Darfur lawyers meet US Special Envoy to Sudan in Cairo

A delegation from the Darfur Bar Association (DBA), met with the US Special Envoy to Sudan, Tom Perriello, in Cairo in Egypt on Wednesday. During the meeting, which was requested by Perriello, the delegation, consisting of Mohamed El Doma, member of the DBA Board of Trustees, El Sadig Hasan, acting chairperson, Nafeesa Hajar, vice chair, and Azza Mohamed Ahmed, DBA Women Issues secretary, conveyed its reservations to the US envoy regarding the current international mediation efforts, labelling them as insufficient in addressing the war and lacking seriousness, the DBA said in a press statement yesterday.

The Darfur lawyers highlight “the evident shortcomings in the role of the USA“, and expect it to strengthen Sudanese efforts and initiatives produced by the Sudanese will, which have been sidelined by the warring parties.

The delegation warned Perriello that if the war continues as it is, chaos will spread throughout the country and spill over into the region.

The US envoy said he does not have a ready-made plan and does not align with any Sudanese group or adopt the viewpoint of any Sudanese party as a key to the solution. He pledged to meet with all concerned Sudanese parties, especially youth, women, and civil society, to establish a solution based on the Sudanese people’s will.

He expressed concern about the catastrophic consequences of the war on the region and the alarming signs of a famine.

“The US envoy’s stance reveals that, under his tenure, the USA has a new vision for positively contributing to resolving the Sudanese crisis, unlike previous policies, about which the DBA has previously expressed its reservations,” the statement says.

“Wherever the USA proceeds on the same path as the new US envoy has expressed regarding addressing the war and the Sudanese crisis, the DBA reaffirms its support for the efforts of the new US envoy, Tom Perriello, seeing them as the appropriate approach to ending the war and establishing the right direction for restoring the country’s constitutional life and sparing Sudan the risks of fragmentation and division,” the Darfur lawyers conclude.

The USA announced the appointment of Tom Perriello as US Special Envoy for Sudan in February. In a video post on X (formerly Twitter) following his appointment, Perriello says: “I’m heading out to the region because we feel this urgent need to end to end this war and get humanitarian access to all of the Sudanese people, so I’ll be spending the next couple of weeks listening to the Sudanese people, across refugee camps and other areas, meeting with our African partners, and others, who can help us to end this war, and bring justice and democracy to the people of Sudan.”

Sudanese leaders and commentators welcomed the appointment, however, opposition Republican members of the US Congress said at the time that the temporary appointment 10 months into the war, “demonstrates yet another failure in its [the Biden administration’] response to the crisis”.