quote:Originally posted by ARROW99: The first thing Egypt needs to do is eliminate the Muslim Brotherhood. They need to work hard on their educational system in order to build up their middle class.
Such an undertaking will restore national pride, give people a sense of lost glory. We're not lacking in skilled work force. We need to be able to deploy the millions of disparates out there to a new venture. A successful won not Toshky like. That venture lies south of the border. I don't expect the current government to undertake this as its policy has been basically to just sit on its hands.
Egypt deserves a lot more than a chance for mere survival.
Posts: 217 | Registered: Aug 2006
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quote:Ausar, Egypt won't lower their britches for you the way Liberia did.
Just give up and find another "homeland" to return to
But.. you will lower your skirt for any Egyptian man. How about about staying in America and not polluting Egypt with your foul smell.
You want me sonomod? Let's stop playing games. You remeber all the wonderful email exchanges we had with each other? I won't tell.
Why is it always that every thread has to turn into a string of personal attacks
Only did the deed with one Egyptian guy and I am planning to keep the count down to one.
Email exchanges? Yeah I sent you hundreds of journal articles from 50-130 years ago. Then you peppered these exchanges with insults to my intelligence.
Dude stick with the hoochie mamas at the dance hall. I'll stick the the USDA certified American meat!
Why r u addressing me here Posts: 217 | Registered: Aug 2006
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Hot Spot: Egypt and Sudan Wrangle over Halayib by Gabriel Warburg Middle East Quarterly March 1994
Almost entirely unnoticed by the outside world, relations between Egypt and Sudan have deteriorated ever since Ja`far an-Numayri's military regime was overthrown in 1985. The Sudan unilaterally abrogated both the Integration Charter and the military pact, both of which had bound it to Egypt since 1974. Relations reached a new low under the Sudanese government of as-Sadiq al-Mahdi in 1988, when the Egyptian minister of defense, Muhammad `Abd al-Halim Abu Ghazala, warned Egypt's southern neighbor that the Egyptian army would strike if the free flow of the Nile waters was tampered with.1
Cairo was so annoyed with Sadiq al-Mahdi that it was the first to recognize Colonel Hasan `Umar al-Bashir when he overthrew Sudan's democratically elected government in a military coup on June 30, 1989. President Husni al-Mubarak hoped that the Bashir regime would soon resume Sudan's cordial relations with Egypt. But Bashir proved worse than his predecessor on the subject of Sudanese relations with Egypt. Indeed, his government soon became the most hostile Sudanese regime faced by Egypt ever since the Sudan became independent in 1956.
Mubarak (and many others, as well) has ascribed much of Khartoum's bellicosity to the malign influence of Dr. Hasan al-Turabi, the fundamentalist Muslim leader who heads the Sudan's National Islamic Front (NIF), and to the NIF's close relationship with Iran.2 Whether true or not, Sudan's hostility toward Egypt has expressed itself in two main ways: radicalism; and the Halayib issue, which centers on a border question. Of the former, much is known outside the region; of the latter, surprisingly little. Yet the Halayib question, though rather artificial and very obscure, nevertheless indicates well the low ebb into which Egyptian-Sudanese relations have sunk in recent years.
BACKGROUND The Halayib problem, like many border controversies in the Middle East, goes back to the imperial past. In January 1899, when Great Britain and Egypt signed the so-called Condominium Agreement for the administration of the Sudan, Sudan's border with Egypt was drawn along the latitude of 22 north. That put Halayib and its environs on the Red Sea within Egyptian territory, thereby dividing tribes, such as the `Ababda and Bishariyin. Tribal members suddenly found themselves on both sides of a border across which they had hitherto been able to roam freely.
To allow these tribes to resume free movement across the border, the Egyptian minister of war signed an administrative arrangement on November 4, 1902, in which his government agreed to allow the Sudan to administer the Halayib triangle (hereafter, Halayib), an area consisting of some twenty-five thousand square kilometers. This agreement did not, however, imply a renouncement of Egyptian sovereignty over the region.3 Sharif at-Tuhami, a senior Sudanese ex-minister, claimed recently that the Halayib triangle came into existence in 1903, when Egypt agreed that it would be administered by Khartoum.4 But, in fact, the only official document that speaks about sovereignty pertaining to Halayib is the 1899 agreement, which left the area under Egyptian sovereignty.
So long as the Sudan was under Anglo-Egyptian control, the question of sovereignty never really arose and any potential conflict remained dormant. Cairo consistently sought the unity of the Nile Valley, hence it hardly mattered whether Halayib lay on the Egyptian or the Sudanese side of the border. However, all Egyptian maps included Halayib and its environs, north of latitude 22, within Egypt's international borders, both before and after Sudanese independence.
Matters changed after 1956, when the Sudan opted for independence, and especially once `Abdallah Khalil, the leader of the Neo-Mahdist Umma Party, became prime minister on July 5, 1956. President Gamal Abdel Nasser sent troops to occupy the region, claiming that since it lay north of latitude 22, it could not be included as a constituency in Sudan's forthcoming elections.5 But the real reason behind his move was Nasser's resentment of the Umma Party's policies and his desire to teach Khalil a lesson, for Khalil had rejected Nasser's notion of pan-Arab unity, as well as his notion of "positive neutrality." Instead, he supported the Eisenhower Doctrine and allied the Sudan with the United States. Matters deteriorated as troops massed on both sides of the border, at which point Khalil warned Nasser that he would complain to the Security Council.
Finally, Muhammad Ahmad Mahjub (Mahgoub), then Sudan's minister of foreign affairs, convinced Nasser to defuse the conflict by warning Egypt's president that the Halayib issue would unite all of Sudan against Egypt. Nasser's emotional response is yet remembered in Sudan: "Take Halayib and take Aswan, if you desire. I shall not allow Arab blood to be shed on the lands of Egypt or the Sudan, however grave the issue."6 With this flourish of rhetoric, Halayib left the stage for twenty years.
In 1978, under Numayri's military rule, the Halayib issue flared up again when Texas Eastern discovered small quantities of crude oil in the region. Sharif at-Tuhami, then Numayri's minister of energy, had granted the American company a concession in the Red Sea region, which included Halayib, and he did so without consulting Cairo. The Egyptian government warned Texas Eastern that its concession included Egyptian territory north of latitude 22, and thus it required Egyptian approval if it wanted to pursue its search in that region. A crisis was only averted by an agreement between Presidents Numayri and Anwar as-Sadat, in which they permitted Texas Eastern to pursue its search throughout the concession area on the condition that should oil be discovered north of latitude 22, Egypt would get its share. Sadat said half-jokingly: "We'll see what our Sudanese brothers will offer."7 As luck would have it, Texas Eastern discovered neither oil nor natural gas in commercial quantities, and it left the region in 1983, following the renewal of hostilities in southern Sudan. The Halayib issue again abated.
THE CURRENT CONTROVERSY Sudan's present rulers pulled the Halayib issue out of the historical archives, so to speak, when they granted a Canadian oil company a concession to search for oil, once again without consulting Egypt. Furthermore, they stopped the Egyptian Phosphate Company from excavating magnesium in the Halayib region after seventy-five years of uninterrupted work. Finally, they ordered Egyptian citizens in the Halayib triangle to replace their Egyptian documents with Sudanese identity cards.
Faced with Egyptian protests, Bashir and his colleagues responded that since the entire, vast area of the Sudan belongs to all Arabs, who are cordially invited to live there, why quarrel about tiny Halayib? Bashir even told Mubarak that he would welcome Egyptian workers and agricultural experts to settle permanently in Sudan and cultivate its lands for the benefit of all Arabs. In February 1992, the Sudanese authorities flew an Egyptian delegation headed by Dr. Osama al-Baz, President Mubarak's advisor on foreign affairs, on a flight over the fertile Sudanese Gezira, and Egyptians were invited to cultivate it. Sudanese observers then concluded: "We offer them the whole Sudan and they insist on…Halayib," which, they said, makes no sense.8
But, according to Salah al-Muntasar, editor of a Cairene weekly, the Sudanese government was really using Halayib to arouse anti-Egyptian feelings among Sudanese. What made Halayib an issue was not the border question itself but the desire of Bashir and Turabi, Bashir's ideological mentor, to provoke Egyptian ire.9 Egyptian and Sudanese commentators agreed that neither Egyptians nor Sudanese could possibly regard Halayib as an issue worth fighting over. Sudan has problematic borders with all its African neighbors and is fighting a religious-ethnic war in its south. Hence, it can ill afford hostilities with Egypt, its strongest neighbor.
Nevertheless, matters came to a head on December 31, 1992, when the Sudanese government complained to the U.N. Security Council about Egyptian attempts to annex Halayib. It claimed that Egyptian forces penetrated a region some twenty-eight kilometers south of Halayib on December 9, cutting off the road linking Halayib to Port Sudan and virtually putting the town of Halayib under siege. Khartoum responded by taking over Egyptian institutes of learning in the Sudan. It further retaliated by fully opening the Rahad and Kafana canals, using more water than permitted in its agreement with Egypt.10
Three further developments occurred in 1993. First a minor armed conflict within Halayib broke out on May 8, 1993. Secondly, the Sudanese authorities closed down Egyptian consulates in Port Sudan and El-Obeid on June 25, 1993, to which the Egyptians retaliated by closing the Sudan's consulates in Alexandria and Port Said. Thirdly, and probably more significant, the Sudanese claimed that Cairo is carrying out a settlement policy in Halayib to establish an Egyptian majority there.
The Halayib conflict presently rests here, with neither side seemingly willing to compromise, but both willing to stop the argument before it evolves into a major conflict.
CONCLUSION Halayib is more a symptom than a root cause of declining Egyptian-Sudanese relations; it is therefore unlikely to cause war unless more central issues intervene. These issues are two in number: Islamist subversion and water politics.
The Sudanese attempt to undermine Egypt's present regime is the most serious source of potential Egyptian-Sudanese trouble. Turabi has declared that the old reactionary order, consisting of President Mubarak and other rulers, is about to collapse, and that a new "Islamic nationality" will take its place.11 According to many sources, Sudan's fundamentalist leaders are infiltrating into Egypt, with impunity, Islamicist terrorists of Egyptian nationality trained in the Sudan with Iranian aid.
The Iran-Sudan axis has assumed ever more threatening postures since the Kuwait war. During 1992, some eight Iranian missions visited the Sudan and drew up several agreements, one of which concerned promoting the Islamic revolution in Africa under NIF guidance. This effort has taken various forms, including the smuggling of Soviet weaponry from Iran via Khartoum to General Muhammad Farah Aideed, America's arch enemy in Somalia.12
The U.S. government had reason for concern about developments in the Sudan even before it got involved in Somalia, Khartoum's fundamentalist rulers granted asylum to `Umar `Abd ar-Rahman, the sheikh accused of being the spiritual mentor of President Sadat's murderers, of inspiring the World Trade Center bombings, of planning to blow up central buildings and tunnels in New York, as well planning to assassinate President Mubarak, U.N. secretary-general Boutros Boutros-Ghali, and several American politicians. He entered the United States on a visa obtained at the U.S. embassy in Khartoum.
As for water, it is the most sensitive issue in Egyptian-Sudanese relations, for Egypt depends on the waters of the Nile River for its very survival. In fact, the recent anti-Egyptian hysteria in Sudan, which included threats of cutting Egypt's share of Nile waters, is reminiscent of the December 1924 ultimatum issued by Lord Allenby in the wake of the assassination of Sir Lee Stack by Egyptian nationalists. It also recalls the threat to bombard the High Dam in Aswan, which came from Baghdad via the NIF's anti-Egyptian demonstrators in Khartoum, during the Gulf war.
Halayib, therefore, is not a major point of conflict in itself. The Sudan's present rulers are aware of their relative weakness; they are therefore doing their utmost to play it down; Halayib rarely figures in the Sudan's state-controlled media. It is thus no wonder that it is hardly noticed by the outside world. But if the major factors threatening to push Egypt and the Sudan to arms continue to wax, Halayib will quickly become a hot spot to watch.
Gabriel Warburg is professor of modern Middle Eastern history at the University of Haifa and a former director of the Israeli Academic Center in Cairo.
A Diwan of contemporary life (293) From the moment Egypt set foot in Sudan in the last century, Egyptians looked upon the Sudanese as their flesh and blood. The relationship was fostered by the common lifeline, the Nile. The British, after occupying Egypt in 1882, began hacking away at these bonds. They forced Egypt into signing a condominium agreement in 1899 providing for a joint administration in Sudan. But gradually the British edged Egypt out of its southern neighbour both militarily and politically. Dr Yunan Labib Rizk * tells in this instalment of the Diwan series how Al-Ahram hotly defended the Egypt-Sudan kinship and exposed British designs --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Out of Sudan --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In the latter half of the year of the Egyptian revolution of 1919, Egyptian nationalists had strong presentiments about Sudan. Over the year, Britain had begun to implement a number of major irrigation projects there, compelling Al-Ahram to proclaim that Egyptians have the right to know how these projects would affect their water resources. "The Nile is Egypt's lifeline. Because of its dense population and scarce developed land, Egypt has a greater right to the waters of the Nile," it argued. It did not deny Sudan's right to "an equitable" quota of the waters of the Nile, commensurate with its relatively small population, "who are our flesh and blood." In June and July, against the backdrop of on-going clashes between Egyptian protesters and the British occupation forces, the British authorities arranged for a visit by a delegation of Sudanese leaders to London. Headed by Al-Sayed Ali Al-Mirghani, the delegation paid homage to the British king and met with the Foreign Secretary, Curzon, "who discussed with them issues pertaining to the future of Sudan." A few weeks later, Curzon delivered a lengthy speech before the House of Lords on "the Egyptian question." One passage was certain to compound Egyptian misgivings over their southern neighbour:
"I want to say a word about the encouraging situation in Sudan. The people of that country, still under the government of Sir Lee Stack, governor-general of Sudan, continue to maintain public order. They have offered clear proof of their love for Great Britain last July through a visit by a delegation of their dignitaries to His Majesty's government. The delegation expressed to His Majesty and then to myself their great appreciation for the work Great Britain has undertaken towards the advancement of their country. They also confirmed that they took no part in the incidents that occurred in Egypt recently and that their sole aspiration is to remain a part of the British Empire."
Several months later, Egyptian presentiments turned into fear when, in response to a nudge from the British, a group of Sudanese religious leaders, of whom Al-Mirghani was one, founded the newspaper, Hidarat Al-Sudan (The civilisation of Sudan). In its first issue, the newspaper called upon Sudan to distance itself completely from the Egyptian nationalist movement and expressed its hopes to see an entirely British administration in Sudan. The British, in its opinion, "have always dedicated themselves sincerely to the progress and prosperity of the Sudanese." This contrasted with "the hardship inflicted upon them by the Egyptian administration in the period preceding the Mahdist movement."
The new newspaper found support in an older newspaper, Al-Sudan, also established with British assistance in the early years of dual control. Not coincidentally, the founders of this newspaper were the owners of the staunchly pro-British Egyptian newspaper, Al-Muqattam . Yet, the British must have felt that they needed a more "indigenous" voice in Sudan. Al-Sudan founders, Nimr and Yacoub Sarrouf, were of Syrian origin and, of course, the British strings behind Al-Muqattam had, by then, been thoroughly exposed. Al-Sudan was expected to meet the same fate. Already, Al-Ahram had complained that the British press was deriving most of its information on Sudan from that newspaper and called upon "writers and those concerned with the sacred Egyptian cause to refute the claims of that newspaper and expose its fallacious arguments."
In response to the mounting fears over British plans for the Sudan, Al-Ahram, in the period from 27 February to 14 March 1920, launched a counter-drive. Appearing under the odd, if appropriate, headline, "And Sudan...?", the series opened: "Egypt, Sudan, the Suez Canal, Palestine, Iraq and Iran are vital to Britain because they lie on its route to India, as Lord Curzon proclaimed to the delirious applause of the House of Commons. But, if Egypt said, 'Sudan belongs to me as much as I belong to it; it sustains me and I, alone, sustain it,' British writers would cry out, 'What stuff and nonsense!'"
The article then proceeds to explain how Britain had undermined Egyptian-Sudanese relations. "For a century Britain chipped away at Egypt's might and impeded its development. Then, when it appeared that the Orabi rebellion was about to transfer government to the hands of the people, the British hastened to occupy our country and, then, to rupture its bond of security with Sudan." In this pursuit, the British attempted to portray Sudan as a separate entity. "The world would say that Sudan is Egypt and Britain would respond, no, that is Sudan, until eventually it placed Sudan under the administration of what the Manchester Guardian calls 'a partnership' between Egypt and Great Britain."
That the British press had taken up the Foreign Office's claim that Sudan was a separate entity was worrisome, particularly when the highly influential London Times proclaimed, "Egypt is one nation; Sudan is another". Equally disturbing was the fact that other British newspapers began to sound warnings to the effect that if Egypt secured control over Sudan it would set its sights on the equatorial sources of the Nile in Uganda which was, at that time, a British protectorate.
It is important to note that Al-Ahram accorded its campaign to defend Egypt's claim to Sudan high priority. The seven articles on the subject were featured prominently in the upper half of the front page, in the space generally allotted to major editorials. The articles were also unsigned, generally an indication that the editor-in-chief, himself, had written them. Moreover, contrary to its treatment of most issues of concern to public opinion, the newspaper did not solicit readers' opinions on the subject, possibly because the question of Sudan was too clear-cut to brook any give and take. Egypt's kinship to Sudan was obviously a self-evident tenet of the Egyptian nationalist cause, and Al-Ahram clearly saw it as its task to challenge the British stance on this issue.
Al-Ahram's campaign to defend Egypt's claim to the Sudan appealed strongly to historical evidence. Indeed, three of the seven articles were, in effect, historical studies. The title of the first, "From Mohamed Ali to Abbas II: 1812-1903", might strike specialists in Egyptian-Sudanese relations as odd. To them, the two dates defining the period of the study would seem arbitrary. They would more readily accept, for example 1820 and 1899, the first being the year in which Mohamed Ali initiated the military expedition to the Sudan and the latter being the year in which the Egyptian-British "Dual Control" over Sudan took effect. Yet, as we read the article, we come to understand why Al-Ahram chose those other dates.
According to Al-Ahram, 1812 marked the beginning of Mohamed Ali's Sudanese policy. It was in that year that the Egyptian ruler sent a goodwill mission carrying gifts to the king of Sennar to court his friendship. The mission included "military men and scholars who wrote extensive reports and drew up plans for the conquest of Sudan."
In 1816, Al-Ahram continues, Mohamed Ali sent another team "to investigate the gold deposits in Zabara mountain and to draw up a map of the country."
As for the other end of the time span, 1903 marked the year in which the British crystallised their Sudan policy. In the four-year interval following the defeat of the Mahdist regime and the establishment of Dual Control in 1899, the British Commissioner in Cairo, Lord Cromer, visited Sudan three times, during which "he delivered speeches promising reforms and new public works programmes." Cromer's speeches appeared to be the concrete fulfilment of the prediction made by Gladstone in 1877, five years before the British occupation of Egypt. Gladstone had said: "Once we set foot in Egypt, that will sow the seed for building our East African empire. Then we will move beyond the Blue and White Niles to the equator, extending our reach to Natal and the Cape, swallowing up Ethiopia on the way."
Al-Ahram's historical survey of Egyptian-Sudanese relations pinpointed significant Egyptian personalities and accomplishments. Among those cited for their achievements was an Egyptian police commandant in Sudan, who was credited with "ordering the construction of Khartoum and other cities, extending the conquests towards Ethiopia... building mosques and primary schools and teaching the people to wear clothes made of woven fabrics instead of animal pelts."
When Mohamed Ali on 2 August 1849, the newspaper observed that "lamentations were widespread throughout Sudan." Mohamed Ali's successor, Abbas I, continued to implement projects to develop Sudan.
The second Al-Ahram article in the series gave a coherent picture of Egypt's role in the south. What is particularly striking is that it draws on corroborative testimony from European, and specifically British, sources. It quoted British and French scholars as saying that before the Mahdist uprising in Sudan, an Ottoman edict of 1865 had granted the coastal areas of Suakin and Massawa to Egypt. In 1875 Egypt annexed Zeila and the surrounding areas. In 1882, the Egyptian borders in Sudan were defined to include Lake Albert, Lake Victoria "and the area two degrees south."
Samuel Baker, the famous British discoverer and governor of Equatoria province under Khedive Ismail, testifies to the security of that large stretch of territory under Egyptian control. Al-Ahram quotes him as saying that "the European tourist can tour these lands, the area of which is equivalent to that of France, Germany and Britain combined, with a sense of safety and comfort one might not be able to find in Hyde Park after nightfall."
The article argues that the British took advantage of the Mahdist uprising to push the Egyptians out of Sudan and strip Egypt of its southern possessions. It quotes Sir Reginald Wingate, who wrote in The Mahdis and Sudan, "The Sudan rebelled against the abolition of slavery and the monopoly on ivory and against the harshness of the administrative officials. However, the uprising was local. The British welcomed this and manoeuvred to have the Egyptian army withdrawn from Sudan." The British moved to fill the void they created. "They occupied the coasts of the Red Sea without consulting the Khedive. The forces of Admiral White landed in Suakin, the engineers laid out plans for the railroad to Berber and Colonel Hunter landed in the ports of Somalia and signed a pact with the King of Ethiopia as though Egypt's title to these lands had no value. Let history judge."
The third historical essay was devoted to the Anglo-Egyptian Condominium agreement. Signed by Britain and Egypt in January 1899, the Condominium arranged for dual Egyptian and British administrative control over Sudan. Although Sudan, under the agreement, remained nominally Egyptian, in effect it was run as a British colony, with Egyptians having to foot much of the costs. The agreement would rankle with Egyptians for decades afterwards. In this article, Al-Ahram discussed the details of the agreement and cited Cromer's pretexts for making Britain Egypt's partner in governing Sudan. Again, by way of comment, Al-Ahram quoted a contemporary senior official who had been privy to some of the details of the Condominium. He said, "I am incapable of finding any legal justification for it in all bodies of law."
The last four articles in Al-Ahram's campaign to defend Egypt's claim to Sudan focused on the British drive to bring Sudan entirely under its hegemony. The Egyptian "evacuation from Sudan was not meant to expose it to plunder," the first of these four articles proclaimed in its headline. While the British may have forced the Khedive Tawfiq to withdraw his personnel from the south so that British forces could move in, on the pretext of protecting Egypt from the Mahdist uprising, Egypt had not forfeited its rights to the country. Tawfiq "did not leave Sudan as fair game. Rather, he withdrew out of military exigency. Sudan, therefore, remains an Egyptian property, recognised internationally and under international law which is said to be the order under which all nations operate."
It was in the Equatoria province that the British exposed their true designs on Sudan. This province had never fallen under the control of the Mahdists. Nevertheless, after the British occupied Wadi Halfa, Suakin, Berbera, Zeila and Uganda, "the Equatoria province, which at the time was under the command of Amin Pasha, was the only area left in Sudan under Egyptian rule." In their desire to wrest this latter province away from Egypt, "they compelled Prime Minister Nubar Pasha to write to Amin Pasha to inform him that the government of the khedive was unable to continue to assist him and gave him complete freedom to act as he saw fit, and that should he wish to withdraw he should move to Zanzibar." The article continues, "The British continued to pressure Amin Pasha until he withdrew from the area. The Egyptian arm which had embraced all ports of Sudan was withdrawn and the Egyptian flag which had fluttered there for half a century was folded."
"Such is history as it is. It holds the proof, for all who seek it, of an episode of coercion and hardship that set upon Egypt a full century ago," the article concluded.
The next instalment cited further corroborative testimony regarding British colonialist machinations at the expense of Egyptian rights. One source was The History and Geography of Sudan Past and Present by Naoum Bek Shuqeir (1903). Shuqeir, who had worked in Egyptian military intelligence under the British, was perplexed by the fact that Abdel-Qader Helmi, the Governor-General of Sudan, had been recalled from the Sudan in spite of his success in quelling the Mahdist uprising. Shuqeir recalls, "I asked Abdel-Qader Pasha, 'Why were you recalled from Sudan in spite of your success in restoring peace to the country?' Abdel-Qader responded, 'They charged me with seeking independence, naturally.'"
The article also cites Boutros Ghali Pasha, Egyptian foreign minister at the time of the negotiations over the Anglo-Egyptian Condominium, who wrote to Cromer on 19 October 1898: "The government of His Royal Highness the Khedive has never lost sight of its desire to reoccupy Sudan. That region is the source of Egypt's life. If Egypt had withdrawn from it temporarily, that was the result of overwhelmingly compelling circumstances."
In the opinion of Al-Ahram , the Anglo-Egyptian accords of 1899 had no validity. Its sixth article in the series argued, "Although Great Britain assisted the Khedive Abbas in regaining his lands, or, better put, in suppressing the rebellion and restoring peace in Sudan, it did it on its own accord. If Great Britain came to terms with the khedive, these conditions are invalid, as the khedive had no right to negotiate over land that was under Turkish suzerainty." The article rallies yet another British authority to its support: the British foreign secretary told the House of Commons, "As regards the question of Sudan, we are not bound by any treaty, law or system."
The oft-cited pretext used by the British to justify ruling Sudan, with or without the Egyptians, was that they helped pay for the campaign to reconquer Sudan. Al-Ahram is quick to refute this claim. The Egyptian government put up more than LE8 million for the Dongola expedition alone, while the British contributed less than LE800,000 towards the entire campaign, it said. In order to raise the funds, the Egyptian government "acting on British instructions, began to sell off whatever it could. It sold off the royal ships, it allocated all open credits towards the war effort and it sold off so much royal land and government property that the newspapers began to blazon, 'Egypt is on auction!'"
The final article in the series discussed the relationship between colonising powers and the peoples under their control. Colonised people frequently entertain the notion that they can play upon the internal conflicts within the colonising countries. Al-Ahram was one of the first voices to contend that the stratagem was futile. Under the headline, "Liberals and Conservatives", Al-Ahram argued that whatever the differences the two British parties may have on domestic issues, on matters of foreign affairs they are one. The article relates that, on one occasion, a liberal MP objected that the Sudan expedition would be too heavy a financial burden upon Britain. When the prime minister responded that Egypt would be bearing the costs, "the MP was content." On another occasion, the head of the Liberal Party questioned whether Egypt would be able to come up with the necessary funds. The foreign secretary answered that if Egypt could not, the necessary funds would be drawn from the Debt Fund. "The Liberal Party chief made no objection, because he found the solution totally satisfactory."
Clearly, Al-Ahram recognised a reality that few are aware of up to the present. Many today are overly obsessed with the elections that take place in the West, or even in Israel, under the illusion that the victory of one candidate over another will serve some of our causes. Al-Ahram realised, even at that early date, that the realisation of our aspirations depends upon how well we make use of our available sources of power, not upon the good intentions of others.
The Sudan Defence Force The presence of Sudanese soldiers in the Egyptian army dates back to 1820 when Egyptian forces advanced southwards to unite the two halves of the Nile Valley. For the next several decades they were to become an important component of the modern Egyptian army. But their presence in the Egyptian army was not without complications for the colonial authorities who took all necessary precautions to ensure the Sudanese posed no threat to the British occupation. The measures worked well until 1924 when the British drove Egyptian forces from Sudan and formed the so-called Sudan Defence Force. In Al-Ahram Dr Yunan Labib Rizk traces the fate of the troops south of the Egyptian border.
-------------------------------------- Point five of Lord Allenby's ultimatum to Saad Zaghlul of 22 November 1924 stated, "Within 24 hours orders shall be issued to recall all Egyptian officers and units of the Egyptian army from Sudan. Subsequent changes shall be determined later." In a memorandum issued later that day the British high commissioner said, "Following the recall of Egyptian officers and units of the Egyptian army the Sudanese units of the Egyptian army shall become a Sudanese armed force subject and loyal to the Sudanese government alone and under the supreme command of the governor-general of Sudan." This ultimatum and its appendix, issued following the assassination of Governor-General of Sudan Sir Lee Stack on 19 November 1924, reopened the file of the Sudanese in the Egyptian army, a file that dates back to 1820 when Egyptian forces advanced southwards to unite the two halves of the Nile Valley. It is commonly held among students of modern Egyptian history that one of Mohamed Ali's objectives in annexing Sudan was to secure a source for soldiers for the modern army he was trying to build, while simultaneously being able to keep the Egyptian peasants engaged in the cultivation of the land. Nevertheless, the plan failed, they assert, because the Sudanese recruits were unable to acclimatise to the Egyptian climate, forcing Mohamed Ali to recruit his troops from the Egyptian populace, generally the rural peasant population. Officer ranks continued to be staffed from the Turkish aristocracy.
For nearly a century since its founding under Mohamed Ali, the Sudanese were an important component of the modern Egyptian army. Indeed, certain military missions had been designated for the Sudanese contingents, perhaps the best known being the part they played in Napoleon's Mexican campaign, one of the most curious chapters in the history of the Egyptian army.
The French troops that the French emperor had dispatched to the New World encountered, in addition to popular resistance, the spread of yellow fever. As it was believed that dark-skinned peoples were more resistant to that epidemic, Napoleon appealed to the Egyptian ruler, Said Pasha, to send him some Sudanese from the Egyptian army. Historians differ as to why the Egyptian ruler acceded to the French request and, again, why his successor, Khedive Ismail, sent more Sudanese troops to fight for the French between 1863 and 1876. Some contend that it was pure recklessness to do this favour for Paris and, thereby, involve Egyptian armed forces in a war that did not concern Egypt in the slightest. Others have suggested that the consent to lend Sudanese contingents from the Egyptian army to France was part of an agreement struck between two Egyptian rulers and the French emperor and that, in exchange for these troops, the French would back Egypt's bid to secure independence from Istanbul.
Evidence of a significant Sudanese presence in the Egyptian army appears in the wake of the British occupation of Egypt in 1882. One of the first acts of the new occupiers was to dissolve the army, led by Ahmed Orabi, that had resisted the British invasion and to set about creating a new army under British command. It is noteworthy, however, that Consul-General Lord Cromer, responsible for implementing London's policies in Egypt, did not eliminate the Sudanese contingents in the Egyptian army, which, in turn, proved fortuitous when Mahdist forces under the command of Abdel-Rahman Wad Al-Nujumi began to make incursions across the Egyptian border in 1889. Moreover, the Sudanese presence in the Egyptian army increased as members of the Sudanese tribes opposed to the government in Umm Durman fled northwards and signed up, a phenomenon which the British encouraged when they went on the offensive against the Mahdist state, seizing Donqola in 1896 and toppling the Mahdist government two years later.
The continued presence and rise of Sudanese contingents in the Egyptian army was not without complications for the British. The colonial authorities' prime concern in rebuilding the Egyptian army was to guard against the new force posing a threat to the British occupation. One step was to keep the numbers down to the extent that throughout the 1880s the size of the army remained in the neighborhood of 6,000. A second concern, of course, was to staff the senior ranks with British officers, all subordinate to the British sirdar -- Persian for commander. British authorities, thirdly, introduced a law which enabled the sons of the well-to-do to pay their way out of the draft, making the brunt of the draft fall primarily on the peasants and broadening the social rift between Egyptian officers and troops.
With regard to Sudanese conscripts, the British were careful to keep them from associating with the Egyptian troops. Army regiments were, therefore, either purely Egyptian or purely Sudanese, a policy that was not entirely foolproof as it was not always possible to find Sudanese officers for the Sudanese companies, leaving no alternative but to staff them -- at the lower echelons of command, of course -- with Egyptians.
The risks of this solution were driven home at the turn of the 20th century, at the outset of the Anglo-Egyptian Condominium Agreement (1899) for the dual administration of Sudan, when a Sudanese company serving under an Egyptian officer in Umm Durman rebelled after having heard reports that the British command intended to dispatch Sudanese forces to South Africa to help quell the second Boer uprising.
British colonial authorities in Khartoum took heed of this insurrection and pressed ahead with the establishment of a military academy to produce Sudanese petty officers, so as to better curtail contact between Egyptians and Sudanese in the south. To further ensure their grip over the south and the army in particular, the British expanded their military intelligence in the region, developing a special branch for Sudan. Sudanese intelligence was staffed entirely by Britons with the exception of some Levantine assistants such as Samuel Attiya and Naoum Shaqir. Egyptians and Sudanese were entirely excluded from the agency, one of the primary responsibilities of which was to keep tabs on circumstances within the army. Such was the status of the chief of this agency that he stood in line for promotion to sirdar and governor-general of Sudan, as was the case with Sir Reginald Wingate and Sir Lee Stack.
This situation worked well for the British until 1919, when the winds of revolution built up into a gale that would inevitably hit Sudan and overturn all the colonial office's best laid plans. Not surprisingly, the spirit of Egypt's 1919 Revolution rubbed off first on the Egyptian officers in Khartoum. In November of that year, 60 of these officers assembled in the Sudanese capital to draw up a communiqué to demand the independence of Egypt, to protest the Milner Mission that was due to arrive in Cairo in December that year to investigate the causes of the revolution, and to protest the killing of defenceless civilians in Alexandria at the hands of British forces. The meeting was the subject of extensive intelligence analyses, some of which appeared to confirm British anxieties that Sudanese students and civil servants were becoming influenced by events in the north.
Measures had to be taken to curtail the spread of discontent in the upper Nile Valley. Because the army consisted of the largest, best organised and most politically volatile group of Egyptians in Sudan, the high commissioner in Cairo sent one of his most astute and capable officers to Khartoum to examine ways to buffer the Sudanese in the army against the contagion. The report that Ken Boyd submitted to Allenby on 11 March 1920 reviewed the state of the Egyptian army in Sudan and suggested a scenario for stripping it of its Egyptian element, precisely the scenario seen nearly four years later in accordance with the ultimatum of November 1924. Specifically, Boyd proposed the creation of a purely Sudanese army, or what was later to be called the Sudan Defence Force, and laid out in painstaking detail his vision of the various combat divisions and garrison forces and how they should be deployed. As for the Egyptian forces, the 16th and 17th battalions should be dismantled, he suggested, while the remainder of Egyptian troops in Sudan would be redeployed in the south of the country.
Officials in the high commissioner's office in Cairo and the Foreign Office in London kept Boyd's report in mind, waiting for the right moment to put it into effect. This opportunity presented itself during the events that swept Sudan in the summer of 1924, events which convinced the British authorities that they had to sever the Sudanese limb of the Egyptian army. That summer saw several manifestations of the growing tide of Sudanese nationalism. It was not just the spread of anti-British underground societies that the colonial authorities found so disturbing. So, too, was the fact that they contained many Sudanese officers, one group whose loyalty the British had felt so confident about up to that point. In fact, the most notorious of these societies -- the White Brigade -- was founded by Sudanese Lieutenant Ali Abdel-Latif and contained a number of junior Sudanese officers. The society advocated "unity of the Nile Valley" and professed loyalty to King Fouad. But many other Sudanese shared their sentiments. On 9 August students from the military academy in Khartoum emerged from the academy in military file, carrying pictures of King Fouad and Saad Zaghlul. They headed first to the barracks of the Egyptian 4th battalion to proclaim their support for "the king of Egypt and Sudan" and then proceeded to the home of Lt Abdel-Latif, whom the British had arrested, to demonstrate support for him as well.
If this outpouring of anti-British and pro-Egyptian sentiments were not disturbing enough, to the north Prime Minister Saad Zaghlul had initiated a policy of not renewing the contracts of British officers in the Egyptian army, which ran counter to all the plans the British colonial authorities had been putting into place since 1882 to ensure their hegemony over the armed forces in Egypt and Sudan.
Finally, the assassination of Sir Lee Stack on 24 November galvanised British decision-makers into setting in motion the Boyd recommendations, although the amputation met with considerable resistance among the Sudanese elements in the Egyptian forces. In Talodi, the capital of the Nuba Mountains province, Sudanese officers were arrested for having refused to comply with orders to stop dealing with Egyptian officers. In Khartoum, tension over the issue flared into armed confrontation with the British garrison stationed there. When news of this incident reached Cairo the office of the high commissioner issued the following statement published in Al-Ahram on 4 December: "Reports have reached us that in Khartoum on 27 November two platoons of the 11th Sudanese regiment mutinied. They left their barracks and marched eastwards towards the military hospital where they were met by another platoon from the Argyle regiment. The deputy commander ordered the Sudanese soldiers to return to their duties, but they refused. The forces of the sirdar opened fire on the insurgents who struck back. The skirmish killed or wounded many Sudanese. Two British officers were killed and eight officers and soldiers were wounded."
In spite of these setbacks British authorities pressed ahead with their plans, initiating in January 1925 the expulsion of Egyptian soldiers from Sudan. Although the British may have resolved a security problem in Sudan, it was still premature for them to breathe a sigh of relief. They still had considerable political fallout to deal with.
Because the Egyptian claim to Sudan was a major nationalist tenet, perhaps the British should have anticipated the vehement protest in the Egyptian press which accused the British of violating the terms of the Anglo-Egyptian condominium. The British press countered that the 1899 agreement contained no reference to the nature of the army in Sudan, to which Al-Ahram responded with a lengthy article featured over two editions, on 17 and 19 January 1925. "The Egyptian army is a single indivisible entity, composed of Sudanese and Egyptian regiments, and it was this entity that was to come under the general command in accordance with the 1899 condominium. When the authors of that agreement used the term 'army' it was to signify the entire Egyptian army inclusive of both its Egyptian and Sudanese regiments."
The British were not about to be dissuaded, however. No sooner did newly-appointed Commander-General Sir Geoffrey Archer take his post than he forged ahead with the creation of the Sudan Defence Force. One of his first decisions was to separate the commands of the Egyptian and Sudanese armies. In fact, few are aware that the title sirdar was dropped following the assassination of Sir Lee Stack precisely because it was used to designate the supreme commander of the Egyptian army in Sudan as Al-Ahram defined it in its editorials of 17 and 19 January. The sirdar, moreover, regardless of his nationality, was an Egyptian government official, appointed by decree by the Egyptian throne, a status that British authorities were determined to change.
Al-Ahram adds another interesting footnote in this regard. Sir Archer stopped wearing the tarboush that Stack had worn, as did all previous occupants of the sirdariya in their capacity as Egyptian army commanders. Instead, Archer wore a British-style hat, a gesture that a British newspaper interpreted as an attempt to present himself to the Sudanese as the head of a purely Sudanese army, "for no government official in Sudan had worn the tarboush unless he was serving in the Egyptian army."
Of course, Archer had much more on his mind than his headgear. One of his prime concerns was to dispel the anxieties of the Sudanese over the fate of Sudanese officers who had formerly served in the Egyptian army. In his first meeting with Sudanese tribal leaders and notables, Archer explained that these officers were now members of the Sudan Defence Force, "which is subordinate to the governor-general who has the right to appoint and dismiss them." He assured his audience that he intended to retain all the Sudanese officers who had served in the Egyptian army with the exception of those who had taken part in the "insurrection," because "it would be reckless to use officers who had taken part in a conspiracy."
British propaganda, for its part, did all in its power to sow the seeds of discontent in Sudanese-Egyptian ties. British newspapers, for example, accused Egyptian officers of having incited their Sudanese colleagues to stage the insurrection of the previous November. It was not easy to come up with tangible evidence, since Egyptian officers did not take part, but eventually the British press pointed the finger at Ahmed Bek Rifaat, the commander of the Egyptian artillery division in the Sudanese capital. The Times went so far as to assert that Sudanese soldiers had been extremely angered by "the treachery of their Egyptian colleagues." Egyptians were deeply offended by the accusations. In one instance, Prince Omar Touson, known for his passionate interest in Sudanese affairs, published a book at his own expense, The Activities of the Egyptian Army in Sudan and the Tragedy of its Departure.
It was not long before the Sudan Defence Force took concrete form. According to Al-Ahram's report based on information gleaned from the British press, it was a force of 17,600 regulars and irregulars, the former "receiving accommodation in military barracks, rations and allowances for married conscripts." The army was composed of six infantry regiments, among which were the 10th and 11th from the Egyptian army in Sudan. These were divided, temporarily, into two companies, each commanded by a British officer.
Irregulars primarily made up the camel cavalry, the eastern and western Bedouin forces, the equatorial regiment, the cavalry and the mounted artillery forces. Irregulars were to receive larger salaries than regulars in compensation for the rations accorded to regulars, Al-Ahram explained.
As for the command structure of the Sudan Defence Force, the Al-Ahram report continues, it is not difficult to see political factors at work in the fact that more Sudanese officers were to be brought into second rank positions. British officers were still to fill the command positions, which, the newspaper added, promised them splendid career prospects and were already attracting applicants from British officers in the Egyptian army and in India.
If the new Sudanese army was now a reality, the British still had one more surprise in store for the Egyptians. When authorities in Khartoum were asked how they planned on financing the Sudan Defence Force given Sudan's lack of resources at the time, they were at first suspiciously vague, although they indicated that the income from the railways would be sufficient to cover costs, a suggestion no one took seriously. Soon, the British press began to uncover the truth, which was that it was to be financed primarily from the Egyptian national budget as payment for securing Egypt's southern borders against incursions of the sort that occurred at the time of the Mahdist uprising and in exchange for ensuring "the unobstructed provision of Egypt's water needs."
The truth was made explicit in a statement issued by Egyptian Prime Minister Ziwar Pasha on 5 February 1925, in which he announced, "As the Egyptian government has always considered the army in Sudan as part of the Egyptian army entrusted with the defence of the Sudanese provinces, which are still bound to Egypt through inextricable ties, the government has decided to maintain the budget for the Ministry of War for the 1925-26 financial year at the level of the previous year, specifying in detail the allocation for the army in Egypt and the remainder which shall be allocated in a lump sum for the army in Sudan." British authorities in Cairo, Khartoum and London could not have hoped for anything more.
* The author is a professor of history and head of Al-Ahram History Studies Centre.
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1820 Egypt invades Sudan. By 1876 Egyptian forces control the entire country.
1879 Britain and France jointly take control of Egypt. They also assume control of Sudan's laws and taxes.
1881 Uprising under Muhammad Ahmed against foreign forces in Sudan. British armed forces try to smash him. But they are beaten back.
1885 Muhammad Ahmed's force occupy Khartoum. They kill General Gordon and establish the first national government.
1898 Battle of Omdurman. Sudanese forces massacred by the British under General Kitchener. British and French forces clash at Fashoda 500 miles south of Khartoum, bringing Europe to the brink of war. France eventually backs off, granting Britain control of Egypt and Sudan in exchange for other African colonies.
1914 Britain takes direct control of Egypt and Sudan. The administration separates north and south Sudan. "The southern provinces are not ready for exposure to the modern world," says one governor.
1920s A "closed door" policy bans northern Sudanese from entering or working in the south.
1930 Southern Sudanese declared to be a people distinct from northern Muslims. Region prepared for integration into British East Africa.
1946-7 Britain hands south Sudan to north Sudanese elite of local plantation owners without any consultation with the south. South Sudan's representatives in the new legislative assembly are chosen by Britain.
1956 Sudan gains independence. But British-sown divisions lay the basis for a war that breaks out shortly afterwards.
1980-3 Wave of struggle against repression by the government of Ja'far Nimeiry. He had declared sharia law to drum up a support base.
1986 The IMF declares Sudan "bankrupt" and withdraws all loans. Half a million people die from famine in Sudan. Military seize power three years later.
1991 The US halts grain shipments to Port Sudan during a time of famine in retaliation for the Sudanese government opposing the first US war against Iraq.
Posts: 217 | Registered: Aug 2006
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quote:Not true. If you're an Egyptian, then sure you're familiar with the work of El Raf3i. R u calling him a liar. Ali went into Sudan in 1811/1812 to hunt the renegade Mamaleek. He started conscripting the Sudanese for the army up until 1814/1815 when it was clear that there is no way they would become modern soldiers. This is when they were dispanded and replaced with Egyptian soldiers - falaheen. This is the army that went to Arabia in 1817, Greece 1820s and the Levant in 1830s.
The Anglo involvement came at a much later stage after the occupation of Egypt 1872
Yes, I am familiar with El Raf3i writtings and I respect him as one of the greatest Egyptian thinkers. You must also realize that he was a little biased towards the Egyptians over the Sudanese.
Muhammed Ali was not an Egyptian nor considered himself such and I would have not supported his actions to colonize the Sudan. His agenda was the same as the Europeans to exploit Sudan for its natural resources and not to help anybody in the Sudan.
My ancestors,being rural Egyptian fallahin,from Upper Egypt by the time of Muhammed Ali were coloninzed and ruled by many foreigners that had little concern for them. I cannot support Egyptian colonization of any part of Sudan. Imperilism is wrong no matter who does it. Especially invading a Muslim country invading another Muslim country.
If Egypt colonizes the Sudan the Sudanese will become the external underclasses and it will look like Egyptians are racially opressing the Sudanese. Do you wish to do this?
Do you honestly think you can integrate Southern Sudanese into Egyptian society?
Posts: 8675 | From: Tukuler al~Takruri as Ardo since OCT2014 | Registered: Feb 2003
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I like to Say that there is over a 1/2 million Sudanese whose ancestors came from Egypt during Mohamad Ali rule of the Sudan. I am one from them, of course couple of my grandmothers are Sudanese and a great grandmother, the rest are all from upper Egypt or Cairo in the last 6 generations of my family.
Until 1956 those controlled the commerce of the country and important government jobs, now they are not doing so well but much better than most Sudanese.
As a Sudanese from an Egyptian background I would like the Egyptians to make use of the current laws in the Sudan that encourage Egyptians to migrate into the Sudan.
I expect Sudan will move into democracy and for the Sudanized Egyptians in the Sudan, it is better for us to have more Egyptians in the coming game of politics and numbers of constituents behind you, to get what we want.
quote:Not true. If you're an Egyptian, then sure you're familiar with the work of El Raf3i. R u calling him a liar. Ali went into Sudan in 1811/1812 to hunt the renegade Mamaleek. He started conscripting the Sudanese for the army up until 1814/1815 when it was clear that there is no way they would become modern soldiers. This is when they were dispanded and replaced with Egyptian soldiers - falaheen. This is the army that went to Arabia in 1817, Greece 1820s and the Levant in 1830s.
The Anglo involvement came at a much later stage after the occupation of Egypt 1872
Yes, I am familiar with El Raf3i writtings and I respect him as one of the greatest Egyptian thinkers. You must also realize that he was a little biased towards the Egyptians over the Sudanese.
Muhammed Ali was not an Egyptian nor considered himself such and I would have not supported his actions to colonize the Sudan. His agenda was the same as the Europeans to exploit Sudan for its natural resources and not to help anybody in the Sudan.
My ancestors,being rural Egyptian fallahin,from Upper Egypt by the time of Muhammed Ali were coloninzed and ruled by many foreigners that had little concern for them. I cannot support Egyptian colonization of any part of Sudan. Imperilism is wrong no matter who does it. Especially invading a Muslim country invading another Muslim country.
If Egypt colonizes the Sudan the Sudanese will become the external underclasses and it will look like Egyptians are racially opressing the Sudanese. Do you wish to do this?
Do you honestly think you can integrate Southern Sudanese into Egyptian society?
Every country has minorities and solutions including self autonomy could be accomplished. What we're seeking here is common policies allowing for efficient utilization of resources across the board. Also better ability to face threats in Africa with regard to water. I don't really care about integration into Egyptian society. There are successful cases out there of multicultural societies. Peaceful integration is not an option due to the constant hostile policies of the Sudanese government.
Posts: 217 | Registered: Aug 2006
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Egyptians need to think beyond survival. They need to believe they can go back to playing leading roles on the regional and international stage.
Posts: 217 | Registered: Aug 2006
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quote:Originally posted by katangah: Sooner or later we would have to be back. I hope sooner though.
Are you really an Egyptian or some one who hates both Egypt and the Sudan and wish them to kill each other?
Posts: 1090 | From: Merowe-Nubia | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Originally posted by katangah: Sooner or later we would have to be back. I hope sooner though.
Are you really an Egyptian or some one who hates both Egypt and the Sudan and wish them to kill each other?
I'm an Egyptian. Please refer to the latest presidential address to the NDP. We have some serious security concerns in this area.
Posts: 217 | Registered: Aug 2006
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September 22, 2006, 16 hours, 30 minutes and 51 seconds ago.
By ANDnetwork .com
Johannesburg (AND) United Nations human rights monitors in the conflict-ridden Darfur region of Sudan, report that the government and Janjaweed militia are bombing civilian villages in north Darfur.
United Nations (UN) spokesperson, Jose Diaz, said that the Sudanese government in conjuction with the Janjaweed (term refering to black Arab gunmen from Chadian and Darfurian tribes) militia were continuing with their offensive against rebel factions that did not sign the 5 May 2006 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA).
"Civilians in north Darfur are forced to flee due to indiscriminate aerial bombardments by government aircraft. They are waging a campaign against [rebel] movements who have not signed the peace agreement. It's ongoing," said Diaz.
UN monitors to the country also reported that sexual violence and rape was increasing as a result of the distances women and children had to travel to find water and food.
Although the number of deaths reported since the outbreak of violence in Sudan in February 2003 remains unofficial, the UN estimates that about 200 000 people have perished as a result of war, famine and disease.
Although the CPA was signed by one of the factions of the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM), it was not signed by the rival faction of the SLM or the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM). The two remaining rebel factions are being pursued and engaged in north Darfur by government forces and the Janjaweed militia.
Jan Pronk, the UN envoy to the country, said recently that the May CPA was all but dead, and that the offensive against rebel factions had renewed .
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Those blacks in Sudan are infidels, they can be killed. Isn't that what we hear all the time. Its just the continuation of a 1300 year pattern.
Posts: 904 | From: Texana | Registered: Aug 2006
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Published: Friday, 29 September, 2006, 01:10 PM Doha Time
CAIRO: Egypt yesterday blamed the Darfur rebels for insecurity in the vast region of western Sudan and said any agreement on implementing a UN Security Council resolution should take into account Khartoum’s reservations.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said in a statement that the principal culprits were the rebel groups who refused to sign a peace agreement for Darfur in May.
"The parties which did not sign the agreement (are) those primarily responsible for the current deterioration of the security situation," the Foreign Ministry statement said.
The only signatories were the Sudanese government and one faction of the rebel Sudan Liberation Movement, which took up arms in 2003 to demand a greater share of power for Darfur. Other rebel groups said the deal was inadequate.
Egypt has been acting as an informal intermediary between the Sudanese government and the UN over a UN Security Council resolution which proposes sending 20,000 UN peacekeepers to restore law and order in the troubled region.
Khartoum has rejected the resolution as a violation of Sudanese sovereignty and an attempt to restore colonial rule. Analysts say the Sudanese government is also worried that some officials could be arrested on war crimes charges.
The African Union, which already has a peace force in Darfur, agreed last week to extend the mandate of its force until the end of the year, averting a possible security vacuum.
Aboul Gheit said: "The extension ... could help reach an understanding on the best way to implement the UN resolution with full respect for Sudanese sovereignty and taking into consideration the worries on the basis of which the government of Sudan rejected the resolution."
The statement indicated some Egyptian sympathy for the position of the Sudanese government. Khartoum says that UN and US demands on Darfur are a cover for imposing US plans on the Middle East and possibly overthrowing the government.
Arab diplomats said yesterday that Egypt and the Cairo-based Arab League are trying to persuade Sudan to accept the UN resolution and let in UN forces, avoiding the kind of confrontation which led to the US invasion of Iraq in 2003.
At the same, they want the UN to help the Sudanese government find a way to accept, they added.
"Egypt thinks the Sudanese government has a share of responsibility and they are advising them not to get into a confrontation of the kind with (former Iraqi President) Saddam Hussain," said one diplomat, who asked not to be named.
"They are encouraging the two sides to reach a settlement, through the UN finding a way for Sudan to accept the UN resolution," he added.
"They (Egypt and the Arab League) are trying to work within the resolution, rather than around it," said another diplomat.
One promising sign would be a Sudanese agreement to let in some 105 military personnel that the UN plans to send to Sudan to help the African Union force, he added. "That is an opening that could be expanded," he said. – Reuters
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Egypt tells US envoy to avoid escalation with Sudan
By Alaa ShahineFri Oct 13, 1:29 PM ET
Egypt said on Friday it had warned Andrew Natsios, the new U.S. special envoy to Sudan, against the dangers of seeking confrontation with Khartoum over the Darfur crisis as he began his first visit to the African country.
Instead, Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit told Natsios in a telephone conversation on Thursday that Washington should seek common ground with Sudan over a U.N. Security Council resolution that authorizes the deployment of 20,000 U.N. troops in war-torn Darfur, the foreign ministry said in a statement.
Sudan is under heightened U.S.-led pressure to accept the U.N. force, which Washington says is essential to stop the violence that has killed more than 200,00 people and forced millions to flee their homes since it flared in 2003.
And Natsios, who arrived in Khartoum on Friday, has said his goal would be trying to convince the government, and particularly President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, to accept the U.N. military presence.
Bashir rejects the U.N. resolution as an attempt to restore colonial rule, but has welcomed the world body's logistical and financial support to the ill-equipped 7,000-strong African Union force, which has failed to stop the violence.
"The minister (Aboul Gheit) warned in his conversation with the U.S. envoy against the dangers of the continuation of the policy of escalation and confrontation with Khartoum," the ministry's statement said.
"He noted the benefit of discussing alternatives and options that focuses on implementing the accepted and undisputed parts of the (U.N. Security Council) resolution 1706," it added without elaboration.
Egypt has said any agreement on implementing the U.N. resolution should take into account Khartoum's reservations. It has also blamed the increasing violence in Darfur on the rebel groups that refused to sign a peace agreement in May.
The only signatories were the government and one faction of the rebel Sudan Liberation Movement, which took up arms in 2003 to demand a greater share of power for Darfur, a vast region in northern Sudan. Other rebel groups said the deal was inadequate.
Natsios, who was appointed in his post last month by President George W. Bush, was expected to visit Darfur and Juba, the capital of southern Sudan.
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Eritrea: President Holds Talks With Foreign Ministers of Yemen, Egypt And Arab League Secretary General
October 14, 2006 Posted to the web October 16, 2006
Asmara
President Isaias Afwerki today received and held talks at the State Palace with the Yemeni Foreign Minister, Dr. Abubaker Al-Khurbi, the Egyptian Foreign Minister, Mr. Ahmed Abulkheit, and the Secretary General of the Arab League, Mr. Amr Mousa. All three officials were here to take part in the signing ceremony of the peace agreement between the Sudanese Government of National Unity and the East Sudan Front.
In the meeting, the Yemeni Foreign Ministered conveyed a verbal message to President Isaias from President Ali Abdalla Saleh. In his message, President Ali Abdalla Saleh lauded the supreme role of President Isaias in the process of the peace dialogue between the Sudanese Government of National Unity and the East Sudan Front leading to the peace agreement. The two sides also conducted in-depth discussions on Eritrean-Yemeni relations and future prospects.
Likewise, in the meeting between President Isaias and the Egyptian Foreign Minister, Mr. Ahmed Abulkheit delivered a message of congratulations and appreciation on behalf of the people and Government of his country in which President Housni Mubarek commended the efforts exerted by the people and Government of Eritrea to enable the Sudanese people and government to achieve this successful outcome.
Foreign Minister Ahmed Abulkheit asserted: "This Agreement constitutes a historic event that would have a great impact in ensuring peace and stability not only in East Sudan but also in Darfur and in the region as a whole."
Also in the meeting with the President, the Arab League Secretary General, Mr. Amr Mousa, stated that Eritrea has played a decisive role in the Sudanese peace agreement. Moreover, he pointed out that this Agreement besides being exemplary provides a major lesson towards resolving the existing other misunderstandings in the region, in addition to having a lasting impact.
KHARTOUM, Sudan (AP) -- The Sudanese government on Sunday gave the chief U.N. envoy three days to leave the country, Sudan's official news agency reported.
The news agency report gave no reason for the order against the envoy, Jan Pronk of the Netherlands.
But Pronk drew sharp criticism from the Sudanese military this month after writing in a personal Web blog that government forces had suffered serious losses recently at the hands of rebels in Darfur.
"Losses seem to have been very high," Pronk wrote in his blog Oct. 14. "Reports speak about hundreds of casualties in each of the two battles, many wounded soldiers and many taken as prisoner."
He said morale in the army had sunk in northern Darfur and "some generals have been sacked; soldiers have refused fighting."
The military said Thursday that the remarks by Pronk amounted to "psychological war against the Sudanese army." State television quoted the army the following day as saying Pronk, the head the U.N. mission in Sudan, was "persona non-grata."
Sudan's government has been at odds with Pronk over Western efforts to get Sudan to allow a U.N. force of 20,000 troops to take over peacekeeping in Darfur -- a move President Omar al-Bashir has flatly rejected as neo-colonialism.
An under-powered African Union force of 7,000 is struggling to keep order in the arid region.
European Union leaders called on Sudan on Friday to accept the UN Security Council resolution that would send peacekeepers to Darfur.
The violence has risen dramatically in recent weeks in Darfur, where more than 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million displaced in three years of fighting.
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This is one of the most ridiculous ideas I've ever read. Here you have million of Sudanese refugees trying to leave their land, and you're suggesting that millions more Egyptions should go invade a land that is plagued by drought, starvation, and political unrest.
No one needs to be invading or occupying anyone else's land, I'm against it from the West, Israel and anyone else.
Egypt should just stay on it's current course of discovering ways to green the desert and expand into the unoccupied areas as they are doing with all the new satellite cities.
Find ways to improve your own land and stay the hell away from others, especially an economy more weaker and impoverished than your own.
You can barely get Egyptians to move out into the desert, you honestly think they would migrate to Sudan, you're living in a fantasy. They would assume crowd up Cairo until there is no place to even move, soon the population will explode.
The government has to make a conscious effor to build industry into the desert, currently with private investors, the new cities have become an escape for the wealthy elite. As investors want to see a return on their investment and could care less about building affordable land for the poor which is the fastest growing sector of the population.
Posts: 37 | From: egypt | Registered: Jul 2006
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As far as the answer to arable land is concerned, Egypt is not like it was thousands of years ago, the population is 100 fold. Eventually they will have to start importing most of their food like the gulf countries if they keep building on the agricultural land.
The government does a poor job at protecting the countries natural resource, how the hell can they consider expanding "their empire". With one of the highest rates of pollution in all of Africa and the Middle East, they need to learn ways to improve things they have control over like not littering!
Not far from my compound is a small mountain with level after of level of nothing but garbage. I have driven down country roadways and couldn't believe my eyes at the amount of garbage throughout the farm areas. This is insane. These poor habits have to change from within before they even think about expanding out.
I could see Sudan now becoming a virtual waste land with an invasion from Egyptians.
Posts: 37 | From: egypt | Registered: Jul 2006
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I agree Deseperate Housewife.....I like your name(lol)......Yes, this is ridiculous. But I like hearing the rhetoric of guys like Katangah cause it lets me know how some of these politicans are thinking. Why not let Sudan take over Egypt Katangah? Then, Egyptians could have access to Sudanese land, but Sudanese will run everything, from Cairo, to Aswan, to Juba..........lol. Salaam
Posts: 826 | From: U.S.A. | Registered: Jun 2006
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Egypt does not have the economic and military power to rebuild an empire of any kind. They have much more pressing problems. One is to make sure they do not get sucked into an Iranian empire, which is more likely.
Posts: 904 | From: Texana | Registered: Aug 2006
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quote:Originally posted by *The Dark Angel* aka CAT: Well Egypt has to stop sexual molestors first then start to think of other projects
That's a really old thread
kantagah, enta magnoon
I'm not magnoon. I'm just special
Besides, all those kids molesting women on the streets will be sent far far away to a distant land never to be heard from again. Now vote yes Posts: 743 | Registered: Oct 2006
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New Vision (Kampala) ANALYSIS January 5, 2007 Posted to the web January 7, 2007
By Livingstone Okello-Okello Kampala
WORRYING: The water level at Kiira Dam in Jinja district before the recent rains set in. The low water levels have affected power generation
THE greatest challenge Uganda is facing is the power crisis. The drop in hydro-power from 380 megawatts (mw) to 135mw, as of May, 2006, is unacceptable. This has continued without any permanent solution.
Reports, including the recent one by the Parliamentary Committee on National Economy, have attributed the fall in the economic growth to the power crisis. This is something that could have been addressed in time. The problem has grown over many years.
Laying blame on the "opposition" in the sixth or seventh parliaments is diversionary. First of all, there was no opposition in those parliaments. Secondly, even if there was, it could not have prevented the Government from giving power to Ugandans.
Members of political parties in the opposition belong here. They, their supporters, relatives, friends and well-wishers suffer the negative effects of the power cuts like any other Ugandan.
On the contrary, the Sixth Parliament, especially its committee on natural resources, on which I served, struggled in vain with the President and his Minister of Energy then, Syda Bbumba, to get the building of power stations at Bujagali and Karuma. President Yoweri Museveni and Bbumba vowed that Karuma would never come on board until Bujagali was commissioned.
The intended investor, M/s Norpak, had its funds for the project. There was no reason why the government would insist on building Bujagali before Karuma. The Karuma project should be embarked on immediately, if Uganda is to be rescued from the power crisis. Thermal projects are not sustainable due to the resultant high electricity costs. Bujagali still has problems, environmental and otherwise.
There are several other small, mini and micro-hydro sites scattered all over the country, some already studied and surveyed. At a glance, it can be seen that Uganda has the greatest comparative advantage to supply East Africa, the Great Lakes and Nile Basin countries with cheap hydro-power.
Unfortunately, in spite of this, it cannot satisfy the power needs. This is due to an apparently chaotic energy policy of the Government or even lack of it. As a result, Uganda is fast-losing the opportunity to be the chief hydro-power supplier.
Power cuts in Uganda, glorified as load shedding, are now taken for granted. As a matter of fact, sometimes a home looks strange when power comes on after a protracted darkness.
The relief from power cuts in some areas, as a result of thermal generation, is not sustainable. Thermal electricity cannot be the way forward in a country, where people wallow in abject poverty and cannot afford it, even if it was in abundance.
The effects of power cuts on all sectors have been devastating. Industries have had to operate on alternate days, resulting in much lower production levels and greater overhead costs.
Many have now imported and installed generators, but with much higher production costs, which are passed on to the consumers. The cottage industries, who cannot afford to buy generators, operate less than half of the time in a month.
Naturally, many have been forced to scale down or close their businesses. The long-term effect of environmental pollution by generators and the noise is yet to come. Certainly, our ears will not remain normal. Even important institutions like hospitals have not been spared by power cuts.
Some patients could meet their worst in hospital theatres during surgical operations. Parliament is sometimes adjourned pre-maturely, when its generator is about to go off. But the question is: How and why did these terrible power cuts come about?
Power cuts have come a long way. In 1986, one of the most illustrious sons of Africa, the late Captain Thomas Sankara, also the then president of Burkina Faso, paid a state visit to the Source of the Nile in Jinja. his host Museveni, who had accompanied him was not amused to see a monument with its inscription that John Hannington Speke had discovered the Source of the Nile in 1862. He ordered the monument to be removed and replaced with one, which states that the spot is where the Nile begins.
This monument was not mere history, but also a great tourist attraction, which brought millions of dollars to Uganda. Tourists took photographs at the Source of the Nile as a valuable memory to take back home. It is believed the number of visitors has significantly dropped since its removal.
My information is that it was after the removal of the monument that the management of the then Uganda Electricity Board was summoned to State House, Entebbe, to give information on Owen, after whom our only power station, Owen Falls Power Station, was named. Uganda Electricity Board reportedly had not been told the reason why they were being called to Entebbe and, therefore, did not go with the information. They were, according to my source, given two weeks to comply.
When they returned with the information, they were directed that the name Owen Falls Dam must be changed. The question then arose, "Changed to what?" The dam was (still is) between Buganda and Busoga. Re-naming it in favour of one side would offend the other and could lead to loss of support for the Movement. It was suggested that an extension of the dam be built so that one could be named in favour of Buganda and the other in favour of Busoga.
Now we have the Nalubaale Power Station and the Kiira Power Station for Buganda and Busoga, respectively. Owen Falls Power Station had to go.
It took the Government 13 years (1993-2006) to build just one dam extension, the Kiira Power Station. The planned project life was three years. How could the Government spend 13 years on the construction of a dam with the recommended installed capacity of 60mw, against the estimated annual power demand growth of 80mw?
There was a lot of excitement at the launch of Kiira Power Station on May 19, 2000. But Kiira Power Station could turn out to be the worst economic crime committed against the people of Uganda, East Africa, the Nile Basin and The Great Lakes, generally. Lake Victoria, the second greatest fresh water lake in the world, is being drained in our full view.
The estimated fall in the water level of Lake Victoria is now more than two metres. To blame this on the recent long drought in the region is to miss the point.
The main culprit is the Kiira Power Station. If you have a tank full of water with two taps at the bottom and you open them simultaneously, the water level in the tank will fall faster than if you had opened one tap. This is what has been happening to Lake Victoria when Kiira Power Station started operating. The drainage has doubled.
Also, the falling water level in Lake Victoria is due to the removal of the suds in Lake Kyoga. This removed the natural control. Kyoga essentially acts as a safety valve to regulate the flow of the River Nile. The Government must take blame.
Following the commissioning of Owen Falls Power Station in 1954, the Government of Egypt set up offices in Uganda, one in Kampala and the other in Jinja, to closely monitor the water level in Lake Victoria. Since the removal of suds in Lake Kyoga and the completion of Kiira Power Station, these offices have been closed. The water going to Egypt is too much.
However, Egyptians should not get too excited yet because the lake may dry up as a result of uncontrolled flow. So, the solution lies in blocking Kiira Power Station. The Government should invite Nile Basin countries and our development partners to come to our rescue so that together we fill up the artificial channel of Kiira Power Station. The option of leaving things as they are will prove too costly.
The writer is the MP for Chua Constituency, Kitgum distrct
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