A man accused of coordinating Sudan's Janjaweed militia is a legitimate tribal leader, and attempts to pursue him could lead to the "dismemberment" of the country, a top Sudanese official said.
The U.S. State Department has named Sheik Musa Hilal and six other Sudanese as suspected coordinators of the government-allied Janjaweed, the Arab militia largely blamed for the violence in Darfur. But Sudan's state minister for foreign affairs defended Hilal as a prominent tribal thief chief.
| "So that makes what he's doin' legit, see?" |
Hilal "has nothing to do with the Janjaweed. He is a tribal leader, of a very big, very significant tribe," Minister Najeib el-Kheir Abdelwahab said in an interview Tuesday. Sudan welcomed any international attempt to pinpoint Janjaweed leaders, Abdelwahab said. But "by not adequately identifying the leaders of the Janjaweed, by pointing to some tribal leaders ... if we are not cautious about that, you will ignite a significant tribal conflagration. And this can lead ... to the dismemberment of Sudan." |