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Thursday, April 16, 2009

Darfour rebels defect to largest anti-regime militia

CAIRO Ñ Commanders of a Sudanese rebel militia have defected to a rival group.   

Seventeen commanders of the Sudan Liberation Army's Unity faction were said to have left for a rival militia. The rebel chiefs were reported to have joined the Justice and Equality Movement, the largest anti-regime movement in Darfour and which attacked the Sudanese capital in May 2008.

"Five are political leaders and 17 are commanders," JEM commander Suleiman Sandal said.

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SLA-Unity has acknowledged that about 20 fighters have defected. But the group said none of them was senior members.

"They have joined JEM because they want to unify the struggle in Darfour, and the Darfourian people cannot achieve their demands when there are many factions and fighting among them," Sandal said.

JEM has been the largest rebel militia in Darfour and the only faction invited to reconciliation talks in Qatar in 2009. Sandal said 90 percent of the membership of SLA-Unity, including their weapons and equipment, have been transferred to JEM.

In April 2009, a key commander of SLA-Unity, Suleiman Jamous, joined JEM. Jamous said JEM was capable of unifying the movement against the regime of President Omar Bashir.

The Khartoum regime has launched a crackdown on JEM. On April 15, a Sudanese court sentenced to death 10 JEM operatives connected to the attempted invasion of Khartoum , raising the number of rebels sentenced to die to 60.



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