The last week has seen two important developments regarding ICC prosecutions of alleged war crimes committed in Darfur. Tajeldin Abdalla Adam is a journalist with Radio Dabanga, a Netherlands based station that broadcasts to Darfur. He told the IJT what these rulings will mean for Darfuris.

By Hermione Gee

How have the people of Sudan reacted to the recent ICC ruling regarding President Bashir?

In the beginning there was some confusion about the decision itself. Because a lot of people were actually expecting that President Bashir was going to face genocide charges and that the appeals chamber put a direct decision on that. But later on they discovered is was not like that. But overall they know – especially the victims in the camps – that the government has committed genocide against them and because of that, they hope and expect the court will take this into consideration and genocide would be added to the arrest warrant.

What would Darfuris like to see happen in this case?

They want to see, first of all, justice. These people feel very bitter.They feel like they’ve been let down by their government, by the African Union and by the outside world. So they need to see some sort of justice if they want to reclaim their life. That cannot happen if President Bashir stays in power and controls everything. So they want to see some sort of pressure on the government to the extent that they can move back to their villages, at the same time they want to see those who are responsible be tried.

Do they see the ICC as having any role in this?

They strongly believe in the ICC and that puts the court in a very challenging position because they see it as their last hope. Especially when Luis Moreno Ocampo speaks about Darfur atrocities, they say “well, this man can speak even better than we do.” They are saying if we can’t get peace, then justice. If we get justice we can talk about peaceful settlement and reconciliation, etc. So this is a very uncompromising issue for them.

Is it important to Darfuris that President Bashir is charged with genocide?

Yes. We have done an audio survey on this and it seems they care a lot about the issue of genocide because they say “the government deliberately targeted us in this war, because of our ethnicity, our tribe.” They say if the court needs evidence “we are going to provide it. We are the survivors.”

Survivors in eastern Chad say they have evidence to provide on genocide. For them it’s important, they speak a lot about genocide, the government’s intent to wipe them out, to get rid of them as a population.They want the acknowledgement of what happened to them.

They were also surprised that genocide was not included in the first arrest warrant. “Why is the court dragging its feet? Why are they delaying and talking about it, because we know this is a genocide - what else can you call this?”

The ICC just dropped all charges against Abu Garda. What’s been the reaction in Darfur?

Abu Garda and his supporters are understandably delighted. He maintained that he is innocent and he has nothing to do with the charges against him.

While the government said it was just a showcase, Darfuris who are not necessarily the supporters of Abu Garda, said that this is a very courageous move [by the ICC].

Everybody now sees how the court works independently. The prosecutor accused somebody and brought him to the court but the pre-trial judges rejected his allegation in this particular case. It gives a lot of credit to the court. And this gives [Abu Garda] a lot of credit because he went there voluntarily.

I think this case in particular raises some questions about, if we agree with the pre-trial judges that this evidence is not sufficient, then we have to ask ourselves how the prosecutor gathers evidence, what are the criteria? If Abu Garda is really an innocent man, then why he has been brought by the court in the first place?

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