British Aid Workers Are Expelled From Sudan

The Telegraph (UK) ^ | 11-30-2004 | David Blair

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British aid workers are expelled from Sudan

By David Blair, Africa Correspondent
(Filed: 30/11/2004)

The Sudanese government ordered senior members of Oxfam and Save the Children to leave the country yesterday, accusing them of backing rebels in the war-torn region of Darfur.

The action against the two British-based aid agencies, which are helping hundreds of thousands of refugees, followed a report by Save the Children of a government air raid on one of its feeding centres, and critical press statements issued by Oxfam.

Save the Children is a large distributor of food in Darfur

Sudan pledged three weeks ago to open up Darfur to relief workers but an upsurge of fighting between government troops and rebel fighters forced the suspension of emergency food supplies to Northern Darfur.

The air strike, reported by Save the Children, came after the government agreed to end military flights over Darfur. Its disclosure appears to have infuriated the Khartoum regime, which singled out Kate Halff, country director of Save the Children, and also Oxfam's programme director for northern Sudan, whom the aid agency declined to name.

Both received a letter from the regime's Humanitarian Affairs Commission giving them 48 hours to leave.

"It has been decided to consider you persona non grata for the management of your organisation in Sudan," said the letter signed by Abdul Khaliq al-Hussein, acting commissioner for humanitarian affairs.

Spokesmen at the British headquarters of both agencies said that they were seeking "clarification" from the Sudanese authorities.

Ms Halff was ordered to leave because Save the Children revealed details of an air raid during which a bomb exploded 150ft from the feeding centre, in the town of Tawila in Northern Darfur, forcing 30 aid workers to flee.

The agency said: "Both sides have demonstrated utter disregard for the ceasefire. Yet again innocent civilians, particularly women and children, are suffering at the hands of the rebels and their own government, and still the international community fails to protect them."

Oxfam was criticised for two recent press statements. One condemned the United Nations Security Council for passing a "weak" resolution on Darfur. The other urged the European Union to increase diplomatic pressure on Sudan.

Khartoum's official news agency said this amounted to warmongering: "Rejecting the resolutions of the UN Security Council that call for peace realisation in Sudan simply means that organisation [Oxfam] wants the continuation of war in Darfur."

Save the Children is one of the largest distributors of food in Darfur, feeding some 300,000 people. Oxfam provides clean water and sanitation to 280,000 refugees.

Some 70,000 people have died since the outbreak of war in March between the Arab-dominated government and black African rebels.

Thousands of villages have been destroyed, forcing more than 1.6 million refugees to flee their homes, and now 1.45 million are crammed into squalid camps dotted across Darfur.

Fighting intensified recently, shattering a ceasefire agreed by both sides during peace talks in Nigeria. The UN's World Food Programme has also been compelled to halt supplies to Northern Darfur.