2010 Jul 20, Sudan expelled
three top Chadian rebel chiefs on the eve of a visit to Chad by
Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir.
(AFP, 7/20/10)
2010 Jul 21, President Omar
al-Bashir arrived in Chad, the first time Sudan's leader has been in
a member state of the International Criminal Court. He arrived to
take part in a summit of the Community of Sahel-Saharan States.
Human Rights Watch said that Chad should arrest al-Bashir or risk
becoming the first ICC member state to harbor a suspected war
criminal.
(AP, 7/21/10)
2010 Jul 21, Sudanese rebel
group JEM signed a landmark deal with the UN, pledging to protect
children caught up in the Darfur conflict.
(AFP, 7/21/10)
2010 Jul 26, In Sudan a
helicopter, which was assigned to the UN-AU force, disappeared while
transporting three members of the rebel Liberation Justice Movement
from peace negotiations with the government in Doha, Qatar, to
locations in South Darfur. The Russian-owned helicopter, which
landed in the wrong place in Darfur, was recovered the next day with
all the passengers and crew except the Russian pilot. Pilot Yevgeny
Mostovshchikov was returned to his UN peacekeepers' base on July 29.
(AP, 7/27/10)(AFP, 7/29/10)
2010 Jul 28, In Sudan 3 people
were killed during a gun battle between supporters of rival rebel
groups in a camp for displaced people in west Darfur. 7 UNAMID
peacekeepers on patrol in west Darfur were wounded when they were
ambushed by unidentified armed individuals.
(AFP, 7/29/10)
2010 Jul 29, In Sudan gunmen
ambushed a UNAMID patrol in West Darfur state, leaving four
peacekeepers slightly wounded. UNAMID soldiers repelled their
assailants with heavy gunfire.
(AFP, 7/29/10)
2010 Jul 30, The UN Security
Council extended the stay of peacekeepers in Sudan's western Darfur
region by another year, telling the force to focus primarily on
protecting civilians and aid deliveries.
(Reuters, 7/30/10)
2010 Aug 2, A cattle raid in
Southern Sudan possibly sparked by the region's high bride price,
100 cows or more, left 21 people dead.
(AP, 8/4/10)
2010 Aug 4, A Sudanese court
sentenced 19 young Muslim men to 30 lashes and a fine for breaking
moral codes by wearing women's clothes and makeup, a case exposing
Sudanese sensitivity toward homosexuality.
(Reuters, 8/4/10)
2010 Aug 6, In Sudan
humanitarian officials said all aid agencies have been denied access
to Darfur's Kalma camp after five people were killed there and
thousands fled when divisions over peace talks turned violent.
UN-African Union peacekeepers (UNAMID) have been in a stand-off with
South Darfur's government and Khartoum since five men and a
woman sought refuge in their Kalma police base during the violence
late last month.
(Reuters, 8/6/10)
2010 Aug 8, Gunmen in south
Sudan killed 23 people, including police officers, in an ambush on a
truck in the key oil producing state of Unity, Koch county.
(AFP, 8/11/10)
2010 Aug 9, Sudan halted BBC
broadcasts in Arabic on FM radio frequencies after suspending its
agreement with the British public broadcaster for reasons it said
had nothing to do with its newscasts.
(AFP, 8/9/10)
2010 Aug 10, Northern and
southern Sudanese leaders resumed negotiations on the ramifications
of possible southern independence early next year, such as the
distribution of oil wealth.
(AFP, 8/10/10)
2010 Aug 14, In Sudan's Darfur
region two Jordanian peacekeepers, deployed with the joint United
Nations-African Union mission, were kidnapped. On Aug 17 Jordanian
and Sudanese officials said the peacekeepers have been freed.
(AP, 8/15/10)(AFP, 8/17/10)
2010 Aug 16, In Sudan lightning
struck a religious school in the country's western Darfur region,
killing seven children.
(AP, 8/16/10)
2010 Aug 18, Sudan's government
confirmed it will expel a number of international aid workers from
the restive western region of Darfur, without specifying how many.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 23, The southern Sudan
finance minister said the fledgling economy is being "deliberately"
weakened by former civil war enemies in the north who are paying
Juba's share of oil revenues in local currency.
(AFP, 8/23/10)
2010 Aug 27, Sudan's President
Omar al-Bashir, for whom international arrest warrants have been
issued over the Darfur conflict, returned home after a trip to
Kenya.
(AFP, 8/28/10)
2010 Aug 29, Gunmen in Sudan’s
Darfur region kidnapped a Russian helicopter captain and 2 crew
members working for a company transporting food for international
peacekeepers. Security forces fought with the kidnappers the next
night freeing 3 men.
(AFP, 8/30/10)(AP, 8/31/10)
2010 Aug 30, The government of
Southern Sudan said it will purge child soldiers from the ranks of
its former rebel army by year's end, a policy change that could see
thousands of young troops pushed out of the military.
(AP, 8/30/10)
2010 Aug 31, The army of
Southern Sudan has been looting food convoys and carrying out other
attacks on aid groups, officials of those groups alleged, and a top
military officer warned that the humanitarian groups could be
expelled if the complaints get too "harsh." South Sudan health
officials said floods have forced nearly 60,000 people from their
homes, warning that the situation could worsen.
(AP, 8/31/10)(AFP, 8/31/10)
2010 Sep 2, In Sudan armed men
attacked the settlement of Tabarat and reportedly killed 74 people
in attacks on a busy market there and in surrounding villages in
rebel-held territory of the Darfur region. Air force bombing
continued to the next morning. The insurgent Sudan Liberation Army
(SLA) accused the Sudanese army of attacking the settlements west of
the town of Tawila in North Darfur state. The UNAMID force was later
able to verify from eyewitnesses that 37 people were killed and 30
were injured.
(Reuters, 9/3/10)(AFP, 9/3/10)(AP, 9/5/10)
2010 Sep 4, In Sudan a Darfur
rebel group said 10 people were killed in clashes with Sudanese
police in two camps for displaced people in West Darfur state.
U.N.-African Union peacekeepers said 9 people were killed in the
clashes.
(AFP, 9/4/10)(AP, 9/5/10)(AP, 9/8/10)
2010 Sep 8, In Sudan a Darfur
rebel group was attacked by Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army
guerrillas. The group later said 2 small reconnaissance groups of
about 20 young LRA rebels carrying light arms shot and killed one
LJM soldier before retreating into dense forest in remote South
Darfur.
(Reuters, 9/10/10)
2010 Sep 9, A senior southern
Sudan official said northern Sudan has resolved an angry dispute
with the south by returning the payment of crucial oil revenues to
hard currency.
(AFP, 9/9/10)
2010 Sep 11, In Sudan a rare
three-day meeting of 30 religious and community leaders as well as
local government officials from the Democratic Republic of Congo
(DRC), south Sudan, the Central African Republic (CAR) and Uganda
criticized the "lack of a coordinated and comprehensive strategy" to
tackle the LRA rebels.
(AFP, 9/11/10)
2010 Sep 16, In Sudan 37 people
were killed and 26 injured when two buses collided in the northern
state of White Nile.
(AFP, 9/16/10)
2010 Sep 17, In Sudan 13 people
travelling to mourn victims of a bus crash drowned when their boat
capsized in Sudan's White Nile state.
(AFP, 9/18/10)
2010 Sep 24, Sudan’s
information minister said South Sudanese people will lose the right
to be citizens in the north if their region votes for independence
in a referendum, raising fears for southerners living in northern
settlements.
(Reuters, 9/25/10)
2010 Sep 27, Sudan’s government
promised to inject almost two billion dollars into conflict-stricken
Darfur, but again demanded war crimes charges against its president
be dropped.
(AFP, 9/27/10)
2010 Oct 1, In Sudan Darfur
rebels accused Sudan's army of killing 27 people in a week-long
campaign of air and ground assaults on their positions, as peace
efforts in the arid region continued to flounder.
(Reuters, 10/2/10)
2010 Oct 6, In Britain Halima
Bashir (30), a doctor who says she was gang-raped in 2004 by
Sudanese soldiers after speaking out about atrocities in Darfur, won
the Anna Politkovskaya award for women human rights defenders. She
wrote about her experiences in her memoir, "Tears of the Desert"
(2008).
(Reuters, 10/6/10)
2010 Oct 7, Sudan's army said
it attacked rebel positions in the Darfur region hours before the
arrival of a delegation of UN Security Council envoys in the
territory. Armed men abducted a civilian peacekeeper in the capital
North Darfur state hours after the arrival of UN Security Council
envoys.
(Reuters, 10/7/10)(Reuters, 10/8/10)
2010 Oct 9, In Sudan some 30
separatists in Khartoum clashed with police as some 3,000 opponents
of the country's potential breakup in a southern independence vote
due in January demonstrated during a visit by UN ambassadors. Envoys
from the 15 UN Security Council members were in the capital on the
final stage of a four-day visit in which they expressed the
international community's concern that the referendum go ahead on
schedule.
(AFP, 10/9/10)
2010 Oct 14, A senior Sudanese
official said it is impossible to hold a referendum on the future of
the north-south border region of Abyei as planned. Dirdiri Ahmed, a
member of Sudan's northern ruling party, said that
internationally-mediated talks over Abyei failed to yield an
agreement on who is eligible to vote in the region.
(AP, 10/14/10)
2010 Oct 15, Adrian Edwards,
the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, said the rebels of the Lord's
Resistance Army have killed at least 2,000 people and forced 400,000
to flee in three countries in less than two years. A UNHCR
communique documented a mounting "campaign of terror against
civilians" in the DR Congo, South Sudan and the CAR.
(AFP, 10/15/10)
2010 Oct 18, The UN said it is
sending 100 more troops to Sudan's oil-producing Abyei region to
step up security ahead of a referendum that could pitch the area
back into bloodshed.
(Reuters, 10/18/10)
2010 Oct 19, The UN said that
377 people had died in flooding in central and west Africa, with
nearly 1.5 million people affected since the start of the rainy
season in June. The highest toll was in Nigeria with 118, followed
by Ghana (52), Sudan (50), Benin (43), Chad (24), Mauritania (21),
Burkina Faso (16), Cameroon (13), Gambia (12), with other countries
reporting less than 10 dead.
(AFP, 10/19/10)
2010 Oct 20, The United States
relaxed sanctions on Sudan to exempt farm equipment, a move seen as
part of a wider scheme of carrots and sticks before a sensitive
referendum that could split Africa's largest country.
(Reuters, 10/21/10)
2010 Oct 21, China rejected a
UN report that says Chinese bullets were used in attacks on
peacekeepers in Sudan's troubled Darfur region, calling the charge
groundless.
(AFP, 10/21/10)
2010 Oct 24, In Sudan the
Darfur-based rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) said it was
ready to start discussions with international mediators in Qatar,
but was not yet prepared to re-join full peace negotiations.
(AP, 10/25/10)
2010 Oct 25, Libya's Kadhafi
Foundation announced projects costing eight million dollars to help
Darfur refugees displaced by the conflict in western Sudan to return
to their homes.
(AFP, 10/25/10)
2010 Oct 26, A Southern Sudan
official said that northern Sudan leaders are holding an oil-rich
region "hostage" in negotiations being held before a January
independence referendum.
(AP, 10/26/10)
2010 Oct 27, US officials said
the Obama administration has granted a waiver allowing Chad,
CongoDRC, Sudan and Yemen to continue receiving US military aid
despite their use of child soldiers. Officials said cutting off aid
would do more damage than good.
(SFC, 10/28/10, p.A2)
2010 Oct 30, Sudan began
arresting Darfur activists, just weeks ahead of a southern
referendum on secession. 9 activists including a prominent human
rights lawyer were arrested over the next 24 hours.
(Reuters, 11/1/10)
2010 Oct 31, Sudan shut the
Khartoum office of Radio Dabanga, whose reports on Darfur have
angered it, and arrested 13 staff from the radio station and a
rights group that shares its offices. 9 journalists and four HAND
activists were detained during the weekend raids.
(Reuters, 11/2/10)
2010 Nov 3, Sudanese
intelligence agents arrested Gaafar al-Subki, a Darfuri journalist
working for one the country's leading independent newspapers,
As-Sahafa. Darfur rebels clashed with government troops in South
Darfur, marking a resumption of fighting after heavy rains had
largely subdued hostilities in Sudan's war-torn west.
(AFP, 11/3/10)(Reuters, 11/4/10)
2010 Nov 4, In western Sudan 3
Latvian helicopter crew working for the United Nations were
kidnapped. They were contracted to the UN Humanitarian Air Service,
which delivers aid to poverty-stricken Darfur. On Dec 8 officials
said the men had been freed with no ransom paid.
(AP, 11/5/10)(AP, 12/9/10)
2010 Nov 7, Senior US officials
said the United States will drop Sudan from its list of state
sponsors of terrorism as early as July 2011, if Khartoum ensures two
key referendums take place on schedule in January and the results
are respected.
(Reuters, 11/7/10)
2010 Nov 11, In Sudan a Tarco
Airline Russian-built Antonov 26 carrying 36-38 people crashed on
landing in the western Darfur region killing at least 6 and wounding
four others.
(AP, 11/11/10)(AFP, 11/12/10)
2010 Nov 11, The WHO said a
rare parasitic disease has killed 260 people in southern Sudan in
the past year, a figure that is threatening to double in the coming
months. Kala azar, or visceral leishmaniasis, is a rare tropical
disease contracted by the bite of a sand fly.
(AFP, 11/12/10)
2010 Nov 12, North Sudan's
military bombed a disputed north-south border area, but a Southern
Sudan army spokesman said the bombing was not a provocation.
Casualties were said to be in the single digits.
(AP, 11/13/10)
2010 Nov 12, After weeks of
delays due to Chinese objections, the UN Security Council received a
report on violations of the arms embargo in Sudan's western Darfur
region that infuriated Beijing. The confidential report said
Khartoum committed multiple breaches of the embargo and China has
done little to ensure its weaponry is not used in Darfur.
(Reuters, 11/12/10)
2010 Nov 13, Sudanese Pres.
al-Bashir left Khartoum for the annual hajj in Mecca, despite an
outstanding arrest warrant issued for al-Bashir by the International
Criminal Court for alleged war crimes, crimes against humanity and
genocide in Darfur.
(AP, 11/13/10)
2010 Nov 19, US President
Barack Obama lifted a ban on US aid and government assistance for
Sudan to allow computers to be exported into the country ahead of a
key referendum.
(AFP, 11/20/10)
2010 Nov 23, East African
leaders met in the Ethiopian capital to discuss beefing up the
African Union force in Somalia and tensions in Sudan ahead of
January's referendum on autonomy for the south.
(AFP, 11/23/10)
2010 Nov 24, Sudan's south
accused the northern army of carrying out an airstrike on an army
base in southern Sudan in an attempt to derail a January 9
referendum on southern independence.
(Reuters, 11/24/10)
2010 Dec 1, In southern Sudan
northern-backed militias ambushed its army killing 10 soldiers and
two civilians in the latest hike in north-south tensions ahead of a
January 9 vote on southern independence.
(Reuters, 12/2/10)
2010 Dec 1, Kuwait began
hosting a two-day conference to try to attract aid and investment to
resource-rich but neglected east Sudan.
(AFP, 11/30/10)
2010 Dec 2, In Sudan a protest
outside a Western Darfur university against peace mediators ended
violently when police fired gunshots to disperse the crowd, leaving
two civilians dead.
(AP, 12/2/10)
2010 Dec 2, In Kuwait City a
two-day conference on east Sudan ended. Donors and investors pledged
3.55 billion dollars for the development of resource-rich but
neglected area.
(AFP, 12/2/10)
2010 Dec 6, In Sudan aircraft
from the northern Sudanese military began 3 days of bombings in
western Bahr el Ghazal state. No casualties were reported. They
follow multiple bombing runs by the north in November in a disputed
region on the border between neighboring northern Bahr el Ghazal
state and southern Darfur state. A committee with representatives
from the UN mission in Sudan and the northern and southern Sudanese
militaries later found that the bombings violated the 2005 agreement
that ended more than 20 years of civil war.
(AP, 12/16/10)
2010 Dec 8, US State Department
spokesman Philip Crowley said the self-determination referendum on
Sudan's oil-rich Abyei region will not take place as planned on
January 9.
(AFP, 12/8/10)
2010 Dec 11, The Sudanese army
attacked a village in South Darfur for a second consecutive day in
violence that has left one person dead and driven at least 250
civilians from their homes.
(AP, 12/11/10)
2010 Dec 11, South Sudan’s
ruling party formally confirmed for the first time that it will
support secession in a January independence referendum that could
lead to the break-up of Africa's largest nation.
(AFP, 12/11/10)
2010 Dec 12, Lawyers for a
Sudanese campaign group launched a legal bid to halt Sudan's
referendum on southern independence, accusing organizers of
mishandling the process, a move which could derail the January 9
vote.
(Reuters, 12/12/10)
2010 Dec 13, Israel flew home
150 illegal Sudanese migrants in a secret operation that was the
largest such deportation from the Jewish state.
(AP, 12/14/10)
2010 Dec 14, Sudanese
authorities arrested about 30 women who tried to hold a protest in
Khartoum against the brutal police whipping of a young woman shown
in a video posted on YouTube and charged them with disrupting public
order.
(AFP, 12/14/10)
2010 Dec 16, The UN's human
rights chief said that Sudan is blocking aid workers from entering
the country ahead of next month's referendum on independence for the
south.
(AP, 12/16/10)
2010 Dec 17, Sudan's army
clashed with Darfur rebels for a third time in a week. UN officials
said clashes between the Sudanese army and former rebels who signed
a peace treaty with Khartoum have forced the displacement of more
than 12,000 people in less than a week.
(Reuters, 12/17/10)(AFP, 12/17/10)
2010 Dec 18, Luis Moreno
Ocampo, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, said he
has evidence Sudanese Pres. Omar al-Bashir has stolen billions of
dollars from his impoverished country. The embezzlement accusations
were first reported by British newspaper The Guardian, based on a
diplomatic cable provided by the Wikileaks website.
(AP, 12/18/10)
2010 Dec 19, Sudan's President
Omar al-Bashir said the country would adopt an Islamic constitution
if the south split away in a referendum due next month, in a speech
in which he also defended police filmed flogging a woman.
(Reuters, 12/19/10)
2010 Dec 21, A Sudan military
source said 20 soldiers from the south Sudan army (SPLA) have been
killed in clashes with rebels led by former general George Athor.
(AFP, 12/22/10)
2010 Dec 21, The leaders of
Egypt and Libya were in Khartoum for talks with Sudanese leaders on
the future of Africa's largest country ahead of a referendum that's
likely to break it into two.
(AP, 12/21/10)
2010 Dec 22, In Sudan Mudawi
Ibrahim, a prominent Darfur activist, was sentenced to one year in
prison and fined on embezzlement charges. He was acquitted on the
same charges earlier. Authorities appealed and won a new verdict
without a retrial.
(AP, 12/25/10)
2010 Dec 23, In western Sudan
Darfur's main rebel groups fought alongside each other for the first
time in years as they clashed with government forces. Rights group
Amnesty International said that a Sudanese court had sentenced high
profile rights activist Mudawi Ibrahim to one year in jail for
embezzlement despite an earlier acquittal which found no fraud
within his aid agency, SUDO, one of many shut down last year.
(AFP, 12/23/10)(Reuters, 12/24/10)
2010 Dec 24, Sudanese
government troops killed at least 40 rebels and wounded many more in
a new offensive in the country's troubled Darfur region. 3 soldiers
also died and 13 were wounded when army forces attacked joint
positions of two rebel groups: the Justice and Equality Movement and
the Sudan Liberation Movement.
(AP, 12/25/10)
2010 Dec 29, Sudan demanded a
detailed UN audit on a program to rehabilitate ex-civil war soldiers
following charges that millions of dollars have been embezzled or
mismanaged.
(AFP, 12/29/10)
2010 Dec 29, Groups including
the UN, Harvard University, Google Inc and Not On Our Watch, an
organization co-founded by actor George Clooney, launched the
Satellite Sentinel Project, a project using satellites to "watch"
Sudan for war crimes before a vote that could split the African
country in two.
(Reuters, 12/29/10)
2010 In Sudan the Darfur
conflict claimed more than 2,300 lives in 2010, according to new UN
figures released in January 2011.
(AFP, 1/19/11)
2011 Jan 3, In Sudan a Darfur
alliance of rebel splinter factions said that it has agreed to sign
a final peace settlement with the Sudanese government.
(AP, 1/3/11)
2011 Jan 8, In Sudan 6 people
were killed in clashes between rebel militias and south Sudan's army
over the last 24 hours, a day before a referendum in which the south
is expected to vote for independence. A spokesman for the southern
Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) said his forces ambushed
fighters loyal to militia leader Galwak Gai in oil-producing Unity
state on Jan 7 and Gai's men launched a counter-attack on Jan 8. Gai
was among several southern militia leaders who rebelled after April
elections, accusing the south's government of fraud. In Jonglei
state deadly clashes between men commanded by militia leader David
Yauyau and the southern military left at least one civilian dead.
(AP, 1/8/11)
2011 Jan 9, In Sudan millions
of jubilant south Sudanese started voting in an independence
referendum expected to see their war-ravaged region emerge as
Africa’s 54th sovereign state. Khartoum's government was expected to
lose a third of its land, nearly a quarter of its population and
much of its main moneymaker, oil. Armed Arab nomads clashed with
tribespeople in the disputed Abyei region for the third day leaving
20 people dead. At least 36 people were reported dead in clashes
over the last three days between tribespeople and Arab nomads near
Sudan's north- south border.
(Reuters, 1/9/11)(Reuters, 1/9/11)(AP,
1/10/11)(Econ, 1/8/11, p.11)
2011 Jan 10, Thousands of south
Sudanese poured out to vote for a second straight day in a landmark
independence referendum, bringing the region a step closer to
becoming the world's newest state. Former US President Jimmy Carter
told CNN that Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir offered to
take on all of the country's crippling debt if the south declares
independence after a referendum. Armed men killed 10 southern
Sudanese in an ambush on a convoy of people returning to the south
for the referendum. The attack had happened on the northern side of
the border between the northern state of Southern Kordofan and the
southern state of Northern Bahr al-Ghazal.
(AFP, 1/10/11)(Reuters, 1/10/11)(Reuters,
1/11/11)
2011 Jan 12, Sudanese students
demonstrating against rising food and petrol prices began 2 days of
clashes with police in three towns in the mostly Arab north,
including Khartoum.
(Reuters, 1/15/11)
2011 Jan 13, In Sudan 3
Bulgarians flying aircraft for the World Food Program were kidnapped
in the western Darfur region.
(AP, 1/13/11)
2011 Jan 13, South Sudan's
independence vote cleared two major hurdles after former president
Jimmy Carter gave the poll his endorsement and organizers said high
turnout meant the result would be binding. Former US president Jimmy
Carter said that Khartoum wants all of Sudan's $39-billion debt
forgiven, saying he had erred in earlier saying it was ready to
assume the south's share.
(Reuters, 1/13/11)(AFP, 1/13/11)
2011 Jan 15, In South Sudan
voters began celebrating after the end of a weeklong independence
referendum.
(AP, 1/15/11)
2011 Jan 16, Southern Sudan's
Pres. Salva Kiir offered a prayer of forgiveness for northern Sudan
and the killings that occurred during a two-decade civil war, as the
first results from a weeklong independence referendum showed an
overwhelming vote for secession.
(AP, 1/16/11)
2011 Jan 18, Sudanese security
forces arrested Hassan Turabi, Sudan's top Islamist opposition
leader, overnight after he called for a Tunisia-style uprising in
the country. Around eight other members of Turabi's Islamic Popular
Congress Party also were arrested.
(AP, 1/18/11)
2011 Jan 19, Sudanese police
clashed with protesters demanding the release of opposition leader
Hassan al-Turabi, who was detained after he called for a "popular
revolution" over price rises and political demands.
(Reuters, 1/19/11)
2011 Jan 20, Sudan's army
clashed with fighters from two rebel factions in Darfur in a
four-hour fight that left 21 people dead.
(Reuters, 1/21/11)
2011 Jan 21, A Sudanese man,
Al-Amin Musa Al-Amin (25), set himself on fire in the latest
instance of self-immolation in the Arab world. He was being treated
in hospital for second-degree burns in Omdurman, Khartoum's twin
city.
(AFP, 1/22/11)
2011 Jan 23, Sudanese
government forces swept the Zamzam camp on the outskirts of the
Darfur’s historical capital El-Fasher, arresting 37 people and
seizing weapons and ammunition. The camp is considered a stronghold
of Minnawi's faction of the Sudan Liberation Army.
(AFP, 1/25/11)
2011 Jan 23, South Sudan’s
referendum commission's website said provisional results from the
referendum showed that almost 99 percent of voters have chosen
independence, after 98.7 percent of the votes had been counted.
Turnout exceeded 100 percent in several areas, and a top election
official said that some results were being quarantined.
(AP, 1/23/11)
2011 Jan 24, A Sudanese man,
Al-Amin Musa Al-Amin (25), who was hospitalized on Jan 21 after
setting himself on fire in a suburb of Khartoum, died from his
wounds.
(AFP, 1/25/11)
2011 Jan 25, Sudan's army
clashed with Darfur rebels for the second time in a week. Insurgents
said they shot down a helicopter gunship, killing at least three
people.
(Reuters, 1/25/11)
2011 Jan 30, In north Sudan
students clashed with police as youths heeded calls to take to the
streets for a day of nationwide anti-government protests, despite a
heavy security presence on the ground. Mohammed Abdulrahman, a
student beaten by police during the demonstrations in Khartoum, died
of his wounds in Omdurman hospital.
(AFP, 1/30/11)(AFP, 1/31/11)
2011 Jan 30, Sudan’s government
welcomed the preliminary results of the southern Sudan referendum
but said there was a "huge amount" to do before it becomes an
independent nation. Southern Sudan's referendum commission said
close to 99 percent of south Sudanese chose to secede from the north
in the landmark January 9-15 referendum.
(AFP, 1/30/11)
2011 Feb 1, China Harbor
Engineering Company, a subsidiary of state-owned China
Communications Construction Company, signed a 1.2-billion-dollar
contract to build Khartoum's new international airport.
(AFP, 2/15/11)
2011 Feb 3, Sudanese police
beat and tear gassed students protesting in Sennar state, the latest
in a series of short-lived demonstrations partly inspired by
uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt. Police arrested dozens of people
near the scene of a planned protest in the capital's Khartoum North
suburb.
(Reuters, 2/4/11)
2011 Feb 4, In Sudan two days
of fighting in Malakal, a flashpoint town near the north-south
border, has killed nine people, including a UN staff member.
(AP, 2/4/11)
2011 Feb 5, In South Sudan a
rebellion by former pro-Khartoum militiamen against giving up their
heavy weapons sparked clashes in oil-producing Upper Nile state.
Fighting in Malakal close to the border with the north, has killed
20 people and wounded at least 24. Soldiers in north Sudan's army
fought each other, killing at least 30 in a dispute over who gets to
keep the artillery they are holding in Southern Sudan. The fighting
took place in two towns in Upper Nile state. 11 soldiers were killed
in Paloich and 19 in Melut.
(AP, 2/5/11)(AP, 2/6/11)
2011 Feb 7, Sudan's Pres. Omar
al-Bashir accepted a southern vote for independence in a referendum
that is set to create Africa's newest state and open up a fresh
period of uncertainty in the increasingly volatile region. The final
results of the historic independence referendum showed that 98.83
percent had voted for secession.
(Reuters, 2/7/11)(AFP, 2/8/11)
2011 Feb 10, The fighting in
Southern Sudan between the region's army and a rebel faction left
105 people dead, including 39 civilians, 24 southern soldiers and
police officers and 42 rebels. Rebel commander George Athor's troops
captured Fangak a day earlier, and the fighting continued today
until the southern military retook it. Rebel troops attacked the
town of Phom el-Zeraf over two days. Women and children ran for
their lives — straight into a river, where many drowned or were shot
to death. Some 240 people, mostly civilians, were killed.
(AP, 2/11/11)(SFC, 2/12/11, p.A3)(AP,
3/11/11)(http://tinyurl.com/4bsgaep)
2011 Feb 12, In Sudan hundreds
of civilians sought refuge at a UN compound in the contested town of
Abyei following a spate of violence that killed three people from
north Sudan.
(AP, 2/14/11)
2011 Feb 13, In Sudan a group
of women demonstrated in Khartoum to demand the release of dozens of
protesters arrested last month, as 3 journalists were detained in a
separate rally.
(AFP, 2/13/11)
2011 Feb 16, In South Sudan a
one-day meeting began in Juba between leaders of all the south’s
parties, the start of a consultation process to draw up a
constitution for the new nation. South Sudan's ruling party accused
northern authorities of arming rebels since the region's landmark
independence vote last month, including renegade troops behind
clashes that killed more than 200 people last week.
(AFP, 2/16/11)
2011 Feb 24, Sudan's army
attacked remnants of a divided rebel movement in the western Darfur
region, setting off clashes that killed 25 of the fighters and two
government soldiers.
(AP, 2/25/11)
2011 Feb 27, In Sudan at least
10 people died when a militia attacked a police post in the disputed
area of Abyei. The fertile area is claimed by both north and south
Sudan and is near several large oil fields.
(AP, 2/28/11)
2011 Mar 1, In Sudan fresh
clashes broke out in the Abyei region between gunmen from the
northern-supported nomadic Arab Misseriya people and local the Ngok
Dinka tribe, who backed the south.
(AP, 3/2/11)(Econ, 5/28/11, p.54)
2011 Mar 2, In Sudan at least
70 people were killed and two villages razed in two days of fighting
in the flashpoint oil-producing border district of Abyei.
(AFP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 8, Sudanese riot
police arrested more than 40 women minutes after they started a
protest against rape and rights abuses in the Khartoum suburb of
Omdurman.
(Reuters, 3/8/11)
2011 Mar 12, South Sudan's
ruling party said it has suspended talks with Khartoum after
uncovering a plot overseen by President Omar al-Bashir to topple it
ahead of southern independence in July. Renegotiating a revenue
sharing formula was one of the various issued that Juba and Khartoum
were trying to resolve ahead of July. A pre-dawn rebel attack on the
capital of south Sudan's oil-rich Upper Nile state killed 11 people,
with the army battling to regain control of Malakal. The rebel group
that launched the attack was commanded by a man called Ulony, whose
men fought with the SPLA in Owach, west of Malakal, earlier this
week.
(AFP, 3/12/11)
2011 Mar 13, A top Southern
Sudanese official said Southern Sudan is suspending talks and
diplomatic contact with northern Sudan over claims that the northern
government is funding militias in the south.
(AP, 3/13/11)
2011 Mar 23, South Sudan's army
(SPLA) accused the north of bombing its territory, violating a 2005
peace deal ahead of the oil-producing region's independence.
(Reuters, 3/23/11)
2011 Apr 5, In Sudan an
unidentified plane flew in from the Red Sea and fired a missile at a
car travelling from the airport to Port Sudan, killing both
passengers and destroying the vehicle. The next day Foreign Minister
Ali Ahmad Karti accused Israel of carrying out the air strike.
(AFP, 4/6/11)
2011 Apr 7, Northern Sudanese
Armed Forces have deployed two Mi-24 helicopter gunships and at
least nine T-55 tanks about 60 miles (100 km) from Abyei's border
according to the US-based Satellite Sentinel Project.
(AP, 4/7/11)
2011 Apr 10, Sudan said that
remnants of a missile used in a mysterious attack that killed two
people on April 5 proved that Israel carried out the strike.
(Reuters, 4/10/11)
2011 Apr 14, In Sudan Ahmed
Haroun, a candidate for South Kordofan state governor, said Sudanese
militia have killed 17 people in the oil-producing South Kordofan
region just two weeks before long-delayed elections. Haroun has been
accused by the International Criminal Court of coordinating brutal
militias during a counter-insurgency campaign in Darfur. Most of the
north's oil reserves have been discovered in South Kordofan. South
Kordofan lies on the fault line between north and south Sudan,
incorporating: the Nuba population, which largely sided with the
south during the war.
(Reuters, 4/14/11)(http://tinyurl.com/455t92s)
2011 Apr 18, A Sudanese army
helicopter crashed in North Darfur, killing all five people on
board.
(AFP, 4/18/11)
2011 Apr 28, Sudan’s President
Omar al-Bashir warned that Khartoum will not recognize the new state
of south Sudan when it declares independence in July if it insists
on claiming the disputed Abyei region.
(AFP, 4/28/11)
2011 May 1, In Sudan tribal
clashes over a land dispute in the oil-producing state of South
Kordofan left at least 15 people dead. A heavily armed Sudanese
military convoy entered the flashpoint border district of Abyei,
sparking clashes that left up to 14 people dead. Neither the
northern or southern armies are authorized to maintain troops in the
disputed Abyei area.
(AFP, 5/2/11)(AFP, 5/3/11)(AP, 5/4/11)
2011 May 2, In Sudan former
civil war foes faced off in polls to elect a new governor and
regional assembly in the oil-producing northern state of South
Kordofan, a key battleground in the conflict. Sudan's Islamist
opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi, who helped slain Al-Qaeda
mastermind Osama bin Laden settle in Khartoum in the 1990s, was
freed after more than three months in jail.
(AFP, 5/2/11)
2011 May 8, North and south
Sudan agreed to start withdrawing unauthorized troops from the
flashpoint Abyei border region, a week after clashes there left 14
people dead. The pullout would begin May 10 and be completed within
a week.
(AFP, 5/9/11)
2011 May 15, Sudan said the
northern ruling party won an election for governor in South
Kordofan, the north's main oil state, after a vote the south said
was rigged, creating a fresh flashpoint before the south secedes in
July.
(Reuters, 5/15/11)
2011 May 15, Sudan's army
carried out air strikes against the villages of Labado and Esheraya
in the troubled western Darfur region.
(AP, 5/17/11)
2011 May 19, In Sudan a UN
convoy transporting 200 northern army troops was attacked as they
were pulling out of the contested region of Abyei along the
north-south border. Sudan's army spokesman said northern troops were
ambushed by the southern army and suffered "huge losses." A
spokesman for the south's Sudan Peoples' Liberation Army (SPLA) said
the northern forces provoked the fighting in at attempt to seize the
disputed area. 70 northern troops were killed and more than 120
others were missing.
(AP, 5/20/11)(AP, 5/24/11)
2011 May 21, Southern Sudan's
army said the northern army is bombing by air for a second day in
the border hotspot of Abyei. Local officials said at least six
rebels and soldiers have been killed in clashes between the southern
army and rebels over the last 24 hours in Unity state. Northern
Sudanese forces with tanks occupied the disputed town of Abyei,
scattering southern troops that were there as part of a joint
security unit.
(AP, 5/21/11)(AP, 5/22/11)
2011 May 22, Northern Sudanese
troops seized control of most of Abyei district on Sudan's
north-south border as the south accused Khartoum of an "illegal
invasion" that threatens the lives of thousands.
(AFP, 5/22/11)
2011 May 23, In Sudan armed men
burned and looted the flashpoint town of Abyei. Southern Sudan's
military said the northern army is moving to carry out a "full-scale
war" in the contested region. Angry Sudanese rallied in the southern
capital of Juba, demanding northern forces end their "invasion" of
the contested Abyei region.
(AP, 5/23/11)(AFP, 5/23/11)
2011 May 24, In Sudan gunmen
from an Arab tribe fired on four UN helicopters taking off from
Abyei a disputed border town at the heart of a new north-south
conflict.
(AP, 5/25/11)
2011 May 25, Sudan's president
gave northern troops a "green light" to attack southern forces if
provoked. President Barack Obama, speaking at a news conference in
London, called for the rapid reinforcement of UN peacekeeping troops
in the Abyei region, from which tens of thousands of civilians have
fled over the last week.
(AP, 5/25/11)
2011 May 26, South Sudan's
President Salva Kiir called on north Sudan to withdraw its forces
from the disputed Abyei region. He also said there would be no war
over the incursion and it would not derail independence.
(Reuters, 5/26/11)
2011 May 28, Sudan’s Suna news
agency said Khartoum has ordered the official termination of the
UN's north-south peacekeeping mission on July 9, the date the south
is to declare full independence following a referendum.
(AFP, 5/29/11)
2011 May 28, South Sudan's vice
president flew to Khartoum on a mission to "ease tensions" over
Abyei, one week after northern troops overran the contested border
region.
(AFP, 5/28/11)
2011 May 29, Advocacy group
Satellite Sentinel Project said new satellite images provide
evidence that northern Sudanese troops have committed war crimes,
including ethnic cleansing, in the contested border town of Abyei
where forces rolled in on May 21. Save the Children's U.K. office
said the conflict has displaced up to 35,000 children in the Abyei
region.
(AP, 5/29/11)
2011 May 31, The African Union
said representatives from north and south Sudan have agreed to set
up a demilitarized zone along their shared border, ten days after
the north seized the disputed Abyei region.
(Reuters, 5/31/11)
2011 Jun 1, Sudanese farmers
clashed with police in Gezira state, Sudan's agricultural heartland,
while demonstrating against an "unacceptable" government offer to
buy their land. Under the Gezira Scheme, set up by colonial ruler
Britain in 1925 to cultivate cotton and spanning 840,000 hectares of
land divided into lots of 20 feddans (around 8-9 hectares), Khartoum
was supposed to pay the farmers rent in return for a share of
production, but had not done so for more than 40 years.
(AP, 6/1/11)
2011 Jun 3, The UN Security
Council demanded that Sudan withdraw troops from Abyei and stop
looting and attacks in the region disputed with rival southern
Sudan.
(AP, 6/4/11)
2011 Jun 8, In Sudan an
eyewitness allegedly saw 100 bodies or more put into a pit in
Southern Kordofan state, where the Arab military has been targeting
a black ethnic minority loyal to the military of the newly
independent Republic of South Sudan. On July 14 the Satellite
Sentinel Project released images showing what appeared to be freshly
dug grave sites in Southern Kordofan state. In August satellite
imagery revealed the existence more mass graves, bringing the total
number of mass graves sited there to eight.
(AP, 7/14/11)(AP, 8/24/11)
2011 Jun 9, In Sudan fighting
resumed for a 5th day along the north-south order.
(SFC, 6/10/11, p.A2)
2011 Jun 16, The Sudanese army
said it will continue to fight by all available means to stop the
rebellion in South Kordofan, as concern grew over the humanitarian
impact of the conflict. Aid workers and a UN report said fighting
has erupted along a new front near the internal border between north
and south Sudan with dozens of people reported killed.
(AFP, 6/16/11)(AP, 6/16/11)
2011 Jun 17, The army of north
Sudan shelled a town just south of the flashpoint Abyei border
region, with tensions rising along the frontier just weeks before
southern independence. Satellite images showed northern Sudanese
military vehicles including heavy transports and artillery massing
in the capital of the conflict-stricken Southern Kordofan state.
(AFP, 6/17/11)(Reuters, 6/19/11)
2011 Jun 20, Rival north and
south Sudan signed a deal to demilitarize their disputed frontier
region of Abyei and let in an Ethiopian peacekeeping force. Sudanese
intelligence agents were said to have posed as Red Crescent workers
and ordered some 7000 civilians to leave a UN camp in Kadugli,
Southern Kordofan. The IFRC launched an investigation but found no
evidence that its emblem was misused.
(AP, 6/21/11)(AP, 6/23/11)(AP, 6/28/11)(AP,
7/15/11)
2011 Jun 22, In Sudan sporadic
air strikes and shelling began taking place in the eastern and
southern parts of South Kordofan's Nuba Mountains, home to Sudan's
indigenous non-Arab Nuba. One woman was killed and four others,
including two children, were wounded in an aerial attack on Kauda.
The Nuba peoples had fought with former southern rebels, the SPLA,
during their 1983-2005 war with Khartoum.
(AP, 6/26/11)
2011 Jun 25, A South Sudanese
officials said 8 members of a militia tied to the northern
government were killed during an attack on Turalei. 3 South Sudanese
soldiers were also killed.
(SSFC, 6/26/11, p.A2)
2011 Jun 25, In Iran Pakistani
Pres. Asif Ali Zardari and his Afghan counterpart Hamid Karzai
attended an international anti-terrorism conference alongside
Sudan's Pres. Omar al-Bashir, Iraqi Pres. Jalal Talabani and Tajik
Pres. Emomali Rahmon. The presidents of Afghanistan, Iran and
Pakistan agreed to join forces in combating militancy.
(AP, 6/25/11)(AFP, 6/25/11)
2011 Jun 27, The UN Security
Council ordered a 4,200-strong Ethiopian peacekeeping force to Abyei
to monitor the withdrawal of northern Sudanese troops who occupied
the disputed border region on May 21.
(AFP, 6/29/11)
2011 Jun 28, Sudanese leader
Omar al-Bashir arrived in China for talks with President Hu Jintao.
(AFP, 6/28/11)
2011 Jun 29, Sudan’s state
media said the government has agreed to appoint a vice president
from the war-torn Darfur region, taking a step toward satisfying a
key rebel demand for greater power-sharing.
(AFP, 6/29/11)
2011 Jun 29, North and south
Sudan agreed to create a demilitarized buffer zone along their
common border just days before the country splits.
(AFP, 6/29/11)
2011 Jun 29, In China Sudan's
Pres. Omar al-Bashir, wanted on a war crimes warrant, won pledges
from China and its state-owned energy firm they will continue
investing in his country after its resource-rich southern region
becomes independent next month.
(AP, 6/29/11)
2011 Jun 30, In Sudan an
Ethiopian peacekeeper was killed in West Darfur and another wounded
when an unidentified gunman fired at their vehicle.
(AFP, 7/2/11)
2011 Jul 1, Sudan's President
Omar al-Bashir ordered the army to fight in South Kordofan until it
has "cleaned" the border state of rebels.
(AFP, 7/1/11)
2011 Jul 2, Sudan’s northern
army carried out cross-border air strikes that killed three
civilians and wounded 17 in south Sudan's oil-producing Unity state
just a week before independence.
(AFP, 7/3/11)
2011 Jul 4, North and south
Sudan agreed to continue negotiating outstanding issues between the
two sides after southern independence on July 9.
(AFP, 7/5/11)
2011 Jul 5, Sudanese journalist
Fatima Ghazali was jailed for a month, and her editor fined, for
publishing reports on the alleged rape of Safiya Ishaq, a female
opposition activist, by security force personnel after her arrest in
Khartoum last February.
(AFP, 7/6/11)
2011 Jul 5, A boat caught fire
of Sudan’s northeastern coast and almost 200 African migrants, on
their way to Saudi Arabia, were feared drowned. 3 migrants were
rescued.
(SFC, 7/6/11, p.A2)
2011 Jul 9, South Sudan raised
the flag of its new nation for the first time, as thousands of South
Sudanese citizens and dozens of international dignitaries swarmed
the new country capital of Juba to celebrate the country's birth.
Salva Kiir was sworn in as South Sudan's president. South Sudan
expected to become the 193rd country recognized by the United
Nations next week and the 54th UN member state in Africa.
(AP, 7/9/11)
2011 Jul 12, Sudan's Pres. Omar
al-Bashir said his country will issue a new currency following the
loss of oil revenues resulting from South Sudan's independence last
week.
(AP, 7/12/11)
2011 Jul 18, In Sudan the
Darfur rebel group Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) said that it
carried out a deadly attack on Sudanese army positions in South
Kordofan alongside anti-government forces there.
(AFP, 7/18/11)
2011 Jul 22, Sudanese police
used tear gas in Khartoum to break up three separate protests at the
lack of running water, two days after a similar demonstration in
neighboring Gezira state.
(AFP, 7/22/11)
2011 Jul 24, Sudan launched a
new currency, six days after the newly independent south did so amid
fears of a currency war, but the central bank said it was ready to
negotiate with Juba on the old money.
(AFP, 7/24/11)
2011 Jul 25, Sudan jailed
journalist Amal Habani for reporting the alleged rape of a female
opposition activist by security forces.
(AFP, 7/25/11)
2011 Jul 25, A Southern
Sudanese official said northern Sudan has declared "economic war" by
violating an agreement and issuing a new currency just weeks after
the two countries split. He said the north had agreed not to issue a
new currency until six months after the south did. The move will
cost the southern government at least $700 million.
(AP, 7/25/11)
2011 Jul 27, UNAMID, the joint
African Union-UN peacekeeping force, said air strikes 2 weeks ago
around the village of Abu Hamara in Sudan's war-torn Darfur region
killed one civilian and prompted villagers to flee their homes.
(AFP, 7/27/11)
2011 Jul 27, Chadian rebels
denounced the repatriation and imprisonment of 27 senior members of
their force captured in Sudan.
(AFP, 7/27/11)
2011 Aug 2, In Sudan a landmine
killed four Ethiopian UN peacekeepers and badly wounded seven others
on patrol in the disputed territory of Abyei.
(AFP, 8/2/11)
2011 Aug 2, In Sudan a heavy
rain storm in West Darfur caused two buildings housing Sudanese
soldiers to collapse, killing 20 and injuring another 30.
(AFP, 8/3/11)
2011 Aug 5, Sudan’s foreign
ministry said it has blocked a shipment of southern oil after Juba
refused to pay customs fees, escalating a row between the two sides,
with the south accusing Khartoum of sabotaging its economy. The ship
was released the next day but negotiations over transit fees
remained stalled.
(AFP, 8/5/11)(AFP, 8/6/11)
2011 Aug 7, Sudanese security
forces seized all the copies of Al-Ahdath newspaper from the
printers, in the latest sign of a clampdown on independent media in
Khartoum.
(AFP, 8/7/11)
2011 Aug 8, Sudan said it has
granted a petroleum exploration license to China after visiting
Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi and President Omar al-Bashir held talks
in Khartoum.
(AFP, 8/8/11)
2011 Aug 15, The United Nations
called for a thorough probe into alleged war crimes and crimes
against humanity committed in Sudan's South Kordofan region between
June 5-30, shortly before the nation formally separated into two
countries.
(AP, 8/15/11)
2011 Aug 19, In South Sudan
fighters loyal to rebel leader George Athor crossed the border from
north Sudan and attacked a town in Upper Nile state. The violence
left 60 people dead, including seven soldiers and 53 militia
members. Soldiers managed to repel the attackers.
(AP, 8/21/11)
2011 Aug 23, Sudanese President
Omar al-Bashir declared a two-week ceasefire in South Kordofan state
which has been rocked since June by violent clashes between the
Sudanese army and Nuba rebels.
(AFP, 8/23/11)
2011 Aug 30, International
rights groups accused Sudan's government of killing at least 26
people in indiscriminate aerial bombardments of a contested region
in the country's main oil-producing state. Researchers from Amnesty
International and Human Rights Watch investigated 13 air strikes in
the Kauda, Delami, and Kurchi areas of South Kordofan during a week
in late August.
(AP, 8/30/11)
2011 Sep 1, In Sudan 17
civilians were killed in attacks by the SPLA in the areas of Um
Dahilib and Murung, in the Kalugi region of South Kordofan state.
(AFP, 9/3/11)
2011 Sep 1, South Sudan
completed the swift circulation of its new currency, a move matched
by Khartoum, but strengthening the south's formal independence from
the north less than two months ago.
(AFP, 9/1/11)
2011 Sep 2, Sudan's president
declared a state of emergency in Blue Nile state and fired elected
governor Malik Agar after clashes broke out between armed forces and
a rebel group. The SPLM-North's secretary general Yasser Arman met
with leaders of the three main Darfuri rebel groups to form the
nucleus of a united political and military movement for change.
(AP, 9/3/11)(AFP, 9/4/11)
2011 Sep 3, Sudan's government
shut down all the offices of the country's largest opposition party,
the SPLM-North, charging that it was not a legally represented
political party. The SPLM-North vowed to fight for regime change
through armed struggle and mass protests, and called for
international support. The UN refugee agency said some 16,000 people
have fled across the Sudan’s border to Ethiopia since fighting
erupted on Sep 1.
(AFP, 9/3/11)(AP, 9/3/11)
2011 Sep 7, The UN humanitarian
office said Sudan has denied it and other aid agencies access to
Blue Nile state, where at least 50,000 people have been displaced by
fighting that erupted last week. The armed forces clashed with
remnants of Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) near Bau town in
Blue Nile state, and reportedly inflicted heavy losses on them.
(AFP, 9/7/11)
2011 Sep 8, The governments of
the rival Sudans struck a new agreement to withdraw their troops
from the flashpoint border region of Abyei where UN forces are now
in place. They agreed that between September 11 and 30 there is
going to be a redeployment or withdrawal of the troops" from Abyei
by both sides.
(AFP, 9/8/11)
2011 Sep 8, Thirteen Sudanese
police officers were killed and 30 wounded in clashes with an armed
gang as they tried to rescue three hostages in the war-torn Darfur
region.
(AFP, 9/9/11)
2011 Sep 16, The UNHCR warned
that more than 8,000 people have fled violence in Sudan's South
Kordofan state to South Sudan and more are expected to arrive.
(AFP, 9/16/11)
2011 Sep 19, In Saudi Arabia
Abdul Hamid al-Fakki, a Sudanese man, was executed for the crime of
sorcery.
(Econ, 9/24/11, p.73)
2011 Sep 19, The UN refugee
agency said nearly 3,000 Eritreans were flooding into Sudan and
Ethiopia every month from Eritrea, a country of some five million
people and about the size of England.
(AFP, 9/19/11)
2011 Sep 19, Sudan's official
news agency said Sudan and its newest neighbor, breakaway South
Sudan, have signed their first agreement since their split in July.
The accord sets out 10 crossing points between the two nations for
people and goods.
(AP, 9/19/11)
2011 Sep 19, The Sudanese army
attacked a heavily armed convoy of Darfur rebels, Justice and
Equality Movement (JEM), near the war-torn region's border with
Libya, killing one and seizing a truck load of weapons. The rebels
were traveling in two big vehicles, one full of fuel and the other
full of weapons, that they had hijacked in Libya.
(AFP, 9/20/11)
2011 Sep 22, Sudan approved
measures aimed at boosting agricultural output and reining in
spiraling food prices by cutting tax on some food products and
easing imports. A deadly gunbattle in the North Darfur village of
Tamaru broke between nomads and farmers trying to stop them crossing
their land. Rebels initially blamed the Sudanese army.
(AFP, 9/22/11)(AFP, 9/23/11)(AP, 9/25/11)
2011 Sep 23, The Satellite
Sentinel Project said images from Sudan show heavily camouflaged
military equipment and several thousand troops moving south toward
the rebel stronghold of Kurmuk in Blue Nile state. The group said
the force appears to be equipped with tanks, artillery and infantry
fighting vehicles.
(AP, 9/23/11)
2011 Sep 26, In Sudan police
fired tear gas and used batons to break up a protest in Khartoum
against the punitive rise in food prices, witnesses said, with
protesters burning tires and demanding cheaper food.
(AFP, 9/27/11)
2011 Sep 27, Sudanese security
officers shut down the independent Al-Jarida newspaper, in what
rights groups say is the latest sign of increasing political
repression. Sudanese riot police used tear gas to disperse youths
demonstrating in Khartoum against unaffordable food prices, in the
second incident of its kind in just two days.
(AFP, 9/27/11)
2011 Sep 27, The UN refugee
agency said some 25,000 people have fled Sudan's troubled Blue Nile
state to Ethiopia in the last three weeks amid fighting between the
Sudanese army and rebels.
(AFP, 9/27/11)
2011 Sep 28, In Sudan a Chinese
oil worker was killed and another wounded by unidentified gunmen in
South Kordofan, Sudan's only oil producing state where the army is
battling insurgents. A leader of the local Misseriya tribe said
criminals had carried out the attack on the Chinese workers.
(AFP, 10/3/11)
2011 Sep 30, Sudan failed to
meet an agreed troop withdrawal deadline for the contested Abyei
region and blocked the return of displaced southern residents.
(AFP, 9/31/11)
2011 Oct 8, South Sudanese
President Salva Kiir lead the first top-level delegation to Khartoum
since southern secession. After one-to-one talks both presidents
pledged to work together for peace and stability, and to put the
years of conflict behind them.
(AFP, 10/8/11)
2011 Oct 10, In Sudan attackers
killed UNAMID three peacekeepers and wounded six others near the Zam
Zam displaced persons camp in North Darfur. One assailant was
killed.
(AP, 10/11/11)
2011 Oct 13, Sudan's President
Omar al-Bashir arrived in Malawi for a regional trade summit, in
defiance of the international war crimes warrant against him.
(AFP, 10/13/11)
2011 Oct 25, Human Rights Watch
said Sudan has condemned more than 300 Eritreans asylum seekers to
"certain detention and abuse" by deporting them back to Eritrea, one
of the "most brutal" countries in the world. Last week Sudan handed
more than 300 Eritreans to the neighboring country's military
without screening them for refugee status.
(AFP, 10/25/11)
2011 Oct 28, The UN refugee
agency said fresh aerial bombings in Sudan's border Blue Nile state
are sending more refugees fleeing to Ethiopia, with 2,000 arriving
in the last four days.
(AFP, 10/28/11)
2011 Oct 31, Hundreds of
SPLM-North rebels were killed in clashes with the Sudanese army in
South Kordofan, Sudan's only oil producing state where the army is
battling insurgents.
(AFP, 10/31/11)
2011 Nov 3, Sudan said its army
has captured the key rebel stronghold of Kurmuk in the country's
war-torn border state of Blue Nile.
(AFP, 11/3/11)
2011 Nov 6, In Sudan
unidentified gunmen killed a UN peacekeeper and injured two others
in an attack on a patrol in the war-ravaged Darfur region.
(AFP, 11/7/11)
2011 Nov 10, Military aircraft
from Sudan crossed the new international border with South Sudan and
dropped bombs in and around a camp filled with refugees fleeing
violence in the north. At least 12 people were killed. The violence
in and near the Yida refugee camp, located 10 miles (15 km) south of
the border, came one day after bombings were reported in another
region of South Sudan. A cross-border attack by Sudanese troops on a
military base left 18 fighters dead and 73 wounded.
(AP, 11/10/11)(AFP, 11/11/11)
2011 Nov 12, In Sudan an
alliance of rebel groups committed to regime change said that a key
Darfur rebel movement had joined them, as they convened for a second
meeting in the Nuba Mountains.
(AFP, 11/12/11)
2011 Nov 12, Global aid
organization Oxfam said it has withdrawn 22 staff from South Sudan's
Upper Nile state because of escalating violence along the newly
independent country's tense border with the north.
(AFP, 11/13/11)
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