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Sudan to hold referendum on Darfur

30 March 2011 03:22 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. Sudan is to hold a referendum to determine the permanent administrative status of the country’s Darfur region amid criticism from main rebel groups, APA reports quoting Press TV.

"President Omar al-Bashir issued a decree today to conduct a referendum to determine the permanent administrative status of Darfur," Sudan’s official SUNA news agency reported on Tuesday.

Sudanese officials have not specified the exact date of the referendum, but they stressed that the government is committed to holding the plebiscite before May under the 2006 Abuja peace accord.

According to the officials, the move is aimed at deciding whether Sudan’s war-torn western region of Darfur would be afforded regional status, which it had before 1994, or remain as individual states.

Meanwhile, the rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), which is seen as the region’s most powerful rebel force in the volatile region, and the Liberation and Justice Movement lashed out at the decision, saying they would not participate in the vote.

"We will not accept the referendum and its conduct, because it means the end of Doha and the peace process," said JEM spokesman Gibril Adam.

"The government is ignoring the efforts of the Qataris to solve the problems of Darfur that have gone on for more than three years," he added.

In February, JEM signed a framework accord with the Khartoum government in Doha, but walked out of talks in the Qatari capital in May after a committee led by the Sudanese president endorsed a recommendation to establish two new states in Darfur to supplant the existing three.

Hussein Minnawi, a senior figure in his faction of the Sudan Liberation Army, also hit out at the decree, saying that since the Abuja agreement is over, "everything in our eyes has collapsed. So we reject this referendum."

"Technically it is not even possible to hold a referendum in Darfur under the prevailing security situation," he added.

Darfur, a remote region of Western Sudan, has been mired in a civil war since 2003. According to the UN, some 300,000 people have been killed and another 2.7 million have been displaced due to sectarian strife in the region.