Ceasefire team probes 'helicopter attack' on village

African Union monitors are investigating claims that the Sudanese military bombarded a village with helicopter gunships, driving terrified farmers from their homes, just days before the expiry of a United Nations deadline to end the violence in Darfur.

Um Hashab village lies in ruins and abandoned after Thursday’s attack on the Sudan Liberation Army, one of two rebel factions waging war against the government in Khartoum.

The charred earth, scorched trees and empty mud and straw huts in the desert settlement provide evidence that the 18-month war continues, despite an April 8 ceasefire.

A 24-hour rebel boycott of peace talks in Nigeria ended last night, with rebels returning to negotiations after a protest walkout over claims that government forces and allied Arab militia, known as the Janjaweed, continued to target civilians in the arid western region.

“Three days ago they came and dropped bombs on my village,” said Adam Salim Abu Bakir, who fled to the nearby Zam Zam camp for displaced people, 12 miles away from Al-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur.

“I was in the fields planting and the whole village was in flames and everybody was running at the same time. What caused this fire were the planes and the things that they threw on us, and the helicopters with those things that turn round.

“Everybody fled, there is nobody here any more, not even the young ones. Everything that we wear, that we eat and drink, burnt, but nobody died. Now were are living under the scorching sun. We have nothing.”

Broken earthenware pots and smashed crockery scattered among the ash and crumbling mud walls bear testimony to how quickly the community fled.

“They came with helicopters and planes. We were sitting and the planes came overhead and there was shooting,” said Halima Mohammed, who found refuge in a nearby village.

In Abuja, Nigeria, Sudanese government delegate Najib Abdulwahab questioned the allegations.

“We have already refuted that the government of Sudan has carried out any attacks against the rebels in the region of Darfur. If there have been any breaches, it should be announced by the ceasefire committee,” he said.

A senior AU official confirmed that a team had visited the site and was investigating. An AU source said the commission was mediating between Sudanese officials and the SLA rebels, who are demanding a military outpost 300 yards from Um Hashab is withdrawn.

In Abuja, representatives of the SLA and the Justice and Equality Movement, another rebel group, said there would be no retaliation.

“We are not going to counterattack, we have committed ourselves to the (ceasefire) agreements signed,” said Ahmed Tugod Lissan, head of the JEM delegation. “The Janjaweed should be disarmed and their leaders arrested.”

SLA delegate Minni Minnawi said the attacks continued yesterday, with the burning of villages 12 miles south of Al-Fasher. His claim could not be immediately confirmed.

More than 30,000 people are thought to have been killed in the violence since the SLA and the Justice and Equality Movement launched their rebellions in February 2003 – escalating years of low-level conflict between African farmers and Arab herders, competing for water and land.

The rebels, drawn from African tribes, rose up against the Arab dominated government, claiming discrimination and political marginalisation.

Human rights groups, the US Congress and UN officials accuse the government of trying to crush the rebellion by backing the Janjaweed – allegations Khartoum repeatedly denies.

The African Union has sent 80 observers to monitor the rarely adhered-to ceasefire. Rwanda already has 150 troops on the ground in Darfur to protect the observers, and Nigeria is expected to send 150 troops today.