The situation that is playing out in Southern Sudan has been repeated throughout history over and over again. The South Sudanese people voted overwhelmingly to leave the country proper and start their own nation; The Nation of South Sudan is to be declared in July. Do note that there is a difference in definition and reality between country and nation. A country is more or less set by political boundaries on a map that are recognized by other countries. A nation is something very different, a nation is a homogeneous culture defined by a shared set of beliefs and mores that define the individual that makes up the nation. A nation can be spread across many countries.
Please Refer to this map of Sudan for this post, it is far too detailed to display here.
A quick look at the map linked above reveals two nations in one country, often this leads to failure except where an over-riding sense that the nations in the country are similar enough and the nations are mature enough to get along in a situation where the nations make the country stronger. In that case, differences are celebrated and enjoyed by all. The map of Sudan shows an impossibility though. Note the names of the towns in the north, then note the names of the towns in the south. The names in the north are Arabic, the names in the south are Sudanic. There was a program of Arabization occurring, driven by the ruling 40% self identified ‘Arabs’ against the 50% Native Blacks. Sudan is a microcosm of the result of Arab expansion using Islam as the weapon to bring populations to heel. Another factor of this forced Arabization is that there is still a slave trade in Sudan, Black non-Muslims are taken by Muslims for forced labor and sexual exploitation. South Sudan is on the ever violent edge of the Muslim world. It is and will be a war zone.
There was a recent mass migration of non-Muslims to South Sudan both out as refugees in neighboring countries returned and non-Muslims in the north ethnically cleansed themselves and left the north. This ‘nation’ of Christians and Animists then voted on a referendum to split from Arab controlled Sudan and carve out a nation and a country in the south. Well, as always occurs on a border with Muslims, there is war and violence.
The main players of this fight are the SLPA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army, South Sudan) versus northern Muslim nomad tribes that are , of course, armed and funded by the north. The most recent clash was in the Abyei region. Oddly, the Misseriya tribe ‘nomads’ had jeeps with mounted machine guns at their disposal that are exactly like the jeeps used by the Army in the North. The pretense for the fighting is that the Muslim nomads are ‘concerned’ that they wont be able to use the grazing lands, the real reason is that there is oil in the South. and that one cannot live in peace with Muslim neighbors.
Deng Arop Kuol, the top government official in the disputed border region of Abyei, alleged the attackers were supported by the northern Sudanese government. Tribesman involved in the attack said the southern government provoked the attack.
The violence underscores the volatility between Sudan’s north and south ahead of the south’s independence in July. The two sides fought for more than two decades and the civil war claimed around 2 million lives before it ended in 2005.
Seven police officers and three attackers from the nomadic Misseriya tribe were killed in Sunday’s attack, and fighting continued on Monday, Kuol said. The fertile area is claimed by both north and south Sudan and is near several large oil fields.
Kuol said the Misseriya fighters were using jeeps that belonged to the northern Sudanese Armed Forces when they attacked a police post at Todach.
So the newest nation of South Sudan has some very nasty neighbors and has a long way to go to be secure. They also have a renegade group from the SPLA that backs a former commander:
Abyei was a battleground in the decades-long civil war between north and south Sudan that ended in the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement — the accord that promised the southern secession referendum. Abyei residents were supposed to have their own referendum on whether to join north or south Sudan in January. The vote never took place amid disputes over who was qualified to vote. The south regularly has accused north Sudan of arming Athor’s forces and Misseriya fighters to destabilise the region and keep control of its oil, an allegation dismissed by Khartoum.
The violence has cast a shadow over mass celebrations after southerners overwhelmingly voted to declare independence from the north in a referendum in January. The referendum was promised in a 2005 peace deal that ended decades of civil war with the north. Rebel leader George Athor accused the southern army (SPLA) of starting the fighting in Jonglei on Sunday and earlier last month, breaking the terms of a ceasefire agreed in January. “They attacked us early in the morning on Sunday. We dispersed the SPLA forces and we captured a big number of arms. Also we managed to kill 86 soldiers. We lost 12 of our comrades,” he said. Athor insisted he was ready to return to negotiations with the southern leadership. “I am really worried because the new country will be like a baby born dead. If you start with a guerrilla force fighting the government, I don’t see any development that can happen.” Athor was a senior member of the rebel southern army during the civil war. He took up arms after saying he was cheated out of the Jonglei governorship in last year’s general elections. The SPLA accused Athor of breaking the truce by massacring more than 200 people in Jonglei mid February. Northern Misseriya nomads and allied militias attacked the village of Maker on Wednesday in Abyei, killing at least six southern police, said the speaker of Abyei’s administration Charles Abyei.
Will the nation of South Sudan survive? We can watch, and pray for them. They have one difficult future.
Background reading:
http://www.fox40.com/news/crimealert/sns-rt-international-us-sudtre7211iw-20110302,0,1456668.story
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900sid/ADGO-8EKMQE?OpenDocument&RSS20&RSS20=FS
http://www.cnbc.com/id/41870745
http://www.philly.com/philly/wires/ap/news/world/20110228_ap_10killedduringclashesindisputedsudanregion.html
