Refugee protests ambassador’s visit

In 1989, Isaac Leju-Loding left Sudan, fearing political oppression and threats against his… In 1989, Isaac Leju-Loding left Sudan, fearing political oppression and threats against his life. He traveled to America to escape a government that killed its own civilians while engaging in battle with rebel factions.

On Saturday, Leju-Loding joined protestors and other Sudanese refugees outside David Lawrence Hall in anticipation of a speech by an ambassador from the government he fled more than 15 years ago.

Sheets of rain blanketed the protestors. The ink on a rain-soaked sign began to run, smearing the words: “You can’t hide genocide.”

Inside, Sudan’s deputy chief of missions, Abdel Bagi Kabeir, spoke during a conference on human rights in Sudan that was co-hosted by Pitt’s Muslim Students Association and the Sankore Institute of Islamic African Studies.

Afterward, Leju-Loding called parts of Kabeir’s speech “totally untrue,” “mythical” and “bullsh-t.”

“It is unfortunate that the organizers of this forum could not bring somebody who is from the oppressed,” he said.

In 2003, fighting erupted between government forces and two rebel groups in Darfur, the westernmost region of Sudan. The situation deteriorated to horrific lows during the last two years.

Earlier this year, a commission from the United Nations published its findings from an inquiry mission on Darfur.

The commission concluded that the government of Sudan has not pursued policies of genocide, but its report did state, “Government forces and militias conducted indiscriminate attacks, including killing of civilians, torture, enforced disappearances, destruction of villages, rape and other forms of sexual violence, pillaging and forced displacement, throughout Darfur.”

Kabeir said in his speech that rebel attacks on military units forced the government to take action.

The U.N. commission acknowledged that Sudanese officials credited attacks carried out by government forces to “counter-insurgency purposes.” But the report also said, “It is clear from the Commission’s findings that most attacks were deliberately and indiscriminately directed against civilians.”

Kabeir urged his audience to look at Darfur in its whole context. He told the story of Sudan’s independence and how his government came to power in 1989 through a coup d’etat. Kabeir said he would not downplay the seriousness of the crisis in Darfur, but pledged that the situation was getting better.

“The situation has not gone backwards,” he said. “It has gone forward.”

Kabeir pointed to the increased number of schools and better water pump production that exist in Darfur now, as opposed to before 1989.

But fighting continues in Darfur.

The U.N. News Centre reported that one person died and nine others were injured in a skirmish between merchants and police in Darfur on May 19.

Kabeir described the situation in Darfur as complex, listing ecological problems, increased immigration, increased access to weapons and tribal conflicts as reasons behind the fighting.

But Leju-Loding said the conflicts have less to do with tribal conflicts than they do with the government attacking and moving already displaced people.

“When the war started,” Leju-Loding said, “representatives like him and the president — I will not call him a president — the leader of the regime were saying, ‘Those were bandits.’ And now he was reducing it to tribes, which is not the case.”

In a question-and-answer segment that followed Kabeir’s speech, Leju-Loding got a chance to speak directly with the ambassador. Kabeir responded to his questions, but the two were unable to resolve their differences.

At the end of the program, Tahir Abdullah, the president of the Muslim Student Association, answered a question regarding why they had not invited a speaker from an opposing point of view.

“We didn’t bring the ambassador here to tell us what to think,” Tahir said. “We brought him here to give us something to think about.”