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Civil society organizations oppose al-Bashir’s invitation to Juba, accuse him of brutal campaigns

March 30, 2012Press ReleasesNo Commentssouthsudannews
OPEN LETTER FROM SOUTH SUDANESE CIVIL SOCIETY ORGANIZATIONS TO PRESIDENT SALVA KIIR MAYARDIT
 
Regarding the government of South Sudan’s invitation to President Omar al-Bashir to attend the April 2012 presidential summit in Juba
29 March 2012

Dear President Salva Kiir Mayardit,

March 29, 2012 (SSNA) — We, the undersigned South Sudanese civil society organizations, with the support of human rights organizations across the African continent, are writing to express our deep concern about the invitation that the government of South Sudan has extended to President Omar al-Bashir to attend the April 2012 presidential summit in Juba. With open fighting now reported along the border between Sudan and South Sudan, it appears increasingly unlikely that Bashir will accept the invitation. Nonetheless, we urge the government of South Sudan to adopt a policy of holding any meetings with Bashir and other Sudanese officials wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) outside of South Sudan.

No nation knows President Bashir’s cruelty more than South Sudan. Since Bashir came to power in a military coup in 1989, countless numbers of our people have been killed and displaced by the actions of his regime. Over the course of the war, Khartoum extended its criminal warfare methods to other marginalized regions in Sudan. In Darfur, Bashir’s regime instituted a particularly brutal campaign of mass killings and ethnic cleansing that left more than 300,000people dead and several million displaced.

In response to these grave violations of international human rights and humanitarian law, the United Nations Security Council issued Resolution 1593 (2005), referring the situation in Darfur to the ICC. The Resolution called on all United Nations member states—whether or not they were party to the Rome Statute—to cooperate fully with the Court and its prosecutor. Four years later, the ICC issued two warrants for Bashir’s arrest on charges of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. Overnight, Bashir’s ability to travel became severely restricted. In accordance with Resolution 1593, responsible nations across the globe have refused to receive him. With each refusal, the survivors of Bashir’s atrocities come closer to seeing justice done in their lifetime and to knowing that Bashir will never again subject others to a similar pain and torment.

As a nation that has suffered so much at the hands of Omar al-Bashir, South Sudan has a moral obligation to the survivors of his atrocities take a principled stance on the warrants for his arrest. The millions of South Sudanese who have lost loved ones to Bashir’s criminal acts have the same interest in seeing him held accountable as the women and children that continue to be raped in killed in Darfur and the hundreds of thousands of people that are now at risk of conflict-induced famine in Southern Kordofan and Southern Blue Nile.

We congratulate you and your negotiating team for maintaining open channels of communication with representatives of the government of Sudan and for making progress on the ‘four freedoms’ agreement. The presidential summit and its implications for peace between Sudan and South Sudan should not be understated.

But to host the international fugitive, Omar al-Bashir, in Juba, to turn a blind eye to the warrants for his arrest, to grant him leave to set foot on South Sudanese soil for the first time since independence, does a disservice to the survivors of his atrocities. For little more than a public relations exercise, South Sudan could join the short list of countries that have tacitly condoned Bashir’s crimes by failing to respect the ICC’s warrants for his arrest.

Your Excellency, we strongly urge you to adopt a policy of holding any meetings with Omar al- Bashir and other Sudanese officials wanted by the ICC outside of South Sudan. We also call on the government of South Sudan to demonstrate that it is committed to rule of law and accountability by moving quickly to ratify the Rome Statute and international human rights treaties.

Yours sincerely,

Signatories:

Agency for Independent Media (AIM)
Assistance Mission for Africa (AMA)
Care for Children and Old Age in South Sudan (CCOSS)
Community Empowerment for Progress Organization (CEPO)
Generation Agency for Development Transformation-Pentagon (GADET-Pentagon)
Kush, Inc.
Legal Research and Human Rights Initiative (LERHI)
Nuer Peace Council (NPC)
South Sudan Human Rights Society for Advocacy (SSHURSA)
South Sudan Law Society (SSLS)
Unist Development Organization
Voices for Change

With support from:

Action of Christian Activists for Human Rights in Shabunda (ACADHOSHA), Democratic Republic of the Congo
Africa Legal Aid (AFLA)
African Assembly for the Defense of Human Rights (RADDHO), Senegal
African Center for Justice and Peace Studies (ACJPS)
Association of Human and Prisoner Rights (ADHUC), Republic of Congo
Benin Coalition for the International Criminal Court, Benin
Cameroon Coalition for the International Criminal Court, Cameroon
Central African Republic Coalition for the International Criminal Court, Central African Republic
Centre for Accountability and Rule of Law, Sierra Leone
Children Education Society-Tanzania (CHESO), Tanzania
Citizens for Justice and Accountability (COJA)
Civil Resource Development and Documentation Centre (CIRDDOC), Nigeria
Darfur Relief and Documentation Center (DRDC)
Human Rights Watch, with offices in South Africa, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda
The Kenyan Section of the International Commission of Jurists, Kenya
League for Peace, Human Rights and Justice (LIPADHOJ), Democratic Republic of Congo
Nigerian Coalition on the ICC (NCICC), Nigeria
Synergy of Congolese NGOs for Victims (SYCOVI), Democratic Republic of Congo
West African Bar Association
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