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From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Mon Sep 20 2010 - 17:36:20 EDT
US, China brace for Sudan trainwreck
By Peter Lee
Sep 21, 2010
The success of Sudan's Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) is one of the few
areas in which the United States and China enjoy a genuine convergence of
interests.
However, even the joint efforts of the world's only hyperpower and Asia's
emergent superpower may not be enough to avoid calamity in the Horn of
Africa.
The United States is committed to the success of the 2005 CPA, the
culmination of a protracted multi-lateral process that, under the aegis of
the George W Bush administration, brought a cessation of hostilities to a
two-decade conflict between north and south Sudan that had claimed
approximately two million lives.
Sudan is a pillar of China's energy security strategy, and Beijing is
anxious for a smooth implementation of the CPA, respect for China's
extensive oil concessions, and uninterrupted production and export of
Sudanese crude.
Neither country may get what it wants.
Darfur is the fly in the ointment. Oil is the aggravating factor. But US
inattention, internal divisions, and an overall inability to manage its
Sudan portfolio effectively may be the precipitating factor in renewed civil
war.
To geostrategists, the conflict between north and south Sudan has been the
main event. Darfur, where the Sudanese
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad01.html> government is waging a
war against the non-Arab indigenous population, is simply a sideshow.
Southern Sudan has oil - perhaps 85% of
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad01.html> Sudan's estimated
reserves of 5 billion barrels - a sizable agrarian population, a deep sense
of alienation as a Christian/animist society long oppressed by the
Muslim/Arab regime in Khartoum, and a natural affinity for political and
economic alliance with the East African nations of Kenya and Uganda.
Darfur, on the other hand, is oil-free, pastoral, relatively
under-populated, and utterly impoverished.
The north-south Sudan war became a focus of a prolonged peace process
spearheaded by Kenya that gained momentum only after the September 11, 2001,
attacks on the US and the active involvement of the Bush administration.
The Sudan government, led by President Omar Bashir, could easily imagine
that its radical Islamicist, terror-exporting, Osama bin-Laden harboring
history could make it a target for US regime change channeled through the
insurgency in the south and decided, like Libya, to come in from the cold.
Reconciliation and rapprochement were also on the mind of the Bush
administration. A successful outcome for southern Sudan - because of its
Christian character, the personal charisma of the rebel leader John Garang
(a fluent English-speaker who had studied at the Infantry Officer Advanced
Course at Fort Benning and at Iowa State University), and its potential as
an oil-rich, pro-American ally - was a focus of American evangelists,
petroleum companies, and geopolitical strategists dear to the president's
political base.
Bush was also eager to demonstrate that he was not at war with Islam and
that, indeed, he could bring US power to bear in a distinctly effective,
moral way in Africa that would contrast with what president
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad01.html> Bill Clinton acknowledged
to be the greatest foreign policy failure of his administration: America's
dilatory response to the Rwandan genocide.
According to Debkafile, in 2004 Bashir may have been willing to undertake an
effort in moral burden-sharing that was unprecedented in international
politics and would have been gratefully welcomed by a US Republican Party
that, in modern times, has found it virtually impossible to put behind it
the white racist roots of its political power:
Bush also has a special occasion in mind with an eye on the African-American
vote where his support is relatively weak. He will step forward as the first
US president to plunge deep and head-on into problems endemic to the African
continent ... On the agenda too is a highly evocative ritual at the White
House at which Sudan's president will solemnly forswear his country's dark
past as recruiter of slaves for America and the Arab caravans carrying
African slaves around the world. [1]
In 2005, the CPA was concluded. It allowed for a cessation of hostilities,
established an autonomous south Sudan regime, set a 50/50 split of oil
revenues, required various reforms in the areas of democratic processes and
religious toleration from the Khartoum government, and stipulated a
referendum in January 2011 that would allow the south to vote for secession.
Given the endemic distrust between the Bashir and Garang forces and the
absence of any unambiguous upside for the Khartoum regime, the CPA could
never have been concluded without American encouragement, including public
indications that Sudan would be taken off the list of state sponsors of
terrorism, sanctions would be lifted, and relations with the US normalized.
Perhaps private assurances that the US would promote unity and economic and
political integration between north and south - instead of encouraging the
forces advancing southern secession - were offered as well.
In the event, CPA execution has been a fiasco. A southern vote for secession
is a foregone conclusion, as is the north's determination to make the cost
of independence unsustainable. The six-year term of the CPA has served
primarily as a ceasefire opportunity for each side to stockpile money,
munitions and diplomatic support against an eventual resumption of
hostilities.
The main reason why the faint promise of Sudanese unity never came close to
being realized has a lot to do with Darfur, and the inability of the Bush
and Obama administrations to reconcile the needs of the north-south peace
process with the agonized international response to the bloodshed in Darfur.
The Darfur rebellion was already percolating during the negotiation of the
CPA. Despite the ongoing carnage inflicted by the Bashir regime, Darfur was
universally viewed as a dangerous distraction and source of confusion and
dispute that would hamper the smooth progress of north-south negotiations.
Darfuri interests were excluded from the peace process. Perhaps more than
malign neglect was at work.
An exhaustive dissection of the CPA process remarked:
GoS [Government of Sudan] sources interviewed during the course of this
research report that the US encouraged military action by the government in
Darfur that would end the rebellion because it threatened the IGAD peace
process. The Americans have labelled this allegation "utter fabrication".
[2]
In any event, the international outcry over the Bashir regime's outrages in
Darfur made rapprochement between Khartoum and Washington impossible. Sudan
stayed on the terror list and subject to US sanctions. Successive American
administrations have been unable even to achieve internal agreement on how
to reconcile US assurances to Bashir over the north-south CPA with revulsion
over his excesses in Darfur, let alone impose a coherent policy on the
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad01.html> US Congress and the vocal
non-governmental and human-rights advocates deeply interested in Sudanese
affairs.
In the Bush administration, Colin Powell as secretary of state championed
the forces wishing to label Khartoum's actions in Darfur as genocide,
thereby irrevocably consigning Sudan to pariah status. In the
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad01.html> Obama administration,
United Nations ambassador Susan Rice and - to a somewhat lesser extent - and
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have been associated with the anti-Bashir
hard line.
Although Sudan was incensed at the US "moving the goalposts" by making
Darfur the litmus test for acceptable behavior, Bashir, for his part, has
executed the north-south CPA in form if not substance or spirit and has
determinedly kept his promise to the Bush administration to engage in
intelligence-sharing on the subject of Islamic militants in Africa.
Nevertheless, the CPA and the de facto US recission of its commitments to
Khartoum have turned out to be an unmitigated disaster for Bashir.
In 2001, a senior southern official speculated that the southern rebels
would have been defeated within three to four years thanks to Khartoum's
ruthless leveraging of its oil revenues to import and manufacture arms and
push the fight into southern Sudan, if Bashir had not opted for the peace
process and engagement with the United States. [3]
Instead, it looks like Bashir gave away a third of Sudan and most of its
oil for an improvement in US relations that never materialized.
This unfortunate history has made things awkward for US-Sudan diplomacy.
For US envoys to Sudan, who have tried to keep Bashir engaged on the
north-south peace process even as the international community savages him
for his brutal policies in Darfur (and the envoys for their appeasing ways),
Khartoum has become the graveyard of reputations.
The latest victim is apparently Scott Gratian, a retired
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad01.html> air force general and
Africa-hand who has been the subject of harsh language and rough handling
both from Darfur <http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad01.html>
activists and within the Obama administration for his inability to extract
satisfaction from Bashir.
If the confirmation gods permit, Gratian will apparently lose the Sudan
brief and be eased into an ambassadorship in Kenya.
In a September 15 briefing at the US State Department (after Sudan has
peremptorily rejected the inconsequential carrots that he was allowed to
offer, such as renewed access to American irrigation and agricultural
technology), Gratian's politically awkward understanding of Bashir's dilemma
was on display:
[The South] look[s] forward to the referendum that will occur on the 9th of
January of 2011. The North, on the other hand, is looking at losing 80
percent of its oil - or oil reserves, 50 percent of the oil revenues, to a
third of their land, and to 30 percent of their population.
Meanwhile, under the CPA, the Government of South Sudan (GoSS) has, despite
some shady accounting by Khartoum, received around $2 billion a year in oil
revenues. A significant fraction of these revenues has been spent on
armaments (in violation of the CPA, with the connivance of Kenya and Uganda,
which have close links to the GoSS regime and are wholeheartedly committed
to its independence, and apparently with the tacit approval of the United
States).
To the embarrassment of Kenya, as the International Crisis Group reported in
a detailed analysis of the extensive, sub rosa support of East African
states for southern Sudan independence, one arms shipment fell into the
hands of Somali pirates and became part of the public record. [4]
The ship, the MV Fania, was seized in October 2008 and released only after
four months of negotiations and the payment of a ransom of US$3.2 million.
The cargo included an impressive load of 33 T-72 main battle tanks from the
Ukraine, anti-aircraft guns, RPG-7V grenade-launchers, BM-21 122 mm rocket
launchers, thousands of rounds of ammunition, and spare parts bound for
southern Sudan under Kenyan auspices. [5]
It is estimated that southern Sudan holds an inventory of over 100 tanks.
GoSS also recently concluded a purchase of 10 military transport helicopters
to create its first military air transport capability.
Given the total inability of the United States to contribute to the
viability of the Khartoum regime and the growing diplomatic and
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad01.html> military resources of
GoSS, it was inevitable that China should emerge as Sudan's most conspicuous
public source of financial, military and diplomatic support.
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad01.html>
http://kona.kontera.com/javascript/lib/imgs/grey_loader.gif
China lifts approximately half of Sudan's oil, accounting for about 7% of
China's total imports.
China's major petroleum interest in Sudan resides in the Greater Nile
Petroleum Operating Company, in which China National Petroleum Corporation
(CNPC) holds a 40% (Malaysia's Petronas Carigall Overseas holds a 30%
interest and India's ONGC Videsh holds 25%; somehow, these investors have
escaped the international execration that has accrued to China for its
investment). Its key oilfields are either in southern Sudan or in border
regions likely to be contested by GoSS.
The CNPC also constructed the Greater Nile Oil Pipeline, a critical piece of
infrastructure connecting its southern oilfields to Port Sudan in northern
Sudan for export. Since this is currently the only way for southern oil to
get out of the country, Bashir can, if desired, cut this lifeline and
deprive GoSS of the oil revenues it currently relies on to arm itself and
sustain its operations (GoSS relies on oil for 98% of its non-aid revenues
and the dusty capital of Juba is known as an "NGO town" in recognition of
its total lack of local, non-rentier income).
A combination of interest and ideology - with its Tibet and Xinjiang issues,
China is eager to support the preservation of multi-ethnic regimes - led
China to support the principle of Sudanese unity and become a major provider
of investment, infrastructure and arms to Khartoum. Many of these arms,
either by transfer or capture, have also found their way into the hands of
the vicious militias that Khartoum relies on to pursue its battles with its
myriad enemies by proxy and with a veneer of deniability.
China's willingness to support Bashir in his southern struggles even as he
continued his depradations in Darfur earned Beijing the vociferous
opprobrium of Darfur activists, not to mention the understandable distrust
and resentment of the government in southern Sudan.
In August, the Sudan Tribune reported:
Anne Itto, south Sudan's minister of agriculture, told reporters yesterday
in the region's capital Juba upon returning from China that the Chinese
government fears that its assets in Sudan's oil would be "a waster" if the
south opts for secession.
"A lot of wild rumors have been getting to them, that
if the south separates, there will be insecurity, and if there is
insecurity, their assets worth billions of dollars in the form of pipelines
and so on will have been a waste," she said.
Itto, who is also the deputy secretary general of the SPLM (Sudan People's
Liberation Movement), the ruling party in south Sudan, said that she had
told Chinese officials that "if they want to protect their assets, the only
way is to develop a very strong relationship with the government of southern
Sudan, respect the outcome of the referendum, and then we will be doing
business."
The minister said that China was interested in expanding oil exploration to
more blocks. She further announced that a senior delegation from the Chinese
Communist Party would visit the region in early October to try to "bridge
the gap". [6]
On September 16, the Sudan Tribune reported on a meeting between Vice
President Machar of GoSS, and China's outgoing consul in Juba, Zhang
Qingyang:
China, which is the leading country in the oil business mostly produced in
southern Sudan, has been told to initiate dialogue with the emerging world's
newest country, southern Sudan, on issues of future economic relations with
the region.
... [Machar] said China should prepare for possible independence of the
region so that it would not come as a shock, adding that there is need for
further dialogue at both government and party levels aiming at strengthening
bilateral relations between China and southern Sudan for post-referendum
economic relations. [7]
If the transition to south Sudan independence occurs with a minimum of
violence and rancor, China may hope to retain its existing oil concessions,
perhaps with the renegotiation of percentages and various payments that
these <http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad02.html> transactions often
involve.
Indeed, China is discretely hedging its north-south bets, not only in the
matter of sending delegations to Juba.
Kenya, GoSS's close ally, has ambitious plans to integrate southern Sudan
into East Africa. In addition to trans-shipping arms and dispatching
bureaucrats to Juba to engage in capacity-building, Kenya has announced its
intention to construct a massive port at Luma.
After construction of rail and possibly pipeline links to Juba, Luma would
replace Port Sudan as the outlet for independent south Sudan's petroleum and
other exports.
Beijing promptly opened its
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad02.html> checkbook and offered a
$16 million <http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad02.html> grant to
assist in the preparation for the project, which has a reported price tag of
$22 billion.
GoSS has also encouraged interested parties to discuss the Juba-Luma
pipeline. Toyota's <http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad02.html>
trading arm announced its willingness to build the $1.5 billion pipeline,
operate it for 20 years, and then transfer it to GoSS. It was delicately
stated that China might be invited to participate in the pipeline, assuming
that China had retained its vulnerable oil concessions and had products to
export.
China recently received Sudan's new foreign minister in Beijing. Chinese
media reported the official coverage, which had a certain air of glum
resignation:
No matter what results the referendum were, China believed the top priority
lay in maintaining peace and stability in Sudan and the region, [Vice
President Xi Jinping] said at a meeting with visiting Sudanese Foreign
Minister Ahmed Ali Karti.
... China has always supported the unity of
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad02.html> Sudan according to
principles of the CPA.
"China is happy to see Sudan remain united because that is the basic
principle of the CPA to make unity attractive. At the same time, we will
respect the choice of the Sudanese people, the option of the Sudanese
people," Chinese special envoy to Darfur Liu Guijin said during a trip to
Sudan in July. [8]
For his part, Karti stated that, if the south chose secession, there would
be a six-month period to work out details of borders and revenue-sharing -
issues that have proved intractable for the past six years.
Today, Khartoum is determined to minimize the economic consequences of its
disastrous participation in the CPA process.
Bashir apparently hopes to maintain southern Sudan as a weak, dependent
state, exporting through the north and sharing oil revenues, for as long as
possible. Sudan has been deliberately slow-walking preparations for the
January referendum to raise doubts about its legitimacy, and can always
wield the threat of unleashing its proxies (not only local tribal militias,
but also the anti-Ugandan rebels of the Lord's Resistance Army and even
mutinous elements inside GoSS's
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad02.html> military establishment)
and cutting off oil <http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad02.html>
revenues to push GoSS into failed-state status.
If the civil war resumes in earnest, GoSS's oil revenues will disappear as
Khartoum either seizes contested oil-producing areas along the border at the
origin of the pipeline and monopolizes the export revenue or shuts down the
pipeline to Port Sudan altogether; Khartoum would also presumably be able to
make enough mischief to ensure that the security environment for building a
competing pipeline from Juba to Luma would become virtually untenable.
However, Bashir must walk a fine line. If the referendum is undermined or
postponed and the costs of coexisting with Khartoum become too onerous, Juba
has already stated its determination to declare independence unilaterally -
and undoubtedly obtain immediate recognition from Kenya and Uganda and, most
probably, aid from the United States.
Understandably, Clinton characterized Sudan as "a ticking time bomb". In
recognition of Khartoum's sources of leverage and a sense of grievance that
most US observers find incomprehensible - and to the outrage of anti-Bashir
activists - Clinton suggested that southern Sudan should be open-handed in
sharing oil revenues with the north. [9]
The delicate situation in Sudan has elicited a spasm of last-minute
diplomacy from the Obama administration, including a UN confab scheduled for
September 24 with Obama's personal participation. [10]
However, the US appears captive to its strong Darfur stance, victimized by
the flaws in the original agreement, and demoralized by internal divisions
and the apparent lack of viable options.
Clearly, the US can offer virtually no meaningful concessions to Bashir -
who, in addition to his other Darfur-related diplomatic headaches, now
labors under an International Criminal Court indictment for genocide and
will be unable to attend any UN discussions - in order to influence his
behavior on the fraught north-south situation.
A Darfur activist commented anonymously to Asia Times Online:
... having left the many problems in CPA implementation to far too late a
date, what we see today is simply last-minute scrambling. There is no
strategy! No game plan, no contingency plan, nothing but Gration's mindless
determination to reward Khartoum at every possible turn in the naive hope
that they'll be nice in return.
Darfur activists have attempted to escape this cul-de-sac by proposing
escalation as an alternative to futile efforts at accommodation.
Distinguished Sudan activist Eric Reeves wrote in an op-ed:
The United States and its allies must signal to the regime that if the
referendum is compromised and war results, there will be unsustainable
consequences for the regime and its cronies - economic,
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad02.html> financial, diplomatic and
military. Smart, targeted sanctions must threaten real pain. After seeking
whatever multilateral support is available, the United States must be
prepared to threaten a naval blockade of Port Sudan, using non-lethal force
to prevent the departure of oil export tankers.
<http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/LI21Ad02.html>
http://kona.kontera.com/javascript/lib/imgs/grey_loader.gif
The great risk of such a blockade - which should come into force only if
Khartoum restarts the war in the south - is a naval encounter with a
Chinese-flagged tanker. Broad and urgent diplomatic engagement with Beijing
is required. [11]
Reeves points out that the US and China have a shared interest in
maintaining the normal operation of Sudan's petroleum extraction and export
industry.
However, if Sudan really blows up and the south - emboldened by regional and
US support and a deep sense of grievance - and the north - whose only hope
for victory is to use its military, proxies, and oil revenue leverage to
push GoSS into failed-state status - there probably won't be any oil to
export at Port Sudan.
Reeves told Asia Times Online:
But the Obama admin is facing very significant domestic political pressure
on Sudan, and now desperately wants things not to unravel around the
referenda. China has the same goal, but a very different motive: they want
peaceful referenda because in their absence, civil war will resume and the
oil fields/infrastructure will be the primary military focus for both sides
(Khartoum to protect, the SPLM/A [Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army]
to disable). The SPLA is much more militarily capable than when a "cessation
of hostilities agreement" was signed in October 2002. They will have the
logistics, the transport, and the weaponry to make for a very violent
confrontation in the producing concession areas of the Greater Nile
Petroleum Operating Company (China's CNPC has a 40% stake). I also would not
underestimate the SPLA's ability to attack the other major consortium
(Petrodar - Chinese stake is 43%) to the east in Upper Nile.
As Reuters reported:
State-owned China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), the largest foreign
player with a roughly 40 percent stake in Sudan's oil industry, is "hoping
for the best but preparing for the worst", according to an industry source
familiar with Chinese operations in Sudan.
"An independence vote for the south is likely to lead to clashes between the
north and south, a worst-case scenario that we do not wish to see," said the
source, speaking on condition of anonymity.
CNPC would have no option but to "halt production and evacuate our 2,000
people in Khartoum and the oil-fields", the source added. [12]
According to the same report, the United States, like China, is hoping for
"a civil divorce, not a civil war".
Perhaps cool - and generous - heads will prevail and a loose north-south
confederation and judicious sharing of oil revenues will result.
But, as is often said, hope is not a plan. And Washington and Beijing are,
to a considerable extent, captives to events, and the calculations of
covetous, well-armed and ruthless forces are beyond their control.
Notes
1. The
<http://chinamatters.blogspot.com/2006/09/twisted-triangle-america-china-and
.html> Twisted Triangle: America, China, and Sudan, China Matters, Sep 11,
2010.
2. Sudan
<http://www.sudantribune.com/IMG/pdf/Igad_in_Sudan_Peace_Process.pdf> IGAD
peace process: an evaluation, Page 39, Sudan Tribune, May 30, 2007.
3. Ibid
<http://www.sudantribune.com/IMG/pdf/Igad_in_Sudan_Peace_Process.pdf> , Page
32.
4. Sudan:
<http://www.crisisgroup.org/%7E/media/Files/africa/horn-of-africa/sudan/159%
20Sudan%20Regional%20Perspectives%20on%20the%20Prospect%20of%20Southern%20In
dependence.ashx> regional perspectives, Sudan Tribune, May 6, 2010.
5. MV
<http://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2009/07/mv-faina-cargo-100-tanks-were-ordere
d.html> Faina cargo: 100 tanks were ordered by Government of South Sudan,
Sudan Watch, Jul 19, 2009.
6. China must <http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article36022> recognize
referendum result to retain oil assets - south Sudan's minister, Sudan
Tribune, Aug 21, 2010.
7. China hopes for <http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article36295>
transparent, fair referendum in southern Sudan, Xinhua, Sep 14, 2010.
8. Clinton
<http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2010-09/14/c_13494786.htm>
Says U.S. Working to Prevent Potential Sudan Oil Violence in 2011,
Bloomberg, Sep 9, 2010.
9. Intensifying
<http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-09-08/clinton-says-u-s-working-to-avoid-
sudan-oil-violence-ahead-of-2011-vote.html> Diplomacy in the Lead up to the
Referenda in Sudan, US Department of State, Sep 14, 2010.
10. The gathering <http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2010/09/147103.htm>
clouds of war, Boston.com, Sep 5, 2010.
11. RPT-Special
<http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2010/09/0
5/the_gathering_clouds_of_war/> report-Southern Sudan: oil boom to bust-up?
Alert Net, Apr 9, 2010.
12. RPT-special <http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/LDE62S0O5.htm>
report-Southern Sudan: oil boom to bust-up? Alert Net, Apr 9, 2010.
Peter Lee writes on East and South Asian affairs and their intersection with
US foreign policy.
(Copyright 2010 Asia Times Online
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