White House to Launch Sudan Peace Initiative

WASHINGTON —  In an attempt to end one of the world’s longest wars, the United States will launch a major diplomatic initiative this week to mediate between Sudan’s Muslim government in the north and Christian and animist militias fighting for autonomy in the south, according to U.S. officials.

The White House is expected to announce the appointment of former Sen. John C. Danforth (R-Mo.), possibly as early as Thursday, as special envoy to lead the peace effort, the officials said. The Bush administration is also planning to unveil a major aid program of as much as $30 million for humanitarian relief and development for the poor nation, which has been ravaged over the past four decades by two wars, at least four coups, periodic famines and ongoing political instability.

State Department officials concede that the initiative is fraught with risks, especially after the failure of at least four earlier U.S. attempts to end an 18-year-old war that has claimed more than 2 million lives, mostly in the south. But new realities on both sides of the conflict--most notably major new oil finds--make the prospects of a U.S.-brokered deal more feasible than at any juncture in the past, they say.

“It’s a serious effort, but we don’t approach it with any idea that it’s a sure thing. Both sides say they want the U.S. involved and that the U.S. is the only party able to bring peace to the region. And some preliminary gestures indicate that they may be serious,” said a well-placed U.S. official who, like others involved with the issue, asked to remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the initiative. “It’s worth spinning the wheel, even if it’s only a 50-50 proposition.”

Oil is the biggest new variable and could make the difference after the past failures, the U.S. officials say. Sudan began exporting oil from the north in 1999, with significant revenue expected to begin next year. But the larger reserves may be in the south, they say.

Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir is under growing pressure from oil companies and foreign governments to negotiate. His government also faces internal pressures over the prospect of another famine and recent military inroads by southern rebels.

In the south, the Sudan People’s Liberation Army, led by John Garang, faces the possibility that Sudan’s new oil income next year will pay for major new arms purchases by the government that will diminish or eliminate the rebel group’s viability.

“Oil could make both sides realize that they’ll be better off if they can take advantage of this new income,” the well-placed U.S. official said. “It may make the government willing to hold its nose and give political concessions to the south to get those economic benefits.”

The new U.S. intervention reflects Secretary of State Colin L. Powell’s interest in increasing American involvement in Africa. However, the move is also the product of mounting pressure from an unlikely coalition of evangelical Christian groups, congressional conservatives and black politicians and activists. The coalition shares a common concern about the fate of Christians in southern Sudan.

U.S. officials predict that it will take Danforth, who is also an ordained minister, at least a couple of months to determine how serious both sides are about making peace. The job is considered so difficult that it was turned down by Chester Crocker, a former assistant secretary of State and ambassador who now teaches at Georgetown University.

To encourage the process, the U.S. will pledge between $25 million and $30 million, with roughly half going to food aid primarily in the north and half to two development programs to help prepare the south for peace.

“There’s a whole generation of kids lost to any formal education due to conflict. It’s time to take this problem seriously so that there will be some educated body of southern Sudanese, whatever the political arrangements look like,” said Michelle King, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Agency for International Development.

The U.S. will also provide assistance to help Sudanese move off food aid and produce their own crops. Nongovernmental and international organizations--not Sudan or the insurgents--will administer the assistance.

The U.S. officials say the administration is also expected to agree not to renew U.N. sanctions on foreign travel by Sudanese officials when the restrictions expire this month, although this decision is still being finalized.

The latter move is the result of findings by U.S. counter-terrorist experts that Sudan has stopped supporting key extremist groups, including an Islamic movement tied to the 1995 assassination attempt on Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. The Bush administration is expected to allow the ban to expire largely because Egypt has said it is satisfied that its southern neighbor has been as forthcoming as it can be, most notably in forcing many of the militants to leave the country, U.S. officials say.

But the U.S. will maintain its own tough economic sanctions on Sudan because of what it considers the African nation’s poor human rights record and practice of providing safe haven to some extremists.

Sudan’s Islamic government, however, has lessened its support role recently, the U.S. officials note.