Sudan's
Tumsaha
Claim Not
Investigated,
or Even Heard,
by UN
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
March 21 --
While the
government of
north Sudan in
Khartoum
stands accused
of genocide
and war crimes
in Darfur and
now South
Kordofan,
sometimes even
they have a
point.
For weeks,
even months,
Sudan has been
raising at
every
opportunity
their claim
that the
Justice and
Equality
Movement
rebels took
Gaddafi
weapons from
Libya
through Darfur
into South
Sudan, to a
place called
Tumsaha.
According
to
Sudan's
Permanent
Representative,
when UN Sudan
Sanctions
Committee
panel member
"Mister Bryan"
asked for
access into
South
Sudan to check
on the claim,
he was not
allowed
access.
It
should be easy
enough to
verify or
disprove this.
And Sudan has
not only said
it to
Inner City
Press
numerous times
-- it says it
in open
sessions of
the
Security
Council, in
the presence
of the 15
members.
But
when this
month's
Council
president Mark
Lyall Grant
came to the
stakeout
Wednesday
evening to
summarize the
meeting of the
Sudan
Sanctions
Committee, he
did not
mention
Tumsaha. And
so Inner City
Press asked,
as transcribed
by the UK
Mission to the
UN:
Inner
City
Press: On
Sudan
sanction, the
Sudanese
Ambassador has
raised a
number of
times, in the
open chamber,
and out here
in front, this
issue that he
calls ‘Tomb
Sahad’ (?),
that somehow
that Sudan’s
sanctions
committee, a
British
gentleman he
says, Mr
Brian, was
unable to
verify if Jem
had taken
Qadaffi
weapons into
South Sudan.
He said it a
number of
times, I don’t
know if it’s
true or not,
but is it
something the
committee has
even taken up.
Amb.
Lyall
Grant: I’m not
aware of that
particular
issue, it
wasn’t
discussed in
the Council
today. That’s
something
you’d have to
take up with
Ambassador
Osoria
directly.
It
is hard to
accept this
answer, given
that Sudan has
raised its
complaint in
writing and in
testimony to
the Security
Council. Is
the committee
not paying
attention?
To
follow up on
this, two
letters have
been seen by
Inner City
Press in which
the
Sudan
Sanctions
Committee
praises Sudan
for granting
visas, in
November and
December 2011.
A well placed
source,
otherwise
anti-Sudan,
told Inner
City Press
that the
sanctions
committee gets
visa after the
first or
second
request. The
problem, the
source said,
is with visas
to the
international
staff of
UNAMID -- a
problem, but
a separate
problem.
To
Inner City
Press
it seems
similar to the
Council's
treatment of
Eritrea.
Whatever that
country's
sins, it
essentially
won a court
decision about
the land
around Badme.
But no one
enforced it.
Frustrated,
Eritrea
through the
UN and its
UNMEE mission
out. Now even
before the
Council
imposed yet
more sanctions
on Eritrea,
the US and
others made it
difficult for
the country's
President to
be heard by
the Council in
a meaningful,
pre-decision
way.
It
is important
that claims be
followed
through,
regardless of
which side
they come
from. Watch
this site.
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