The Sudanese government was forced to apologise to the United States secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, on Thursday after a series of scuffles between her entourage and Sudanese security.
Officials and reporters travelling with Rice to Khartoum were initially prevented from entering the compound of the president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir. After they were allowed in there were further bouts of shouting and shoving, with one reporter being manhandled after shouting a question about alleged atrocities.
Rice, who then left the capital for a trip to the stricken province of Darfur, demanded and received an apology. She said: ”It makes me very angry to be sitting there with their president and have this happen. They have no right to push and shove.”
The scuffles, though minor, were a diplomatic disaster for the Sudanese government given the already strained relations between Khartoum and Washington. The US withdrew its ambassador in 1997 and normal relations have not been resumed. The US government last year labelled as genocide the Sudanese government’s policy in Darfur, where an estimated 70 000 people have been killed and 1,5-million displaced.
When Rice’s motorcade arrived at Bashir’s compound, guards shut the gates before the final three vehicles could get in. These cars included US state department officials who were supposed to be at the meeting, as well as Rice’s interpreter. One of the officials, Jim Wilkinson, was repeatedly pushed and pulled by security men.
After obtaining access to the compound, US TV crews and photographers were denied entry to the meeting between Rice and the president, though it had previously been agreed that they would be allowed in.
After they got in, another row developed. In spite of objections by state department officials, the security guards refused to allow questions, shoved and elbowed reporters and tried to tear a microphone from a correspondent. The entire press corps was bundled out after Andrea Mitchell, an NBC reporter, tried to ask Bashir about alleged atrocities in Darfur. Guards grabbed her and frogmarched her to the back of the room. Wilkinson shouted at the guards: ”Get your hands off her.”
The state department spokesperson, Sean McCormack, said the Sudanese foreign minister, Mustafa Osman Ismail, had phoned Rice while she was on her way to Darfur to apologise.
At the Abu Shouk camp for the internally displaced, near El Fesher in northern Darfur, Rice was in no mood for conciliatory gestures. She said the Sudanese government, which has repeatedly promised to end the violence in the region but failed to do so, would be judged on its actions. ”I said to the Sudanese government that they had a credibility problem with the international community,” she said.
Relations between the US and Sudan have been bad since Khartoum offered a haven to Osama bin Laden in the 1990s. Rice hinted on Wednesday that relations could be normalised, but a US official said she had told the Sudanese government that Darfur was an obstacle.
Government planes and the government-backed Janjaweed militia combined in 2003 and again last year to force people out of their homes. The government blames rebel groups.
Violence in Darfur, while continuing, has decreased this year, in part because so many villages have already been destroyed.
The US has a special interest in Sudan because of lobbying by the Christian right in the US. While reluctant to commit troops, George Bush has provided logistical support for the 53-member African Union, which has a monitoring force of about 3 000 in Darfur.
The US and Britain have attempted to introduce tough measures against the Sudanese government through the UN security council but have been blocked by China, which has oil interests in Sudan. – Guardian Unlimited Â