The threat of hunger, disease and violence continues to blight the lives of millions of Darfuris even as the most intense fighting of 2003 and 2004 has eased into a pattern of more varied and sporadic violence.
Optimists say the arrest warrant for Omar al-Bashir, Sudan’s president, could quell government-instigated violence by signalling the end of impunity for those behind it – but the argument is undermined by doubts over whether Mr Bashir will ever be arrested.
Other analysts say a warrant could worsen the situation in Darfur by antagonising the government and driving it into a corner from which it rejects any further attempts at finding a negotiated political settlement to the conflict.
Some 300,000 people are estimated to have been killed in the Darfur conflict and the majority of Sudan government-orchestrated massacres occurred in its first two years, when the western region’s rebels were united against the Sudanese army and state-backed janjaweed militias.
Since then the rebel groups have splintered and government attacks have become more unpredictable – both aerial bombardments and militia raids – while a series of inter-ethnic conflicts have flared and banditry has become endemic.
The one constant is the devastating impact on lives and livelihoods: some 317,000 people were forced from their homes last year, compared with 300,000 in 2007, the UN says. That brought the total number of displaced people to at least 2.7m, nearly half of Darfur’s population.
The government attack that drew most outrage last year was on one of the refugee camps in south Darfur, known as Kalma, where 33 civilians including women and children were shot dead in August when the police and army tried to enter the camp.
The government claimed the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), the most militarily powerful rebel group, which in its boldest attack last year reached the outskirts of the capital Khartoum, was storing weapons there. The UN condemned the authorities’ use of force as “indiscriminate and disproportionate”.
This year in January and February fighting between rebels and the government around the town of Muhajeriya in south Darfur marked the worst violence for months, causing at least 17 deaths, mostly civilians, and displacing a further 50,000 people.
It began when JEM captured the town from a rival rebel group and continued when the Sudanese government launched a successful offensive to seize it back. In response, Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary general, said: “It is clear the parties do not have the will or capacity to transcend this conflict alone.”
The well-being of millions of Darfuris continues to be further undermined by the harassment of aid workers trying to deliver food and medical care, which in some cases is instigated by the government and in others is deliberately ignored by it.
Last year a total of 277 aid vehicles were hijacked, up from 137 in 2007, the UN says. Two hundred and eighteen aid workers were abducted and 192 premises belonging to aid agencies were attacked.
The government has aggravated insecurity by obstructing a UN-African Union peacekeeping mission, which is still 6,000 troops short of its planned deployment of 19,000. Its helicopters have been shot at and it is often prevented from carrying out patrols by unidentified militiamen.
