Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Already and this is the Daily This is.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
The dalyi os oh, now it makes sense. Good morning
and welcome to the Daily ODS. It's one day, the
first of December. I'm Lucy Tassel.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
I'm Zara Seidler.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
It's been more than two and a half years since
war broke out in Sadan between rival militias. Since then,
twelve million people have fled their homes, thousands have been killed,
and international authorities have made accusations of war crimes and genocide.
Last week, one side said it had implemented a humanitarian truce,
while the other rejected a US and United Arab Emirates
(00:44):
led to ceasefire proposal. In today's episode, we explained the
progress of ceasefy negotiations and why one side of this
war is against the proposal.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Lucy, there is a lot to explain about this conflict,
and you've just mentioned at the top there that we're
talking about a possible cease fire. To understand that latest development, though,
we do need to understand the context of this conflict
that has been going on for years now. Can you
start at the beginning For our listeners, where did this begin?
Speaker 2 (01:19):
For those who haven't been following or maybe just need
a refresher. Sudan has been engulfed in violent conflict since
April twenty twenty three. That's when a fragile partnership between
the leaders of two different militias fell apart. There are
two main initialisms you need to know here. There's the
SAF and the RSF.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
What did those stand for?
Speaker 2 (01:42):
The RSF stands for Rapid Support Forces. That's a paramilitary
group formed from previous paramilitaries active in a western region
of Sudan called Dafur. The RSF was established by the
former leader of Sudan, Omar al Bashir, and he is
actually wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes
(02:04):
and genocide in Darfur in the two thousands. The other
one we need to know is the SAF. That's the
Sudanese Armed Forces and that is the official army of Sudan.
In twenty nineteen, the SAF and the RSF teamed up
to overthrow Albasha. Democratic elections were supposed to follow, but
(02:25):
they didn't because the SAF and the RSF overthrew the
existing government and took power completely in twenty twenty one,
so they were back to back coups. In April twenty
twenty three, that partnership fell apart, as I've said, resulting
in the ongoing violent conflict between these two groups as
we speak. As of right now, the RSF controls the southwest.
(02:48):
Remember I said they had come from those militias in
the west, and the SAF controls the southeast. That's also
where Sudan's capital, Khartoum is.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
Okay, So we've got these two groups who control different
areas of the country. They've been at war for over
two years now. What's been the human costs? We're talking
about a war and a very large country that's been
at war for so long. What do we understand about
what this has been like for the Sudanese people.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
The term used is humanitarian crisis. It almost kind of
doesn't feel big enough to encompass what's been happening. The
UN has not provided a death toll, though estimates put
the toll as high as one hundred and fifty thousand,
but it's quite difficult to know.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
Can I just jump in here, Lucy, because off Mike,
I was asking you about why it is that the
UN can't give us a death toll, because we've seen
in other conflicts that the UN has been able to.
Can you just run our listeners through what you explain
to me here?
Speaker 2 (03:46):
My analysis suggests that there isn't the same level of
infrastructure in Sudan that would allow the UN or other
bodies to understand the scale. Reports that I've read are
looking at things like aerial satellite footage to determine it's
quite grim, but like to determine bodies on the ground
to determine how many people have been killed by say
(04:09):
the RSF in the city of El Fashia. So there's
not the same level of infrastructure that we might see
in other wars where we would know, like there's a
group on the ground that is in contact with all
the hospitals and it's keeping tabs on the death toll.
As far as I can tell, that is not happening
in Sudan, and things are at a very extreme point.
(04:31):
Things were not necessarily great before this started and have deteriorated.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Yeah, okay, so what do we understand about the death toll?
What it's estimated to be then?
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yeah, So one estimate I read was one hundred and
fifty thousand, but it's really quite difficult to know. There
were some estimates from the end of last year around
sixty thousand, but again it's really yeah unknown currently numbers
we do know twenty one point two million people. That's
the number experiencing a cute food insecurity and famine has
(05:03):
also been declared in two cities. In July twenty twenty five,
the Migration Policy Institute found the violence had forced at
least twelve million people from their homes. Some of the
people who fled the country had originally come to Sudan
as refugees themselves and have since had to find a
third place to go or even gone back to their homes.
(05:26):
That's again according to the Migration Policy Institute.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
So while there is a lot that we don't know,
what has become clear is that there is a humanitarian
crisis unfolding in Sudan. One of the things that I've
read reported quite a bit is accusations of genocide and
also of ethnic cleansing. What can you tell me about Firstly,
who's leveling those accusations and secondly, I guess what are they?
Speaker 2 (05:51):
These accusations are coming both from groups within Sudan and
they're also coming from international observers, and mainly these accusations
have been leveled at the rsf Okay, So to just
explain for the audience, genocide and ethnic cleansing are similar crimes,
but they have different definitions. Genocide under international law is
(06:12):
defined as killing members of a national, ethnic, racial, or
religious group or making their survival impossible, and then UN
experts have said ethnic cleansing is removing members of an
ethnic or religious group from an area by quote violent
or terror inspiring means. In terms of ramifications for these allegations,
(06:36):
International Criminal courte Deputy Prosecutor Nazat Shamin Khan said her
team earlier this year, she said, is actively gathering evidence
of war crimes in Sudan. In comments to the UN
Security Council in July, she said the humanitarian situation in
Sudan had reached quote an intolerable state. She added, quote hospitals,
(06:57):
humanitarian convoys and other billion objects are apparently being targeted.
Famine is escalating and humanitarian aid is not reaching those
in dire need of it. Rape and sexual violence are
being weaponized.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
Lucy, you said there that she is gathering evidence, Does
that mean then that they will seek they being the ICC,
will seek to take people to trial because we know
the ICC is about people whereas the ICJ is about states.
So are we looking at people then being taken to trial?
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Yes, eventually, though I will note that, as I said earlier,
the ICC still can't hold a trial for previous dictator
Omar Albasher over crimes dating back to two thousand and
two because they don't try people in absentia. That is,
they don't try people who aren't physically present and international
trials as we've explained before, and this podcast can take
(07:50):
a really any time yep to come to fruition.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
So we run through what the latest is on the
ground in Sudan. The context behind this current conflict is
you did start by mentioning a ceasefire though, so can
we just go back to that now? What is the
state of play with a ceasefire?
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Back in September, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the US, and the
United Arab Emirates all proposed a ceasefire plan for Sudan.
We don't have exact details, but the group did release
a statement outlining some of their ideas, including starting with
a three month truce to allow quote the swift entry
(08:29):
of humanitarian aid that would then be followed by a
permanent ceasefire The statement said, Sudan's future government is quote
for the Sudanese people to decide, not controlled by any
warring party, So that would be the SAF and the RSF.
That's one point that has been contentious for the SAF
who said this plan would quote eliminate them and keep
(08:51):
the RSF quote in its positions. In terms of Sudan's government,
currently it's being run by the SAF, as I said before,
they are technically the official army, while the RSF is
in the process of setting up a rival government.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Right, So, I mean, how would that work to have
an existing government a rival government. There has been this
power struggle that has been so violent for so many years.
How would that even work.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
There's a couple of examples we can point to in
the world. I mean, hypothetically, we could have an East
Germany West Germany situation where there's two the country splits
in two, and S'dan has already split into Sudan and
South Sudan. But there's also a different example, literally right
next door to Sudan on its northwestern border, and that's Libya.
So since twenty fourteen, there have been two governments in Libya,
(09:42):
two parallel governments, one in the east and one in
the west. That also is a situation that arose out
of a war, a civil war. Only the government in
the West, based in the city of Tripoli, is recognized
by international governments, so places like Australia, I means other
countries only do business and only engage in diplomatic talks
(10:04):
with the Tripoli government, which is backed by the UN.
And you've asked how it would work, not particularly well.
I would say there have been many attempts at reconciling
the two sides, none of them have yet been successful,
and the fact that other countries don't recognize the Eastern
government limits what it's able to do. That could happen
(10:26):
in Sudan assuming neither side can agree on the ceasefire proposal,
which has some other points of contention too, And I
would say the main one relates to the United Arab
Emirates or the UAE.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
I'm glad you brought that up because I have been
wanting to ask you because it does feel like I mean,
certainly when we've uploaded posts in the past, there have
been a lot of comments about the UAE and the
role of the UAE. Why is the UAE so controversial
when it comes to this conflict in particular.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Yeah, and people are right to point this out. The
UAE has been accused by many places, particularly the SAF
of supplying weapons to the RSF. It has denied these allegations,
but I will say international observers have documented the movement
of weapons on planes from the UAE to an airport
(11:16):
in the country of Chad which is near the border
with Sudan, to the RSF to their training camps. And
that includes weapons from Europe that have somehow come through
the UAE.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
And just to jump in here, So it's the RSF
who have had genocide allegations leveled at them, and there
have been international observers who have documented the movement of
weapons to that group. Yeah, yeah, Okay.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
Back in March, Sudan sued the UAE in the International
Court of Justice, the ICJ. So, as you said, different
to the icc alleging it provided quote unlimited support to
the RSF, enabling the group to perpetrate quote genocide, forcible
displacement and murder.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
What happened in that ICJ case, So.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
The ICJ actually throughout Sudan's case, saying that while it
was quote deeply concerned by the conflict, it didn't actually
have the power to hear the case, which was a
very interesting nuance of international law here. So the UAE
and Sudan are both signatories. They're both agreed to be
bound by the United Nations Genocide Convention. This is a
(12:23):
legal text that obliges countries to prevent genocide and to
punish those who carry it out, including within their own countries.
One section of this legal document states that countries can
take disputes quote, including those relating to the responsibility of
a country for genocide, to the ICJ, basically saying we
(12:44):
accuse you of committing genocide. We're taking this to the
World Court.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
And we've seen that in previous cases. South Africa took
Israel to the ICJ over this exact claim.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Yea, and that case is ongoing. But this case couldn't
go ahead because the UAE is not party to that
specific section of this legal document.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
They've got a carve out.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
They yeah, they got a carve out of just this
specific section, which meant the ICJ basically had to say,
while we agree that there's something very concerning going on here,
we literally don't have jurisdiction, which for me, raises the question.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Who does yeah, fascinating.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
So the Sudanese government, however, which as I said, is
controlled by the saf is still making these allegations. The
International Observer's observations still stand, and that means that it
is not accepting the saf UA led ceasefire, because I said,
that's one of the countries involved in this ceasefire proposal. Meanwhile,
(13:41):
last week the RSF that's the other group, said it
would activate a three month humanitarian truce, but US negotiators
said it hadn't actually formally accepted the deal, and there
have been reports of ongoing violence regardless of this kind
of stated truce. So for now seems like things are
at an impasse as they have been already.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
Okay, so no one has formally accepted that truce deal
that's been put on the table. As you've just said,
there is ongoing violence, and so whether or not that
is accepted, given that there are such huge reservations about
both the involvement of the UAE and also some of
the details in the plan, certainly one to keep an
eye on to see if it does get through. Definitely, Lucy,
(14:26):
thank you so much for explaining this today. Thanks Sarah,
and thank you for joining us for another episode of
The Daily Os. We'll be back as normal this afternoon
with the headlines, but until then, have a great day.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
My name is Lily Madden and I'm a proud Arunda
Bungelung Caalcuttin woman from Gadighl Country. The Daily Os acknowledges
that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the
Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Island and nations. We pay our respects to the
first peoples of these countries, both past and present.