சூடானின் அதிபர் அல் பஷீர் அரபு ஜாதிகளில் ஒன்றான ஜாலி ஜாதியை சேர்ந்தவர். ஜாதிபெருமை, அரபு இனப்பெருமை மிக்க இவர் சூடானில் காலம் காலமாக வாழ்ந்துவந்த கருப்பினத்தவர்களை டார்பர் பகுதியில் கொன்றொழித்து அவர்களை நிலங்களை பிடுங்க அரசாங்கத்தின் மூலமாகவே முயன்று லட்சக்கணக்கான கருப்பினத்தவரை ஜிகாது மூலம் கொன்றதாக ஐநா இவர் மீது இனப்படுகொலை குற்றச்சாட்டு கூறியுள்ளது.
Beshir: military man of defiance
By Jennie Matthew, AFP Published:Jul 14, 2008
As an individual, as a member of the Jaali tribe, as a military officer and as head of state, he is intensely proud.
KHARTOUM - Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir, the first sitting ruler named for war crimes by the International Criminal Court, is a fiery and defiant professional soldier who seized power 19 years ago in a coup.
His rule of Africa’s biggest country, torn apart by war for much of its half century of independence, has been marked by Islamist resurgence, conflict and peace with the south, collision with the West and bitter war in Darfur.
"As an individual, as a member of the Jaali tribe, as a military officer and as head of state, he is intensely proud," said Sudan analyst Alex de Waal.
"When he feels humiliated, he is prone to angry outbursts marked by extreme rhetorical excess. His language becomes replete with exhortations to avenge insult and betrayal and crush the cowards and traitors."
ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo has accused Beshir of masterminding a genocidal campaign to try to wipe out three ethnic groups, calling for an arrest warrant for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in Darfur.
Beshir refuses to cooperate with the ICC or surrender officials wanted for alleged war crimes. He told United Nations (UN) ambassadors last month that a "vicious campaign" against Sudan had tarnished its image, heritage and values.
Beshir, 64, toppled a three-year-old democratically elected government in a bloodless coup on June 30, 1989, backed by the National Islamic Front party of his now sidelined former mentor Hassan al-Turabi.
He declared a nationwide state of emergency, suspended the constitution, dismissed parliament and disbanded all political parties.
His regime then introduced Sudan to a more radical brand of Islam and elements of Sharia law, alienating Christians and animists in the south and many in the northern Arab elite who grew up under British rule.
Beshir and Turabi established the Popular Defence Forces, which deployed in the south to fight Jihad or holy war against the "infidels", raising the stakes in what dragged into Africa’s longest running civil war until a 2005 peace deal.
Yet in promulgating a power-sharing constitution with the former rebels that opened a path to democratic transformation in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) Beshir surprised even his staunchest critics.
Born in 1944 into a rural family in Hoshe Bannaga, an Arab heartland 100 kilometres north of Khartoum, Omar Hassan al-Beshir joined the military at a young age.
He rose quickly through the ranks and served with the Egyptian army in the 1973 Arab-Israeli war. He went on to serve as military attache in the United Arab Emirates, garrison commander and as head of an armoured parachute brigade.
In 1988, at the height of the civil war between the Khartoum government and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, he was appointed commander of the eighth brigade, stationed in the south and considered poorly equipped.
The posting brought him face-to-face with the conflict at a time of huge dissatisfaction in the military, particularly among officers, with the rule of then prime minister Sadiq al-Mahdi. A year later, he led a mutiny.
He and Turabi ruled through a Revolutionary Command Council and the National Salvation government, after Beshir purged nearly all the top military brass.
In 1993, he dissolved the RCC and declared himself president before being "elected" for the first time in a 1996 election widely denounced as fraudulent.
In Sudan’s last election in 2000, which was boycotted by the opposition, Beshir won another term with 89.5 percent of the vote.
His government sheltered Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden for five years in the 1990s where the Western world’s most wanted man consolidated his terror network’s operations.
Much of his presidency was marked by the devastating north-south conflict in which more than 1.5 million people were killed over 21 years until the 2005 peace deal.
Sudan began exporting oil in 1999 and despite sanctions imposed by the United States, Khartoum has enjoyed an infrastructure and housing construction boom fuelled by Arab, Chinese, Indian and Malaysian investment.
Sudan has been on the US list of state sponsors of terrorism since 1993. Yet despite the CPA, conflict in Darfur has turned the regime into a pariah.
The United States says genocide is taking place in Darfur where government troops and Arab militias have fought an increasingly fractured and complicated war with splintering ethnic rebel groups clamouring for power and resources.
The United Nations says up to 300,000 people have died from the combined effects of war, famine and disease and more than 2.2 million fled their homes in the five-year conflict. Beshir’s regime says 10,000 have been killed.
Beshir: military man of defiance
By Jennie Matthew, AFP Published:Jul 14, 2008
As an individual, as a member of the Jaali tribe, as a military officer and as head of state, he is intensely proud.
KHARTOUM - Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir, the first sitting ruler named for war crimes by the International Criminal Court, is a fiery and defiant professional soldier who seized power 19 years ago in a coup.
His rule of Africa’s biggest country, torn apart by war for much of its half century of independence, has been marked by Islamist resurgence, conflict and peace with the south, collision with the West and bitter war in Darfur.
"As an individual, as a member of the Jaali tribe, as a military officer and as head of state, he is intensely proud," said Sudan analyst Alex de Waal.
"When he feels humiliated, he is prone to angry outbursts marked by extreme rhetorical excess. His language becomes replete with exhortations to avenge insult and betrayal and crush the cowards and traitors."
ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo has accused Beshir of masterminding a genocidal campaign to try to wipe out three ethnic groups, calling for an arrest warrant for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in Darfur.
Beshir refuses to cooperate with the ICC or surrender officials wanted for alleged war crimes. He told United Nations (UN) ambassadors last month that a "vicious campaign" against Sudan had tarnished its image, heritage and values.
Beshir, 64, toppled a three-year-old democratically elected government in a bloodless coup on June 30, 1989, backed by the National Islamic Front party of his now sidelined former mentor Hassan al-Turabi.
He declared a nationwide state of emergency, suspended the constitution, dismissed parliament and disbanded all political parties.
His regime then introduced Sudan to a more radical brand of Islam and elements of Sharia law, alienating Christians and animists in the south and many in the northern Arab elite who grew up under British rule.
Beshir and Turabi established the Popular Defence Forces, which deployed in the south to fight Jihad or holy war against the "infidels", raising the stakes in what dragged into Africa’s longest running civil war until a 2005 peace deal.
Yet in promulgating a power-sharing constitution with the former rebels that opened a path to democratic transformation in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) Beshir surprised even his staunchest critics.
Born in 1944 into a rural family in Hoshe Bannaga, an Arab heartland 100 kilometres north of Khartoum, Omar Hassan al-Beshir joined the military at a young age.
He rose quickly through the ranks and served with the Egyptian army in the 1973 Arab-Israeli war. He went on to serve as military attache in the United Arab Emirates, garrison commander and as head of an armoured parachute brigade.
In 1988, at the height of the civil war between the Khartoum government and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, he was appointed commander of the eighth brigade, stationed in the south and considered poorly equipped.
The posting brought him face-to-face with the conflict at a time of huge dissatisfaction in the military, particularly among officers, with the rule of then prime minister Sadiq al-Mahdi. A year later, he led a mutiny.
He and Turabi ruled through a Revolutionary Command Council and the National Salvation government, after Beshir purged nearly all the top military brass.
In 1993, he dissolved the RCC and declared himself president before being "elected" for the first time in a 1996 election widely denounced as fraudulent.
In Sudan’s last election in 2000, which was boycotted by the opposition, Beshir won another term with 89.5 percent of the vote.
His government sheltered Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden for five years in the 1990s where the Western world’s most wanted man consolidated his terror network’s operations.
Much of his presidency was marked by the devastating north-south conflict in which more than 1.5 million people were killed over 21 years until the 2005 peace deal.
Sudan began exporting oil in 1999 and despite sanctions imposed by the United States, Khartoum has enjoyed an infrastructure and housing construction boom fuelled by Arab, Chinese, Indian and Malaysian investment.
Sudan has been on the US list of state sponsors of terrorism since 1993. Yet despite the CPA, conflict in Darfur has turned the regime into a pariah.
The United States says genocide is taking place in Darfur where government troops and Arab militias have fought an increasingly fractured and complicated war with splintering ethnic rebel groups clamouring for power and resources.
The United Nations says up to 300,000 people have died from the combined effects of war, famine and disease and more than 2.2 million fled their homes in the five-year conflict. Beshir’s regime says 10,000 have been killed.
