Recently in Sudan Category

Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir is already wanted by the International Criminal Court on charges of genocide and war crimes, and continues to be protected by the Arab League and OIC.

"Sudan bombs US-funded Bible school, forcing students, teachers to flee; US condemns attack," from the Associated Press, February 3:

NAIROBI, Kenya — Sudan’s military bombed a Bible school built by a U.S. Christian aid group, prompting students and teachers at the school to run for their lives in the Nuba Mountains in South Kordofan state.

The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations condemned the attack.

Pictures obtained by The Associated Press on Friday showed that two stone school buildings were demolished in the attack. No one was hurt or killed despite the fact school was in session.

Ryan Boyette, a former aid worker who lives in Sudan and is now leading a team of 15 citizen journalists, spoke to a teacher at the site of Wednesday’s attack in the Nuba Mountains. The teacher, Zachariah Boulus, told Boyette that he couldn’t find his wife and children after the attack because everyone ran into the mountains for safety.

Boyette said that two of eight bombs dropped hit the school.

The Heiban Bible College was built by Samaritan’s Purse, a North Carolina-based aid group. Samaritan’s Purse President Franklin Graham said the attack was carried out by the Sudanese Air Force.

“Please pray for the safety of believers, and that God would intervene,” Graham said.

Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., said she was outraged by what she called a “heinous” bombing.

“It was the first day of school, and the campus was full of students, teachers and families,” Rice said in a statement. “While miraculously no one was killed, this attack-involving eight bombs dropped from the air-underscores the viciousness of Sudan’s ongoing military campaign in Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile states.”

The Nuba Mountains have been an area of conflict between Sudan’s military and a rebel group formerly aligned with South Sudan for months. Tens of thousands of people have fled the violence. Rice said the conflict is affecting more than 500,000 people.

If the conflict continues, it could precipitate a famine, Rice said. Sudan is preventing aid groups from accessing parts of Sudan’s South Kordofan and Blue Nile states.

Sharia forbids the propagation of non-Islamic faiths, and Sudan's president Bashir had promised an intensified enforcement of Sharia alongside a campaign of cultural and linguistic Arabization. This is simply par for the course. "Sudan Threatens to Arrest Church Leaders," from Compass Direct News, January 18:

KHARTOUM, Sudan, January 18 (CDN) — Sudan’s Ministry of Guidance and Religious Endowments has threatened to arrest church leaders if they carry out evangelistic activities and do not comply with an order for churches to provide their names and contact information, Christian sources said.

The warning in a Jan. 3 letter to church leaders of the Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church (SPEC) arrived a few days after Sudan President Omar al-Bashir told cheering crowds on Jan. 3 that, following the secession of largely non-Islamic south Sudan last July, the country’s constitution will be more deeply entrenched in sharia (Islamic law).

“We will take legal procedures against pastors who are involved in preaching or evangelistic activities,” Hamid Yousif Adam, undersecretary of the Ministry of Guidance and Religious Endowment, wrote to the church leaders. “We have all legal rights to take them to court.”

Sources said the order was aimed at oppressing Christians amid growing hostilities toward Christianity.

“This is a critical situation faced by our church in Sudan,” said the Rev. Yousif Matar, secretary general of the SPEC.

Another church leader said the order was another in a series of measures by the government to control churches.

“They do not want pastors from South Sudan to carry on any church activities or mission work in Sudan,” he said.

Sudanese law prohibits missionaries from evangelizing, and converting from Islam to another religion is punishable by imprisonment or death in Sudan, though previously such laws were not strictly enforced. The government has never carried out a death sentence for apostasy, according to the U.S. State Department’s latest International Religious Freedom Report.

Christians are facing growing threats from both Muslim communities and Islamist government officials who have long wanted to rid Sudan of Christianity, Christian leaders told Compass. They said Christianity is now regarded as a foreign religion following the departure of 350,000 people, most of them Christians, to South Sudan following the July 9, 2011 secession.

Sudan’s Interim National Constitution (INC) holds up sharia as a source of legislation, and the laws and policies of the government favor Islam, according to the state department report. Christian leaders said they fear the government is tightening controls on churches in Sudan and planning to force compliance with Islamic law as part of a strategy to eliminate Christianity.

As he has several times in the past year, Al-Bashir on Jan. 3 once again warned that Sudan’s constitution will be more firmly entrenched in sharia.

“We are an Islamic nation with sharia as the basis of our constitution,” he told crowds in Kosti, south of Khartoum. “We will base our constitution on Islamic laws.”

His government subsequently issued the decree ordering church leaders to provide names and contact information of church leaders in Sudan, sources said. Christian leaders said the government is retaliating for churches’ perceived pro-West position.

Muslim scholars have urged heavy-handed measures against Christians to Al-Bashir, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity in Darfur.

And protected by the OIC and Arab League.

Many reports from the time of the fall of Gadhafi's regime described terrible brutality by Libya's revolutionaries against black Africans, as Bashir has heaped abuse on Darfur and the now-independent South Sudan. The great irony is that Bashir, who considers himself an Arab, would be described as a black man in any town in the West. Life imitates art, as Bashir could be described as the Arab world's answer to Dave Chapelle's blind black Klansman. That both regimes are indifferent to non-"Arab" causes would not be surprising.

In any case, once again, Muslim countries are protecting and supporting Bashir, as the OIC and Arab League have done in the past, and utterly ignoring the charges against him. The reality on the ground does not line up with vaunted egalitarianism of Islam that is so heavily emphasized in dawah sales pitches. "Sudan's Bashir criticises Kadhafi in Libya trip," by Jay Deshmukh for Agence France-Presse, January 7:

Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir, wanted internationally for genocide and war crimes, said on Saturday in Tripoli that slain dictator Moamer Kadhafi caused great suffering among the Sudanese people.

His arrival in Tripoli marked Bashir's first Libya visit since Kadhafi was ousted, but the trip faced strong criticism from New York-based Human Rights Group, which said that hosting such an "international fugitive" sent troubling signals about the commitment of Libya's new rulers to human rights.

Wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) on charges of genocide and war crimes in Sudan's war-torn Darfur region, Bashir said that after Libya, Kadhafi inflicted the most damage in Sudan, the official WAL news agency reported.

"We all suffered from the old regime... We (the Sudanese) were the second to have suffered the most, after the Libyan people," Bashir told WAL.

Upon arrival in Tripoli, the Sudanese leader was met by Libya's Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the head of the National Transitional Council (NTC), and members of the interim government, an AFP photographer reported.

Bashir, who claims that Sudan provided weapons to help oust Kadhafi, said the visit felt "like it was the first time," adding that he came to underline Sudan's support for the Libyan people and the country's new government that took charge after Kadhafi's four-decade dictatorship fell. [...]

But Richard Dicker, international justice director at Human Rights Watch, strongly criticised his visit to Libya.

"Omar al-Bashir is an international fugitive from an arrest warrant for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes," Dicker told AFP by telephone from New York.

"Many governments have refused him entry into their countries. His arrival in Tripoli sends a disturbing signal about NTC's commitment to human rights and the rule of law."...

Like the other Arab Spring revolutions, the choices available to the populace would sound like the "Spam" diner sketch from Monty Python: Sharia, Sharia, elections and Sharia; new constitution, Sharia, and Sharia, and so on.

"Sudan will soon see revolution: Islamist leader Turabi," from Reuters, January 6:

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi said Sudan would soon see an "Arab Spring" popular uprising because President Omar Hassan al-Bashir was unable to overcome an economic crisis and end insurgencies in Darfur and border regions.

Bashir is under increasing pressure after his country lost much of its oil production to newly-independent South Sudan. The loss of oil revenues is fuelling inflation as food and other imports have become more expensive, hitting hard Sudanese who have suffered years of conflict and U.S. sanctions.

"I expect the Sudanese people to stage a revolution and I think this will happen very soon," said Turabi, who heads the opposition Popular Congress Party.

"I hope it will be a peaceful revolution so we can get a real multi-party parliamentary system," he told reporters.

He said only the overthrow of the government would end Sudan's problems because Bashir was unable to overcome the economic crisis and end insurgencies in Darfur and two border states.

Sudan has seen some small protests in Khartoum and the underdeveloped east that have become more frequent as inflation has risen, hitting 18.1 percent in December.

One of the most prominent Sudanese politicians, Turabi was the spiritual leader behind the Islamist government when Bashir seized power in 1989 but the two men later fell out.

The security services this week closed down the al-Rai al-Shaab newspaper owned by Turabi's party, saying it had violated professional standards.

Turabi said he expected authorities to arrest him again because of his call for "regime change". He has been in and out of prison since his split from Bashir's party in 1999/2000.

Popular uprisings toppled leaders in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya last year. More than 5,000 people have been killed in Syria, according to the United Nations, in a crackdown against anti-government protests which began in March.

Government officials say Sudan is different from Arab countries witnessing mass protests and the government is capable of overcoming the crisis by diversifying the economy away from oil....

But Sudan under Bashir is trying to solve its problems, or at least divert attention from them, with more Sharia and a campaign of cultural and linguistic Arabization.

Haniyeh is trying to look more statesman-like with this regional tour. There is, curiously, not a peep in this report about Bashir's status as a war criminal wanted by the International Criminal Court for genocide in Darfur. Then again, Bashir is consistently protected by the OIC and the Arab League. In this regard, Haniyeh is following the party line, and Hamas also has its own long-standing presence in Sudan, as noted below.

If an Israeli makes a face at a Palestinian, it is an urgent matter for the UN. But Bashir's history? Not a word. "Gaza premier, Hamas leaders meet Sudan's Bashir," from Agence France-Presse, December 29:

Gaza's Hamas premier Ismail Haniya held talks with Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir Thursday on his first official regional tour since the Islamists' 2007 power seizure in the Palestinian enclave.

Haniya, who arrived in Khartoum on Tuesday, was joined in the meeting by other high-ranking Hamas leaders -- the first time they had met as a group with Bashir, whose country has close ties with Hamas.

The Palestinian group has long maintained a base in Sudan, where its exiled chief Khaled Meshaal is a frequent visitor.

Meshaal joined the hour-long talks with Bashir, as did key Hamas figures Mahmud Zahar, a former foreign minister, and Mussa Abu Marzuk.

"From the Arabs and Islamic countries we want finance and political support to confirm that Jerusalem is the capital of the Palestinian state," Haniya told reporters after the meeting.

He also came to Khartoum for the Al-Quds Forum, an annual gathering which focuses on Jerusalem, the eastern sector of which was occupied by Israel during the 1967 Middle East war and annexed shortly afterwards....

Remember when we said the assessment of blame for the "anti-Islam" toy gun promised to be entertaining? Someone is bound to blame Israel or America at some point, but this explanation is actually rather creative for a change.

Sheik Muhammad Al-Amin Ismail blames Shi'ites, due to the antagonism between Ali and Aisha. Ali is accepted by Shi'ites as the first imam and legitimate successor to Muhammad. Muhammad's child bride, Aisha, was not only the daughter of Abu Bakr, the first "rightly guided" caliph for Sunnis, but also never forgave Ali for noting to Muhammad that there were plenty of other brides to choose from when Aisha was accused of adultery.

And if you believe the Sheikh, the Shi'ites decided to stick it to the Sunnis with... a toy gun that plays offensive sounds. While stories of raids have been more recent, the toys have apparently been on the market for at least a few weeks before them. "Sudanese Preacher Sheik Muhammad Al-Amin Ismail Accuses Shiites of Distributing Anti-Sunni Toy Guns," from MEMRI, September 30:

Sheik Muhammad Al-Amin Ismail: I've brought you an example [of toys manufactured by Shiites]. We all hope that the brothers who supervise these products, and their import and export, will ban products such as these.

Holds up a toy pistol

The sound might not be so clear through the microphone.

Why do they do this?

Shoots the pistol, which emits shooting sounds and a metallic voice:

"Go, go, go. Pull over. Save the hostages."

Sheik Muhammad Al-Amin Ismail: It says: "Shoot 'Aisha" [the Prophet Muhammad's wife]. This is for children. "Shoot 'Aisha."

Pistols. This one costs five Sudanese liras, this one costs seven liras, and there is a large one that costs 20 liras. Again, the sound goes: "Shoot 'Aisha."

Toy pistol sound: "Go, go, go. Pull over. Save the hostages."

Sheik Muhammad Al-Amin Ismail: "Shoot 'Aisha." Until when?

The new constitution will be a deliberate U-turn from the interim one that respected "the cultural and social diversity of the Sudanese people," at least on paper. Wherever Sharia law experiences a revival, tolerance decreases, and persecution, harassment, and abuses of human rights increase.

Bashir is already wanted by the International Criminal Court for genocide in Darfur, but protected by the African Union and Arab League with the support of the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation (formerly the Organization of the Islamic Conference). His plans for the remainder of Sudan after the south's independence amount to cultural genocide (with some of the old fashioned kind likely to follow), with a stated plan of linguistic and cultural Arabization to accompany the imposition of Sharia law.

"Bashir says Sudan will adopt Islamic constitution," from Reuters, October 13:

KHARTOUM - Sudan will go ahead with plans to adopt an entirely Islamic constitution and strengthen Islamic law, President Omar Hassan al-Bashir said on Wednesday, three months after its former civil war enemy South Sudan became independent.

Juba seceded on 9 July after a referendum agreed under a 2005 peace deal that ended decades of civil war between the mainly Muslim north and the South where most follow Christian and traditional beliefs.

Bashir had said in December that Sudan would adopt an Islamic constitution if Juba seceded but many southerners had hoped he would not deliver on this.

His comments will add to uncertainty for more than a million southerners who still live in the north and are now treated legally as foreigners. Khartoum has given them until spring to leave or obtain the legal right to stay, a complicated process.

"Ninety-eight percent of the people are Muslims and the new constitution will reflect this. The official religion will be Islam and Islamic law the main source (of the constitution)," Bashir told students in Khartoum in a speech.

"We call it a Muslim state," said Bashir, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court on charges of war crimes in Darfur.

The 2005 peace deal set up an interim constitution which limited Islamic law to the north and recognized "the cultural and social diversity of the Sudanese people"....

A renewed interest in enforcing Sharia consistently results in decreasing tolerance, and increasing harassment and intimidation. In Sudan, president Omar al-Bashir, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for genocide, has openly stated his intentions for the cultural and linguistic Arabization of Sudan, and the imposition of Sharia on the remainder of the country following the independence of South Sudan. His recent actions against the Nuba people have already shown he is not wasting any time, and here is yet another such indication.

"Bishop highlights challenges facing Christians in North Sudan," from Catholic Culture, July 22 (thanks to Twostellas):

The auxiliary bishop of Khartoum--the capital of North Sudan--says that Christians there are facing increasing difficulties following the independence of South Sudan.

Bishop Daniel Adwok told a Catholic radio station in South Sudan that the largely Muslim population of North Sudan is increasingly less tolerant of Christians and that the government is poised to implement Sharia law fully.

More: "'Do not forget the Christians in north Sudan"' appeal on behalf of the Auxiliary Bishop of Khartoum," from Agenzia Fides, July 21:

[...] For Christians who remain in the north, the situation is not easy, underlines Msgr. Adwok to Radio Good News in Rumbek: Christians in Sudan are having to face a negative attitude by the local population that supports last year's President Bashir’s decree that states that after the independence of southern Sudan, the North will become an Islamic country, where there is full implementation of the sharia, with Arabic being the only official language of the state. Mgr. Adwok also stressed the financial difficulties that Catholic schools are facing in Sudan, to the point that the closure of some schools is being taken into consideration.

Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir has made abundantly clear his intentions for the remainder of the country after South Sudanese independence became official: a plan of cultural and linguistic Arabization, and the imposition of Sharia. Bashir is already wanted by the International Criminal Court for genocide, and the U.N. says he has now unleashed a "devastating" campaign against the Nuba people in what is now the south of Sudan.

Despite his past crimes, he has been defended and protected not only by the African Union, which has its own vested interests in not setting a precedent for African rulers to be tried, but the Arab League and the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation (until recently, the Organization of the Islamic Conference).

We hear time and again of Islam's supposed egalitarianism on the matter of race, as Muhammad once patronizingly said, "You should listen to and obey your ruler even if he was an Ethiopian (black) slave whose head looks like a raisin" (Sahih Bukhari 9.89.256). Those claims, used heavily in Islamic proselytizing, ring hollow as an "Arab" leader (more below) again slaughters darker-skinned Africans with impunity, while the OIC and Arab League look the other way.

"UN mission accuses Sudan of shelling and torturing civilians in Nuba war," by Julie Flint for the Guardian, July 16:

The full horror of the campaign of violence that the government in Khartoum has unleashed against the black African Nuba people of Sudan has been laid bare in two confidential reports by the UN peacekeeping force that the Observer has obtained.

The accounts of "devastating" daily aerial bombardment of civilians, "indiscriminate shelling" of crowded civilian areas, summary executions and deliberate targeting of dark-skinned people are contained in a 19-page report requested by the UN security council. A second report details how "active obstruction by state authorities (in South Kordofan) has completely undermined the ability of the peacekeeping force, UN Mission in Sudan (Unmis), to fulfil the most basic requirements of its mandate" in the Nuba region.

In any North American town, Bashir could easily be described as a black man; Nicholas Kristof discussed Bashir's background in this 2007 editorial. If not for the gravity of his crimes in the name of Islamic and Arab supremacism, his self-hatred of his African ancestry would be comical, reminiscent of Dave Chapelle's black Klansman.

The report says the humanitarian assistance and protection provided by Unmis have become "inconsequential" as it prepares to leave Sudan, at Khartoum's insistence, by 31 July. Unmis officials say privately that they have been "deaf and blind" in South Kordofan ever since war broke out on 5 June and cannot even estimate how many people have been killed and displaced by the fighting – widely perceived as a first step towards President Omar al-Bashir's stated goal of suppressing ethnic and cultural diversity in favour of a rigid Arab-Islamic regime, following South Sudan's decision to separate from the North.

The UN undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs, Valerie Amos, said on Friday that 1.4 million people were affected by what she called "skirmishes" in South Kordofan, which borders the now independent Republic of South Sudan, and by Khartoum's refusal to grant "unhindered access" to them. Causing fury among hard-pressed colleagues on the ground, who have been crying out for much stronger support from the security council, she appeared to cast doubt on their reporting, saying: "We do not know whether there is any truth to the grave allegations of extra-judicial killings, mass graves and other violations in South Kordofan."

The Nuba Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) – formerly allied with the South, but now seeking a northern alliance to overthrow the Bashir government – claims that more than 400,000 people have been displaced and 3,000 killed or disappeared. One Unmis staffer, quoted in one of the documents seen by the Observer, reported seeing the bodies of approximately 150 Nuba lying in pools of blood in just one of the many army barracks in the state capital, Kadugli.

Khartoum and the SPLA have accused each other of starting the fighting, after a ceasefire that began in 2002. Unmis's report for the security council, prepared by its human rights section, notes that the SPLM/A refused to accept the results of disputed state elections in May, but says there is no evidence that it initiated military operations. Rather, it says, the fighting may have been triggered by an ultimatum for Nuba fighters to move to South Sudan by 1 June – an order that was tantamount to "disenfranchising them of their citizenship", given the promise of partition in July.

The report suggests that the "especially egregious" crimes committed by government forces justify referral to the international criminal court. It argues that "the international community cannot afford to remain silent in the face of such deliberate attacks by the government of Sudan against its own people".

Deploring the "gross contempt" and "violent and unlawful acts" of government forces towards Unmis – including execution of a staff member, assaults, arbitrary arrests and detentions, and ill treatment "amounting to torture" – the report says: "Condemnation is insufficient… The international community must hold the government of Sudan accountable for its conduct and insist that it arrest and bring to justice those responsible."....

The Republic of South Sudan is independent today. But the jihad against it is sure not to let up. This new nation deserves the support of all free nations. "Jihad In Sudan Redux," from Christian News Today, July 9:

On July 9, the mostly Christian South Sudan will legally and officially separate from the Muslim north and become a new, independent and free country. Fearing loss of its iron clad grip of other non-Arab regions in the north, whose people likely envy the freedoms won by the South, Arab/Islamist leaders in Khartoum have launched a military assault on the Nuba Mountains, a mixed Christian, animist and Muslim region. Reports from the area are gruesomely reminiscent of the decades-long assault Khartoum waged on the South. These include forced conversions to Islam, mass displacement, bombing of civilians and mass slaughter.

Anticipating the effects of Christians winning freedom from his rule already in December of 2010 Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, who is indicted by the International Criminal Court for genocide and crimes against humanity, laid out a vision for the future of his nation:

"If south Sudan secedes, we will change the constitution and at that time there will be no time to speak of diversity of culture and ethnicity... Sharia (Islamic law) and Islam will be the main source for the constitution, Islam the official religion and Arabic the official language", he told a group of supporters.

Al-Bashir made his statement as the people of Southern Sudan were preparing to vote in the referendum that secured their imminent independence. With less than a week left before South secedes, al-Bashir is determined to fulfill his promise not by changing the constitution, but through murder and ethnic cleansing.

After concluding a military occupation of the disputed border region of Abyei, which resulted in the expulsion of more than 100,000 (non-Arabs, mostly from the Dinka tribe), Sudanese army and government-sponsored Arab militias attacked the African tribes of Nuba Mountains, a region situated in the Northern state of Southern Kordofan. Reports indicate indiscriminate bombings of civilians and a systematic killing of the black-skinned Nuba, which forced estimated 100,000 to abandon their homes. One report described "door to door executions of completely innocent and defenseless civilians, often by throat cutting." Another suggested the government might be using chemical weapons. The Bishop of Nuba Mountains described the events as genocide: "Once again we are facing the nightmare of genocide of our people in a final attempt to erase our culture and society from the face of the earth." A well-respected Sudan analyst concurred.

Nuba embody the diversity of culture and religion that al-Bashir wants to destroy. Numbering some 1.5 million, Nuba people are Christians, Muslims and the followers of traditional faiths. It is not uncommon to find the adherents of all faiths within a single family. Comprising from more than fifty tribes and speaking an equal number of languages, the Nuba have an incredibly diverse culture.

Read it all.

South Sudan's hopeful creation as a new nation is a glorious moment, as well as a sobering one. We should remember as to why South Sudan's existence became necessary in the first place. We must remind the world over and over that the birth of South Sudan as a independent state was long required precisely because Muslims cannot long live amicably with followers of other belief systems.  As Islamic scripture teaches quite explicitly, and as Muslim repeatedly tell themselves, devout Muslims cannot treat the unbelievers with anything approaching equality.

South Sudan's secession from Sudan is in many way a mirror image of another 'secession' that took place over 60 years ago. In the waning days of the British Empire, British India was to be divided into two countries, a Muslim one and a Hindu one, and India was to be cleaved forever into those two parts. The pain and agony of the partitioning process aside (hundreds of thousands are estimated to have died in the resulting forced migrations, associated pogroms, and resettlement), how should history judge the British decision to partition India?

While the larger Hindu India has found a modicum of political stability, has enjoyed decades of economic success, and exports its vibrant culture via its booming film industry worldwide, its Muslim counterpart Pakistan flirts with failed-nation status.

Pakistan is in fact a nightmare of state-sponsored jihadist terrorism inside and outside of its borders. Except for a tiny elite, the country only offers unimaginable squalor and poverty for its people. It has featured a string of unbelievably incompetent and corrupt governments that have exported Islamic terrorism to distant continents, as far as the UK and the USA. Pakistan harbors the world's top terrorists who are allowed to live inside its borders with impunity, free to continue conspiring and plotting mass murder. Pakistan has launched three wars of aggression in its blood-soaked history, all against India, all of which Pakistan lost. Pakistan builds nuclear weapons and nuclear-capable missiles, which it sells the technology for to any and all comers, no questions asked. Pakistan sucks up gifts such as weapons and supplies, intelligence data from the US, and especially financial aid packages from the rest of the world, and either squirrels the money away into various numbered accounts, or passes along as loot to jihad terrorists and other enemies of the Free World. Barbarous shariah laws viciously run riot and leave an ever-growing pile of broken and dead bodies in its wake. Pakistan's police and military murder journalists who question how and why such a horrid state of affairs has come to pass. And on and on.

Over sixty years of ignominious history has not been kind to the decision to create Pakistan. Pakistan itself is a bleeding sore in South Asia, and its continued existence is a shame if not an ongoing crime against humanity. If the past 64 years have proven anything, they prove that, quite unlike South Sudan, Pakistan does not deserve sovereignty, nor does it deserve to be treated as a member of the family of nations.

Given these incontrovertible facts, may I humbly suggest that Pakistan no longer be referred to as "Pakistan", the so-called 'Land of the Pure". Merely mentioning the name is, in a way, tacitly accepting its existence, which right-thinking people everywhere should instantly reject. So, from this point onwards, let us call that place by a more culturally and historically correct name: "Muslim-occupied India". For India was a Hindu land for thousands of years before the invading barbarians of Islam appeared to seize Hindu lands and slaughter its inhabitants, which laid the groundwork for the eventual Muslim calamitous maladministration of that same land.

In a just world, such mistakes would be reversed. One day, let us hope, let us work towards the day that Muslim-occupied India becomes India once again.

May this new nation, born out of the resistance to jihad, last 5000 years. "South Sudan Becomes New Nation Saturday," from CBNNews.com, July 8:

The Republic of South Sudan will join the community of nations on Saturday.

After the military celebrations and parades, the South will have to face up to the realities it faces.

It will be one of the most underdeveloped countries on the planet. Only 15 percent of its citizens can read and fears of renewed conflict abound.

The people of the South have endured a half century of civil war and oppression by the Islamic rulers of northern Sudan that left more than 2 million dead.

The South's population is heavily Christian and black African, two groups targeted by Omar Bashir's regime.

Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir, already wanted by the International Criminal Court for genocide, has stated his intentions to impose Sharia law and a campaign of cultural and linguistic Arabization on what remains of his country following the independence of South Sudan, which will be official on July 9. Bishop Elnail recognizes what is coming for what it is: "a war of domination and eradication."

"Bishop fears genocide in Sudan," by Karen Peake for Christian Today, June 22 (thanks to Zulu):

The Bishop of Kadugli is calling upon Christians worldwide to pray and fast ahead of South Sudan’s secession next month.

Bishop Andudu Adam Elnail has warned of a possible “genocide” in the Nuba Mountains region, where violence has broken out in recent weeks.

The region, home to many Christians, will remain under the control of Khartoum and the Muslim North when South Sudan gains its independence on July 9.

As Sudanese tanks and artillery move in, hundreds of thousands of Nuba are fleeing their homes and development agencies have withdrawn their staff.

UN officials and eyewitnesses escaping the bloodshed tell of elders being executed by the Sudanese Army and bombing campaigns that have destroyed churches and homes.

With Khartoum ordering the UN peacekeeping mission out, there are serious concerns that atrocities will spiral unchecked across the state of South Kordofan.

“Once again we are facing the nightmare of genocide of our people in a final attempt to erase our culture and society from the face of the earth,” said Bishop Elnail.

“It is not a war between armies that is being fought in our land, but the utter destruction of our way of life and our history, as demonstrated by the genocide of our neighbours and relatives in Darfur.

“This is a war of domination and eradication, at its core it is a war of terror by the government of Sudan against their people.”

He expressed concern for the future of Christians in the North, which President Omar al-Bashir declared will be ruled by Sharia law after July 9.

The bishop said that President al-Bashir’s refusal to recognise the legitimate presence of the Christian minority in the North was a “declaration of their determination to also end the remembrance of our Christian heritage that dates back two thousand years”...

In Khartoum, that would be known as jahiliyyah, trappings of the pre-Islamic period of "ignorance."

Ayatollah Pot, I believe you've met Ayatollah Kettle. This summit in Tehran has done a fine job of demonstrating yet again how uselessly vague the term "terrorism" is. It is the name of a tactic anyone can accuse anyone of using -- not so with jihad. And so it plays directly into the hands of Khamenei and kindred spirits to leave the discussion of jihad off the table.

Note also who takes the podium at this "counter-terrorism" conference: Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for genocide. That about says it all.

"Iran slams U.S. at conference on fighting terrorism," by Ramin Mostaghim and Alexandra Sandels for the Los Angeles Times, June 26:

A battered Peugeot sedan greeted visitors Saturday to a conference hall in north Tehran.

"Professor Massoud Ali Mohammadi, martyred in front of his house," explained an accompanying poster. It was a reference to the mysterious assassination last year of the Iranian physicist, killed when a bomb exploded near his car in Tehran. Iranian authorities have blamed the West for the killing.

The Peugeot was the symbolic scene-setter for a two-day conference in the Iranian capital on fighting terrorism. According to the Iranian media, officials from more than 60 countries and several heads of state flew in for the talks — among them Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court on war crimes charges.

The event was heavy on U.S.-bashing, generally reflecting Tehran's views about Washington's policy in the region.

In a message to the conference, Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei lashed out at the U.S. for drone strikes in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The attacks, he said, have "repeatedly" turned "wedding parties into mourning ceremonies." He echoed the official Iranian line that the U.S. and its allies are hypocrites, employing terrorist tactics that kill civilians while condemning others as terrorists.

"The United States, Britain and some Western governments, with a black record in terrorist behavior, have now added to their rhetoric the claim of fighting terrorism," Khamenei was quoted as saying by the semiofficial Fars News Agency. [...]

Sudanese President Bashir made a quick appearance at the podium, slamming Israel and the United States for "supporting terrorism," before jetting off on a trip to China, according to a journalist in his entourage.

Misunderstanders of Islam running amok, trying to terrorize the Christian South into staying under the Islamic government of the North, and no Correct Understanders of the Religion of Peace seem to be around to rein them in. "Sudanese Military, Militias Kill Christians in South Kordofan," from Compass Direct, June 17:

KHARTOUM, Sudan, June 17 (CDN) — Military intelligence agents killed one Christian, and Islamic militants sympathetic to the government slaughtered another last week after attacking churches in Sudan’s embattled South Kordofan state.

Christian sources said a Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) Intelligence unit detained Nimeri Philip Kalo, a student at St. Paul Major Seminary, on June 8 near the gate of the United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) in Kadugli’s al Shaeer area and shot him in front of bystanders. Kalo and other Christians were fleeing the town after Muslim militias loyal to the SAF attacked and looted at least three church buildings in Kadugli, they said.

UNMIS’s mandate is to support the Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the Government of Sudan and the country’s Christian and animist south, scheduled to secede on July 9, by helping in the disarmament process, among other means. Armed conflict in Kadugli broke out between southern and northern militaries on June 6 after northern forces seized Abyei last month.

SAF military intelligence agents accused Kalo of being a Christian and suspected he was therefore opposed to the Islamic government, the sources said.

“They shot him in front of our eyes and forced us not to cry, or else we would face the same fate,” a Christian source told Compass on condition of anonymity. Likewise, another Christian survivor said while breaking into tears, “They killed him in front of my eyes.”

On the same day, Islamic militants loyal to the SAF slaughtered a young Christian man by sword in Kadugli Market, the sources said. Adeeb Gismalla Aksam, 33, a bus driver whose father is an elder with the Evangelical Church in Kadugli, was murdered by Muslim extremists shouting, “Allahu-akbar [God is greater]!”

The Islamic militias were heard shouting “Allahu-akbar!” as they began shooting at a Roman Catholic Church building at 3:30 p.m. on June 8, during a mass in which the congregants were asking God to protect them.

“As we were praying, they started to pour bullets at us to the point that we were terribly scared,” a Christian who escaped the attack told Compass.

No one was hit by the bullets shot at the building from the outside, but SAF agents on June 8 arrested the Rev. Abraham James Lual in front of his congregation, a priest of a Kadugli parish told Compass. Accusing Lual of preaching that people should oppose the Islamic government, authorities took him to an unknown location and tortured him two days, releasing him the following morning, the priest said.

The Rev. Paul Okeny, another Catholic priest, told Compass that Islamic militias loyal to the SAF looted other churches in Kadugli as well, besides attacking Lual’s church and depriving him of his belongings....

Another Christian who requested anonymity said he was arrested at gunpoint by SAF military Intelligence agents at 8:30 a.m. on June 8. Accusing him of being anti-Islam and therefore opposed to the Islamic government, the security officers took him to a military jail, where he was severely beaten and “kicked like a ball,” he said.

According to the Christian, one high-ranking official told another, “Why shouldn’t you shoot him in his house so that his body gets rotten in his own house?” After taking him to his house, they started to torture him with sticks, guns and knives, saying, “We will kill you,” he said....

The SAF and Islamic militias on June 8 also set fire to buildings of the Episcopal Church of Sudan and the Sudanese Church of Christ in Kadugli, sources said.

“I saw a building of the Episcopal Church of Sudan in flames,” said one eyewitness....

On Sunday (June 12), North Kordofan Gov. Mutasim Mirghani Zaki El-deen declared jihad (holy war) on the Nuba people, most of whom are Christians....

Somehow I doubt that North Kordofan Gov. Mutasim Mirghani Zaki El-deen was referring to an interior spiritual struggle.

What is at stake for Abyei is whether it is forcibly included in Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir's stated plan to impose Sharia on all territory under Khartoum's control, and to launch a campaign of cultural and linguistic Arabization.

Bashir is already wanted by the International Criminal Court for genocide in Darfur, but protected by the African Union and Arab League with the support of the Organization of the Islamic Conference. And he is taking advantage of the fact that, with independence for South Sudan so tantalizingly close on July 9, no one wants to provoke a confrontation at this time that could spoil what has been so many years in the making. South Sudan in particular does not want to risk its own destruction at the hands of the north by challenging Khartoum's presence in Abyei.

International support and sustained pressure are essential to keep Abyei from becoming a trophy of Islamic supremacism. "Northern Sudan dismisses U.N. call for troops to quit Abyei," by Alex Dziadosz for Reuters, June 4:

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Khartoum on Saturday dismissed calls by the U.N. Security Council for it to withdraw its forces immediately from Abyei, the disputed region of divided Sudan they seized on May 21.

A senior official of the northern government in Khartoum said the dispute would be resolved only through north-south negotiations, not pressure from the council.

"This arrangement by government forces is a temporary arrangement. The only solution for the two parties is to find a solution different from referendum or to conduct the referendum," said Rabie Abdelati, an information ministry official and senior member of the ruling northern party.

"I don't see any justification for the United Nations Security Council to be involved."

South Sudan is scheduled to secede and become an independent country in about five weeks, and there has been no agreement on which state should control the fertile, oil-producing region of Abyei on the ill-defined border between them.

A referendum on whether it should be part of the north or south was marred by disputes over who should be allowed to vote. The region is used all year by Dinka Ngok people linked to the south and part of the year by northern Arab Misseriya nomads.

The security council condemned Khartoum's continued military control of Abyei in a unanimous statement, calling it a "serious violation" of north-south peace accords.

It expressed concern at an influx of Misseriya into Abyei town that "could force significant changes in the ethnic composition of the area."...

All the better to engineer the "referendum" results Khartoum wants.

All the better to hold onto Abyei, which the north recently invaded. While the UN office is in Khartoum, most of the personnel are in the south, so Khartoum would be largely trying to order the UN out of what is about not to be their country anymore. But Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir has big plans to impose Sharia and a campaign of cultural and linguistic Arabization on the remainder of his country, and Abyei. He doesn't want any unnecessary obstacles in the way of his Extreme Makeover/Final Solution.

And once again, "restive" is the reliable code word for "jihad-afflicted." "Sudan orders UN out of restive south," from the South African Press Agency and Agence France-Presse, May 31 (thanks to Ima Freeman):

Juba - Sudan has ordered the official termination of the UN's north-south peacekeeping mission on July 9, the date the south will declare full independence, Khartoum’s official news agency said.

“Sudan has officially notified the United Nations of the end of the term of the United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) on July 9,” Suna said in a statement late on Saturday.

Violence in the contested border region of Abyei following the occupation on May 21 by Khartoum’s troops and tanks have raised fears the two sides could tip back into civil war.

Heavy fighting has forced thousands of people to flee southwards.

Khartoum has received international condemnation for the taking of Abyei, saying that it violated the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) signed between the two sides to end two decades of civil war.

Sudan's Foreign Minister Ali Ahmed Karti sent a message to thank UN chief Ban Ki-moon, noting that Sudan has shown “the utmost cooperation, transparency and commitment” to the CPA, the deal that set up the UN force.

UNMIS includes over 10,000 people, most of whom are troops, as well as almost 500 military observers monitoring the peace agreement, and over 1,000 civilian staff.

Although UNMIS headquarters are in Khartoum, most staff are based in the south, which voted overwhelmingly to split from the north in a January referendum.

A separate joint UN-African Union force (UNAMID) operates in the north’s war-torn western Darfur region.

Omar al-Bashir's Islamic supremacist regime may yet be persuaded to leave Abyei, but it appears they will take all the spoils of war they can carry, and leave nothing left that can be burned. An update on this story: again, what is at stake for Abyei is the potential for the north to impose Sharia. "Sudan Abyei dispute: Gunmen burning and looting - UN," from BBC News, May 23:

The Sudanese town of Abyei has been set on fire, with gunmen looting property, the United Nations says.

The town and surrounding area are claimed by both Khartoum and by South Sudan, set to become independent in July. The town was captured at the weekend by northern troops.

The UN has urged Sudan's government in Khartoum to withdraw its forces.

Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir later said that Khartoum wanted to resolve the issue peacefully.

South Sudan's secession follows decades of north-south conflict and some fear this dispute could reignite the war.

'Act of war'

In a statement, the UN Mission in Sudan (Unmis) said it "strongly condemns the burning and looting currently being perpetrated by armed elements in Abyei town".

It stressed that the northern troops were "responsible for maintaining law and order in the areas they control", urging Khartoum to "intervene to stop these criminal acts".

South Sudan earlier denounced the Abyei takeover on Saturday as an act of war.

A southern military spokesman told the BBC the north had attacked the area with 5,000 troops, killing civilians and southern soldiers.

Some 20,000 people, almost the whole population of the town, had fled, aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) told the BBC.

Khartoum has said it acted after 22 of its men were killed in a southern ambush last Thursday. The northern troops were travelling in a UN convoy.

UN officials have described the incident as "a criminal attack" and the US called on South Sudan to "account" for the assault.

South Sudanese forces have denied responsibility for the incident.

Since then, both UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and EU top diplomat Catherine Ashton have condemned the violence in the region.

On Sunday, UN Security Council envoys said during a visit to Khartoum that the north should "withdraw immediately" its troops from the Abyei region. The diplomats have now arrived in South Sudan.

Tension over Abyei - a small town claimed by a southern group, the Dinka Ngok, and northern nomads, the Misseriya - has been rising since a referendum on its future scheduled for January was postponed....

Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for genocide but protected by the African Union and Arab League with the support of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, made clear his intentions to impose Sharia even more intensively on his territory once the south seceded. And al-Bashir has not even attempted to hoodwink the West with empty promises of "Sharia Lite," saying "Sharia law has always stipulated that one must whip, cut, or kill."

That is what is at stake for Abyei, and anything else al-Bashir sets his sights upon. "Sudan: UN urges Khartoum to pullout from Abyei region," from BBC News, May 22:

South Sudan is due to become independent in July, but Abyei is still claimed by both sides

UN Security Council envoys have urged North Sudan to "withdraw immediately" its troops from the contested Abyei region on the border with South Sudan.

The call was made by the French, Russian and US ambassadors to the UN.

South Sudan said the Abyei takeover was an act of war, saying civilians and southern soldiers were killed.

South Sudan is due to become independent in July, but Abyei's status remains to be determined after a referendum on its future was shelved.

People in the Southern capital of Juba are worried and there is a grim mood on the streets of the capital, the BBC's Peter Martell in South Sudan reports.

The North said it acted after 22 of its men were killed in a southern ambush earlier this week.

Residents flee

"The members of the Security Council call upon the government of Sudan to halt its military operation and withdraw immediately from Abyei town and its environs," the French ambassador to the UN, Gerard Araud, said in Khartoum.

"They condemn the escalatory military operation being undertaken by the Sudanese armed forces. This constitutes a serious violation of the CPA (Comprehensive Peace Agreement in 2005)," Mr Araud said.

He was speaking during a joint news conference with his Russian and US counterparts.

Separately, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and EU top diplomat Catherine Ashton condemned the violence in Abyei.

A southern military spokesman earlier told the BBC the North had attacked the area with 5,000 troops, killing civilians and southern soldiers.

Some 20,000 people, almost the whole population of the town, had fled, aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) told the BBC....

"I cannot tell anyone how we got this information," said Mohannad Mohammed's father. Is anyone watching him? "Sudanese diplomat killer slain in Somalia: father," from Agence France-Presse, May 8:

KHARTOUM - One of four Sudanese Islamists who escaped from prison last year after they were sentenced to hang for the murder of a US diplomat was killed while waging "jihad," or holy war, in Somalia, his father said on Saturday.

Mohannad Osman Yussif Mohammed was one of the four Islamists convicted of the New Year's Day killing, in 2008, of US diplomat John Granville, 33, and his driver Abdel Rahman Abbas, 40, who both worked for the US Agency for International Development (USAID).

"Today we were informed that Mohannad was killed in jihad in Somalia. I cannot tell anyone how we got this information," the man's father told reporters at his house in north Khartoum.

"I am calling for the government to release the Islamic youth from prison and also for the court to cancel the decision against Mohannad, because they were answering President Bashir's call when he told them to fight international troops in Darfur," he added.

The four escaped from Kober jail in northern Khartoum in June last year.

The United States said afterwards that it expected Sudan to apprehend the escapees and "ensure that justice is served."

Some of those who came to pay their condolences to the slain convict's family on Saturday congratulated them, shouting "Allahu Akbar!" (God is greatest!)...

Not that this has anything to do with Islam.

Once again we see government officials complicit in the Muslim persecution of Christians, because the Muslim officials read the same Qur'an and follow the same Muhammad as do the kidnappers in this case. "Islamists Suspected in Abduction of Christian Girl in Sudan," from Compass Direct News, February 22 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

NAIROBI, Kenya, February 22 (CDN) — A Christian widow in north Sudan is agonizing over the kidnapping of her daughter eight months ago by suspected Islamic extremists in Khartoum.

“Since my daughter was kidnapped, I have been living in a state of fear and terror,” said Ikhlas Anglo, 35, a mother of two daughters.

She said her 15-year-old daughter, Hiba Abdelfadil Anglo, went missing while returning from the Ministry of Education in Khartoum on June 27, 2010. Hiba, a member of Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church in Khartoum, had gone to the education ministry office to obtain her transcripts for entry to secondary school.

Two days later, the family received threatening telephone calls and SMS messages from the kidnappers telling them to pay 1,500 Sudanese pounds (US$560) in order to secure her return.

“Don’t you want to have this slave back?” one of the kidnappers told Anglo from an unknown location by cell phone, she said.

Anglo and others said they believe the kidnappers are Muslim extremists who have targeted them because they are Christians, and that police are aiding the criminals. She said that when she went to a police station to open a case, police bluntly told her she must first leave Christianity for Islam.

“You must convert to Islam if you want your daughter back,” officer Fakhr El-Dean Mustafa of the Family and Child Protection Unit told Anglo, she said. Recently transferred to another station, Mustafa was not immediately available for comment.

A relative of the girl said police are fully involved in the crime, as officers had traced the phone number of the kidnappers but were reluctant to admit that to the girl’s family.

‘‘The police have a direct link with the kidnappers,’’ the relative said....

No more "multi-ethnic," "multi-cultural" and "multi-religious" Sudan -- not that those assurances were ever much good for the Christians of the southern part of the country, anyway. More on this story. "Sudan mulls Islamic law after southern secession," from Deutsche Welle, January 26:

As referendum results make southern Sudan's independence from Khartoum nearly certain, northern Sudanese are unsure what is in store for their country. The president has promised to base the constitution on Sharia law.

Results from a week's worth of voting showed that more than 95 percent of people in Southern Sudan wanted to break away from the Khartoum government with more than 98 percent of votes counted. Official results are expected to be released at the end of January.

In his first public speech since the referendum, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir said on Tuesday he would support the new Southern state.

"Secession has become a reality, but we will not be sad ... we will go to the South and celebrate with them," Bashir said. "We will support the new Southern state and will hold onto its stability because we are neighbors and will remain friends."

While people in Southern Sudan are happy with the vote's outcome, anxiety is increasing in the country's North. Many people there fear that their freedom could be limited if the conservative form of Islam prevalent in the North gains ground as soon as the predominantly Christian South segregates from the country....

"If Sudan segregates I will change the constitution," he said before the referendum, adding that southerners staying in the North after calling for independence would be treated as foreigners. "All that belongs to the South will go there. The Sharia is the original source of our laws."

Basing the constitution on Sharia law represents a major change from the current interim constitution, which recognizes the "multi-ethnic," "multi-cultural" and "multi-religious" aspects of Sudan. Adopted under the 2005 peace deal, the interim constitution is set to expire in July when Southern Sudan is expected to declare independence.

A return to a more conservative form of Islam would be particularly hard on women, according to journalist Zeinab Saleh. She has been following the case of a woman who was whipped after reportedly walking in public with her fiance.

"We women are a disgrace in their eyes, anything could happen to me here," she said. "This young woman was portrayed as if she were a prostitute, only because she crossed the street with her fiance or boyfriend. They have a problem with the female species - how can I live in this kind of environment?"

Sudan's progressive Islamist opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi recently called on the Sudanese people to learn from the recent events in Tunisia and stand up against this government. He was arrested and released 48 hours later.

"We are giving the (ruling) National Congress Party a choice - to have a transitional government authorized by a new constitution, and then to conduct free and fair elections," he told a news conference ahead of a demonstration last week.

"If they don't agree to that, we are going to fight them in the streets," he added. "We're not an armed party and we're not going to stage a coup, but we are going to change the regime."

Threat noted.

An update on this story. The involvement of Arab tribes backed by a militia supported by Khartoum fits all too neatly with Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir's supremacist plan to impose an Arab identity on the remainder of the country and allow for no law but Sharia to govern the territory. Outsourcing the dirty work to local tribes gives Khartoum a strategic degree of plausible deniability.

Amid all of these recent developments, one must recall who has helped shield Bashir from prosecution for the charges of genocide he already faces: not only the African Union, which has its own vested interests in not setting a precedent for brutal leaders to be held to account, but also the Arab League, and the Organization of the Islamic Conference.

"20 Policemen Die in Attack in Sudan," by Jason Strasziuso and Maggie Fick for the Associated Press, January 10 (thanks to Twostellas):

JUBA, Sudan -- Southern Sudan's military spokesman says 20 policemen in the disputed north-south region of Abyei have been killed and 30 more wounded in two attacks by Arab tribesmen and militia.

Col. Philip Aguer said Monday that he believes the Arab tribesmen are supported by north Sudan's military. Aguer said the tribesmen attacked the police with anti-tank weapons and artillery.

Aguer says the attack came Sunday, the day that Southern Sudan began voting in an independence referendum likely to split Sudan in two and create the world's newest country.

Abyei, which lies on the north-south faultline, had been promised a separate self-determination vote, but its future is now being decided by north-south negotiations.

More: "Sudan border clashes kill 36 as south votes," by Andrew Heavens for Reuters, January 10:

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - At least 36 people have died in clashes between Arab nomads and southerners near Sudan's north- south border, leaders in the contested Abyei region said on Monday, on the second day of a vote on southern independence.

Analysts say the central region of Abyei is the most likely place for north-south tensions to erupt into violence during and after the vote, the climax of a troubled peace deal that ended decades of civil war.

Southerners are expected to vote to split from the mostly Muslim north, depriving Khartoum of most of its oil reserves.

Senior southern official Luka Biong condemned the fighting and told Reuters both sides were still trying to settle their bitter dispute over the ownership of Abyei as part of a package of negotiations, including how the regions will share oil revenues after a split.

Building leverage: Bashir knows he cannot launch an outright military response to a southern vote for independence. But it stands to reason, given his track record, that today's goodwill gesture may become an instrument for tomorrow's blackmail:

In a separate, more positive, development, former President Jimmy Carter told CNN on Monday that Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir had offered to take on all of the country's crippling debt if the south seceded. [...]

Leading members of Abyei's Dinka Ngok tribe, linked to the south, accused Khartoum of arming the area's Arab Misseriya militias in clashes on Friday, Saturday and Sunday and said they were expecting more attacks in days to come.

The speaker of the Abyei administration, Charles Abyei, said the Misseriya attacked because they had heard false rumors the Dinka were about to declare themselves part of the south.

"A large number of Misseriya attacked Maker village yesterday (Sunday), backed by government militia ... The first day one person died, the second day nine, yesterday 13 ... It will continue," he said.

The south's Biong warned the Misseriya could provoke the wrath of an independent southern Sudan if the attacks continued.

Misseriya leader Mokhtar Babo Nimr told Reuters 13 of his men had died in Sunday's clash and accused southerners of starting the fighting.

Residents of the central Abyei region were promised their own referendum on whether to join the north or the south but leaders could not agree on how to run the poll and the vote did not take place as planned on January 9.

A U.N. source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there had been another clash in the village of Todach on Monday morning.

The source said Misseriya were attacking police posts in the area, suspecting them of being occupied by southern soldiers, and said the death count could be higher. "Both sides are concealing their casualties," the source said, adding southern police and Dinka youth had been caught up in the fighting.

In another sign of tension, southern army spokesman Philip Aguer said two men -- a Ugandan and a northern army soldier -- were arrested with four boxes holding 700 rounds of AK-47 ammunition in the southern capital Juba on Sunday night....

He said it. Is Omar al-Bashir some kind of Islamophobe? No, he is looking forward to using the outcome of southern Sudan's independence referendum to ramp up Sharia law within the remainder of the country. Religious minorities in the north are rightfully afraid (along with all minorities who will be further marginalized under Bashir's intended campaign of cultural Arabization), given the subjugated status Islamic law prescribes for them (Qur'an 9:29). The entire population can look forward to more punishments like the flogging of a terrified woman by laughing police, which Bashir has emphatically defended.

When one looks at the contents of Sharia law and the Qur'anic verses and ahadith that underly it, it is easy to confirm that Bashir is not just a thug abusing the law; rather, it is Sharia that validates and guides his thuggery.

"Fears grow for minorities in north Sudan if south votes to secede," by Peter Moszynski for the Guardian, January 8:

As southern Sudanese prepare to vote for independence tomorrow, the jubilation at the prospective breakup of Sudan that is so widespread in the south is not shared by everyone in the north.

Particularly concerned are people in the two "contested areas" - South Kordofan and Blue Nile - who fought alongside the southerners in the civil war but have been left in the north by Sudan's comprehensive peace agreement (CPA).

With predominantly African populations of Nuba and Ingessana, who practise Christianity and traditional religions in addition to Islam, the people of the two areas are now being referred to as janubeen jadeed - the new southerners. This reflects their potential future status as marginalised Africans on the southern periphery of an integrated Arab-Islamist state. Precisely the same situation that led to the southerners calling for independence. [...]

Under the CPA, the two areas are supposed to have "popular consultation" on their future status, but this process - like the referendum for Abyei district - is completely off-track and people are extremely nervous about their future should the south vote to secede and President Omar al-Bashir carry out his threat to amend the constitution to consolidate north Sudan as an Arab-Islamic state with no concessions for racial or religious minorities.

Bashir recently declared: "If south Sudan secedes, we will change the constitution, and at that time there will be no time to speak of diversity of culture and ethnicity ... sharia and Islam will be the main source for the constitution, Islam the official religion and Arabic the official language."

This statement - coupled with his defiant stance on Islamic law after international condemnation of a YouTube video of a woman being flogged by laughing policemen - has caused massive unease among north Sudan's minorities. Bashir said those calling for an investigation into the ill-treatment misunderstood Islam, because "sharia law has always stipulated that one must whip, cut, or kill".

Kamal Kambal, of Nuba Mountains Solidarity Abroad, says: "This is the reason why the southerners want to break away, and of course it is also going to be a disaster for those of us who are going to be forced to live with people with this mindset." Pointing out that the Nuba had been fighting alongside the south "to prevent the imposition of sharia law and Arabic culture", Kambal adds: "For us, this statement is a declaration of war." [...]

"Bashir clearly doesn't recognise the rights of anyone other than Arabs and Muslims," Kambal says. "He allowed cultural and religious freedom for minorities while he wanted to keep the southerners on board, but what rights will Christians and minority people like the Nuba have after the south breaks away?"

He believes that Britain and the CPA's other international guarantors are "currently only concerned about the south and the referendum, and have forgotten about the CPA's protocol on the two contested areas, which stipulates 'popular consultation' on the future status of South Kordofan and Blue Nile".

Ahmed Hussein Adam, spokesman for Darfur's Justice and Equality Movement, says: "This has revealed the true face of President Bashir and gives a clear indication of the type of state we're going to be left with after the separation of the south...."

They want Sharia in the entire country "whether citizens of the mainly Christian region of south Sudan like it or not."

Isn't it great that Judge Vicki Miles-LaGrange made Oklahoma safe for Sharia?

"Sudan: Fundamentalist Clerics Reject South Sudan Referendum, Demand Islamic Laws," from the Sudan Tribune, December 25 (thanks to Twostellas):

Khartoum -- A group of Islamic fundamentalists on Friday overtly faulted the Sudanese government for accepting south Sudan's referendum on independence, and demanded imposition of Islamic Shar'iah law in the entire country whether citizens of the mainly Christian region of south Sudan like it or not.

South Sudan, whose population mostly follows Christianity or traditional beliefs, is bound for secession from the Muslim-ruled north in a referendum vote due in January 2011, a plebiscite stipulated by the 2005's Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) which in 2005 ended nearly half a century of intermittent civil war between north and south Sudan.

Under the CPA, north Sudan maintained Islamic laws whereas the south was given extensive autonomy under a secular government led by the former southern rebels Sudan People's Liberation Movement [SPLM].

The legitimate League of Muslim Preachers and Clerics (LLMPC), a group of radical clerics existing in parallel to the official clerical body known as the Association of Muslim Scholars, marched in protest on Friday, 24 December, and held a press conference in which the group's leaders declared rejection to south Sudan's referendum on independence and called on the government to implement Shari'ah law in full.

The group's prominent member Mohamed Abdel-Karim addressed the protestors and demanded the government in the north fulfills its long-standing promise to implement Shari'ah Islamic law regardless of what southerners want.

Abdel-Karim, whose name is often cited in association with Al-Qaidah branch in the Land of the Two Niles, said that the implementation of Islamic Shari'ah was currently incomplete in Sudan as evidenced by the fact that president Al-Bashir said he would adopt an Islamic constitution after south Sudan secession.

Sudan president Al-Bashir last week sparked a nationwide controversy when declared that the north would change the constitution to make Shari'ah the only source of lawmaking and Arabic the only language if the south decided to part ways with the north....

"But the opaque talk [about] the Sudanese people I don't know what...is multi-racial and multi-religious, the [Islamic] Shari'a will be the main source for lawmaking....and Arabic language will the official language of the state as will be stipulated in the upcoming constitution," Al-Bashir added.

The group's leaders declared south Sudan's referendum on independence as "null and void" and part of a "Zionist-Western" plot to divide Sudan into five frail states, implying that the government was already aware that signing the CPA would pave the way for the south to secede....

Abdel-Karim further warned that secession would reflect negatively on the Islamic gains in the south under a strong secular drive to boot Islam out of the region.

In August 2009, Mohamed Abdel-Karim and his group sparked concerns of raising religious extremism when they issued a Fatwa branding members of the Sudanese communist party as infidels and instructed that they should be divorced from their spouses and their children to be deemed children of adultery....

This is, of course, the same Sudanese president wanted by the International Criminal Court for genocide, and shielded from prosecution by the African Union and Arab League, with the support of the Organization of the Islamic Conference.

Here, he lays out his plans for the final Islamization of the remainder of Sudan, with a hefty dose of Arab imperialism. This plan will amount to cultural genocide, likely with some of the old-fashioned kind as well. Life will be made extremely difficult for non-Arabic speakers, and all the more so for non-Muslims, so that they "feel themselves subdued," per Qur'an 9:29, and to coerce them into converting or leaving.

"Sharia law to be tightened if Sudan splits - president," from BBC News, December 19 (thanks to Sam):

The north of Sudan will reinforce its Islamic laws if the south secedes as a result of next month's referendum, President Omar al-Bashir has said.

Mr Bashir said the constitution would then be changed, making Islam the only religion, Sharia the only law and Arabic the only official language.

Correspondents say his comments are likely to alarm thousands of non-Muslim southerners living in the north.

They are currently protected from some of the stronger aspects of Sharia.

"If south Sudan secedes, we will change the constitution," Mr Bashir told a gathering of his supporters in the eastern town of Gederef on Sunday.

Commence Operation Out-Saudi The Saudis:

"Sharia and Islam will be the main source for the constitution, Islam the official religion and Arabic the official language," the president added.

The imposition of Sharia on the non-Muslim south was one of the reasons for the long civil war, which ended when a peace deal was signed in 2005, the BBC's James Copnall in Khartoum reports.

Under the accord, an interim constitution was drafted that removed Sharia law from the south and also recognised Sudan's cultural and social diversity, our correspondent says.

President Bashir said on Sunday there would be no question of this diversity when a new constitution was drafted, if the south became independent

Senior northern officials are just starting to acknowledge publicly that South Sudan - where most people follow traditional beliefs and Christianity - are almost certain to choose to separate in the referendum.

Separately, Mr Bashir also commented on a recent high-profile case in which a video posted on the internet showed a woman being flogged by police in the north.

Watch the video. All of it. It is disturbing, but this is part and parcel of the cruel, backward, and morally defective legal system that must not be allowed to advance against the rights and protections of Western constitutions. One report adds that women in Sudan are punished with "600,000 lashes a year" according to the total sentences carried out.

"If she is lashed according to Sharia law, there is no investigation. Why are some people ashamed? This is Sharia," the president said.

Human rights activists have accused the police of treating the woman in a particularly brutal way not compatible with Islam.

Qur'an 24:2 on floggings: "Let no compassion move you." They were just following orders.

"So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which Allah hath guarded. As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them." -- Qur'an 4:34

"Sudan: Women are punished with '600,000' lashes a year," from AKI, December 16 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

Khartoum, 16 Dec. (AKI) - Forty thousand women in Sudan are subject to police whippings for moral transgressions each year, a figure that came to light after a video was circulated on the Internet which showed the public thrashing of a Khartoum woman.

Sudanese feminist and political figure Mariam al-Sadiq al-Madi brought the issue to the attention of authorities, the Sudanese daily al-Sharq al-Awsat reported.

The drama of the physical punishments against women in Sudan is much more serious than previously believed," al-Madi said. She said that each year around 600,000 lashes are dealt to women in Sudan.

"The situation was worsened by a 1991 law that increased violence against them," she added.

The so-called 'law 152' allows for women to be whipped for an array of 'moral' crimes including wearing trousers as in the case of a journalist, Lubna Ahmad Hussein, who was found guilty of this 'crime' last year.

According to lawyer Nabil Adib, "a vast array of crimes allows for whippings," she said, citing the excessive use of alcohol and gambling to washing one's car in an incorrect location as crimes punishable by flogging.

Good thing Judge Vicki Miles-LaGrange made Oklahoma safe for Sharia, eh?

The penalty for fornication or sodomy, according to the Shafi'i Sharia manual 'Umdat al-Salik:

If the offender is someone with the capacity to remain chaste, then he or she is stoned to death (def: o12.6), someone with the capacity to remain chaste meaning anyone who has had sexual intercourse (A: at least once) with their spouse in a valid marriage, and is free, of age, and sane. A person is not considered to have the capacity to remain chaste if he or she has only had intercourse in a marriage that is invalid, or is prepubescent at the time of material intercourse, or is someone insane at the time of marital intercourse who subsequently regains their sanity prior to committing adultery.

If the offender is not someone with the capacity to remain chaste, then the penalty consists of being scourged (def: o12.5) one hundred stripes and banished to a distance of at least 81 km./50 mi. for one year. [...]

An offender is not scourged in intense heat or bitter cold, or when he is ill and recovery is expected (until he recovers), or in a mosque, or when the offender is a woman who is pregnant, until she gives birth and has recovered from childbed pains. The whip used should be neither new nor old and worn-out, but something in between. The offender is not stretched out when scourged, or bound (O: as his hands are left loose to fend off blows), or undressed (O: but rather an ankle-length shirt is left upon him or her), and the scourger does not lay the stripes on hard (O: by raising his arm, such that he draws blood). The scourger distributes the blows over various parts of the body, avoiding the vital points and the face. A man is scourged standing; a woman, sitting and covered (O: by a garment wrapped around her). If the offender is emaciated, or sick from an illness not expected to improve, then he or she is scourged with a single date palm frond (O: upon which there are a hundred strips, or fifty. If a hundred, such an offender is struck once with it, and if fifty, then twice), or with the edge of a garment.

Video thanks to Pamela Geller, who has information here about Sudanese freedom fighter Simon Deng's Sudan Freedom Walk.

This story has come out of Sudan. Just days ago, there was a college chapel seized in Pakistan. Wow, did these guys call each other?

No. What is most revealing about such stories is how often the same acts of discrimination (if not violence) against non-Muslims occur, geographically far removed from one another, but with the same intent: to make the unbelievers "feel themselves subdued" (Qur'an 9:29), and to establish and maintain Islamic supremacy by any means necessary.

"Police in Sudan Aid Muslim's Effort to Take Over Church Plot," from Compass Direct News, October 25:

NAIROBI, Kenya, October 25 (CDN) -- Police in Sudan evicted the staff of a Presbyterian church from its events and office site in Khartoum earlier this month, aiding a Muslim businessman's effort to seize the property.

Christians in Sudan's capital city told Compass that police entered the compound of the Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church (SPEC) on Oct. 4 at around 2 p.m. and ordered workers to leave, claiming that the land belonged to Muslim businessman Osman al Tayeb. When asked to show evidence of Al Tayeb's ownership, however, officers failed to produce any documentation, the sources said.

The church had signed a contract with al Tayeb stipulating the terms under which he could attain the property - including providing legal documents such as a construction permit and then obtaining final approval from SPEC - but those terms remained unmet, church officials said.

Church leader Deng Bol said that under terms of the unfulfilled contract, the SPEC would turn the property over to al Tayeb to construct a business center on the site, with the denomination to receive a share of the returns from the commercial enterprise and regain ownership of the plot after 80 years.

"But the investor failed to produce a single document from the concerned authorities" and therefore resorted to police action to secure the property, Bol said.

SPEC leaders had yet to approve the project because of the high risk of permanently losing the property, he said.

"The SPEC feared that they were going to lose the property after 80 years if they accepted the proposed contract," Bol said.

SPEC leaders have undertaken legal action to recover the property, he said. The disputed plot of 2,232 square meters is located in a busy part of the heart of Khartoum, where it has been used for Christian rallies and related activities.

"The plot is registered in the name of the church and should not be sold or transfered for any other activities, only for church-related programs," a church elder who requested anonymity said.

The Rev. Philip Akway, general secretary of the SPEC, told Compass that the government might be annoyed that Christian activities have taken place there for many decades.

Sharia is unique in how readily people suppose lapses in enforcement represent its true form, extolling what happens in spite of Sharia as merits of the law itself. But whatever relative tolerance has been observed decades past does nothing to defang Sharia, once its proponents assert themselves. It is at that point that this church now finds itself.

"Muslim groups are not happy with the church in north Sudan, therefore they try to cause tension in the church," Akway told Compass.

The policeman leading the officers in the eviction on Oct. 4 verbally threatened to shoot anyone who interfered, Christian sources said.

Proof that liturgical dance should be avoided at all costs. "Sudanese Cardinal Survives Assassination Attempt," from Zenit, October 12 (thanks to Roland):

KHARTOUM, Sudan, OCT. 12 (Zenit.org).- The archbishop of Khartoum escaped unhurt from an assassination attempt that was directed at him on Sunday, the feast of St. Daniele Comboni.

The Catholic Information Service for Africa (CISA) reported today that during a Mass held at the Comboni playground in Khartoum, marking the anniversary of the 1881 death of St. Daniele Comboni, a man with a dagger posed as liturgical dancer and managed to come within a few steps of Archbishop Gabriel Cardinal Zubeir Wako.

The man was apprehended, and has been identified as Hamdan Mohamed Abdurrahman, an Arab of the nomadic Messiria tribe from Southern Kurdufan. He is in police custody as authorities determine his intentions and whether or not he was acting alone.

The master of ceremonies, Barnaba Matuech Anei, is reported to have been the one to spot the would-be attacker, and disarm him. He told CISA that the Church in Sudan will seek to "find out what was his mission [...] and why he did carry a dagger with him. After that, we will see what to do next.

"We must know his background and identity. If he has people backing him to carry out such actions in the church, we would like to know."...

More fashion jihad, although this one seems to be directed more at the mixing of the sexes than at the fashion show itself. What fun they will have in Paris. Sharia Alert: "Police arrest models after fashion show," from Reuters, June 28 (thanks to Block Ness):

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Sudanese police briefly detained more than 20 models, make-up artists and designers after a rare mixed-sex fashion show in Khartoum, participants said Saturday.

Amateur models taking part in the "Sudanese Next Top Model Fashion Show" told Reuters they were rounded up late Thursday by Sudan's public order police, a body known for its crackdowns on indecent dress and drinking in the Muslim north....

All of the detainees were released Friday but at least six were told to report to the police Sunday to face unspecified charges, said one participant.

"They came to the club after the show and arrested between 20 and 30 people -- not just models, but people doing the make- up, the people who provided the clothes," said the participant, who asked to remain anonymous.

"There was nothing bad about the clothes. There were wedding dresses, traditional Sudanese clothes, suits, clothes from local shops and tobs (traditional Sudanese wraparound dresses)."

Other participants said there had been fashion shows before in Sudan, many of them held in private. But Thursday's event was thought to be one of the first public events to feature male and female models sharing the catwalk.

Could it be that someone in the prison who sympathized with their point of view made sure this "escape" happened? After all, supporters of the jihad against the U.S. are not exactly thin on the ground in the Sudan. "Sudanese killers of US envoy 'escape from prison,'" from AFP, June 11:

KHARTOUM -- Four Sudanese Islamists sentenced to hang for the 2008 murder of a US diplomat have escaped from prison, a security source told AFP on Friday.

"It's true. The four men escaped yesterday (Thursday) from the Kober jail" in northern Khartoum, the source said, on condition of anonymity, referring to a report in the pro-government daily Al-Rai Al-Aam.

A US embassy spokesman said "we have read those reports and are reviewing them.'

John Granville, 33, worked for the US Agency for International Development (USAID). He and his driver, Abdel Rahman Abbas, 40, were fatally shot in their car on January 1, 2008 as they returned from a New Year's Eve celebration.

Sudanese authorities charged five young Islamists with the double murder, of whom four were handed the death penalty last year.

In line with Islamic law, the victims' families were asked whether they forgave the defendants, sought compensation from them or wanted to see the death penalty enforced.

The death sentences were first handed down in June but suspended in August after Abbas's father forgave the men. The convictions were renewed in October when both families formally called for the sentence to be carried out.

"Sudanese law does not provide for" a life sentence for murder, said Granville's mother, Jane Granville, in a statement.

"Thus, it is with a heavy heart that I have to conclude that I am left with no other option. The death penalty is the only sentence that will protect others from those who took my beloved son's life."

One of the four condemned men is the son of a leader of pacifist Islamist group Ansar al-Sunna, which is linked to Wahhabism -- a hardline form of Sunni Islam practised mainly in Saudi Arabia-- but is not involved in politics....

The killers showed no mercy: They didn't spare women and children, or even a 4-day-old baby, from their machetes. Nigerian women wailed in the streets as a dump truck carried dozens of bodies past burned-out homes toward a mass grave.

Rubber-gloved workers pulled ever-smaller bodies from the dump truck and tossed them into the mass grave on Monday. A crowd began singing a hymn with the refrain, "Jesus said I am the way to heaven." As the grave filled, the grieving crowd sang: "Jesus, show me the way." - from a news account of the mass-murdering by Muslims, of Christians sleeping in their beds, attacked in the middle of the night, on all sides, by Muslim Fulanis.

And you can read more here.

You've already forgotten just a bit, haven't you? That is, forgotten the details? You remember that about 600 people were killed in north-central Nigeria - was it a week ago? Or two weeks? Or three weeks? It's hard to remember -- when Muslims of the Fulani tribe surrounded Christian villages at night, where there were mostly women and children, and set fire to their houses, and then with machetes killed them, while the Muslim-officered army and police did nothing to prevent it. And you may remember, or not, how in January there was the same story, when Muslims attacked Christians, on a Sunday, burning them alive in a church. But on that occasion, since the Christians around included men, they did fight back, and so that January story's details have been forgotten, and the BBC, and NPR, and everyone else had a high old time, in describing the six hundred Christians murdered last week, in glibly (and wrongly) calling it a "revenge" for the attacks in January -- as if the attacks in January had not been instigated by the Muslims in the first place, and the Christians only inflicting casualties because they were defending themselves.

I've been noting for years that the genocide in southern Sudan and Darfur was identified as a jihad by its perpetrators. But the mainstream media and official Washington have always characterized it as "ethnic violence." Will they believe Sadiq al-Mahdi? I doubt it. He must be some kind of Islamophobe.

"Ex-PM Mahdi blasts Sudan ruling party on south, Darfur," from AFP, February 15:

KHARTOUM -- Former Sudanese premier Sadiq al-Mahdi kicked off his presidential campaign Monday with a blistering attack on the ruling National Congress Party, which he accused of devastating the country.

Mahdi, a leading contender against President Omar al-Beshir in April's elections, also accused the NCP of using the "ethnic weapon" in the war-torn Darfur region.

"The catastrophe that afflicted our country began with the takeover by a minority party that imposed an Arabic Islamic identity on a country of diverse religions and cultures, and treating whoever did not agree with it as a renegade to be fought by jihad," Mahdi told a news conference....

Axis of Evil Update: Kim Jong Il throws in his lot with the Somali jihadis, via the Sudanese jihadis. "N.Korean Arms Cache 'Bound for Sudan,'" from the Chosun Ilbo, December 16 (thanks to Maxwell):

A Georgian cargo plane carrying North Korean weapons that was intercepted in Thailand last Saturday was bound for Sudan, reports say. Christian LeMiere, the editor of Jane's Intelligence Weekly, told AP on Tuesday that the aviation path of the plane suggested it was heading to Sudan, where they might have been handed over to armed groups in Somalia through Chad and Eritrea.

Siemon Wezeman of the Arms Transfers Project of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, agreed, telling AP that the "types of arms found in the aircraft -- used to add firepower against planes and tanks in the arsenal of government forces -- were typical of those used by insurgent movements, and raised suspicion they could be headed for an African rebel group."...

But as everyone knows, the ex-Muslim convert to Christianity in Ohio, Rifqa Bary, has nothing, nothing, nothing whatsoever to fear from her Muslim family or from any other Muslim, and those who think she does have reason to fear are greasy Islamophobes. These Sudanese Muslims must be Misunderstanders of Islam. There is no doubt, however, that Honest Ibe Hooper, Brave Ahmed Rehab, and the distinguished emeritus yada yada M. Cherif Bassiouni are On The Case, explaining to them as we speak how they are Misunderstanding Islam.

"Muslim Relatives of Sudanese Christian Woman Pursue Her, Son," from Compass Direct News, December 10 (thanks to Maxwell):

NAIROBI, Kenya, December 10 (CDN) -- A Sudanese woman who fled to Egypt after converting from Islam to Christianity is living in secluded isolation as her angry family members try to track her down.

Howida Ali's Muslim brother and her ex-husband began searching for her in Cairo earlier this year after a relative there reported her whereabouts to them. While there, her brother and ex-husband tried to seize her 10-year-old son from school.

"I'm afraid of my brother finding us," said the 38-year-old Ali, who has moved to another area. "Their aim is to take us back to Sudan, and there they will force us to return to the Islamic faith or sentence us to death according to Islamic law."...

"Cultural and intimidation issues" -- not surprising, in a culture of intimidation. "Nigerian player in Sudan wants out before next year," from the Sudan Tribune, December 4 (thanks to John):

December 3, 2009 (KHARTOUM) - A Nigerian player in the top Sudanese club El-Merreikh is planning to leave the country by year end citing cultural and intimidation issues he faced since transferring.

The striker Stephen Worgu made the disclosure in an interview with Nigerian sports radio station, Brila FM on Monday.

"I hope to leave Sudan by December," he said but in another interview with Reuters said that would not move to another club in Africa.

In 2008 Worgu was top scorer of the CAF Champions League with 13 goals and was approached by several European and African clubs including Egypt's Al-Ahly, but opted to move to Sudan after El-Merreikh made him a $1 million offer which raised eyebrows locally.

However, the Christian player was recently a center of a controversy after being sentenced last month to 40 lashes in Sudan after being convicted of drunk driving.

Worgu dismissed the charges as false saying that given the locally made alcoholic beverage he was accused of consuming is of "cheap" nature inconsistent with the money he makes.

"They say I drank araki ... I asked my lawyer what is araki? He said it is a local drink that contains alcohol," said the footballer. "The lawyer was like saying this guy earns good money how he can drink araki?" a cheap local drink....

Last week a Christian Southern Sudanese teenager Silva Kashif was arrested while walking to the market near her home in the Khartoum suburb of Kalatla.

Her mother Jenty Doro told Reuters that Khashif was taken to Kalatla court where she was convicted and punished by a female police officer in front of the judge.

"I only heard about it after she was lashed. Later we all sat and cried ... People have different religions and that should be taken into account," she said.

The family is planning to file a lawsuit against the police for clearing her daughter's name and receive compensation.

Under the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) a commission for the rights of Non-Muslims in the capital is tasked with defending the interests of Southerners living in the capital governed by Islamic Shari'a law.

However, observers say that the commission has been ineffective in carrying out its mandate.

What a surprise!

The learned analysts have repeatedly assured us that Sharia provisions do not apply to non-Muslims.

Sharia Alert: "Christian girl, 16, gets 50 lashes for wearing 'indecent' knee-length skirt in Sudan," from the Daily Mail, November 27 (thanks to Alexandre):

A 16-year-old Sudanese girl was lashed 50 times after a judge ruled her knee-length skirt was indecent, her family said today.

The mother of Christian teenager Silva Kashif said she is to sue police and the judge who imposed the sentence under Islamic shariah law.

Saying she only learned about her daughter's conviction after she had been lashed, mother Jenty Doro said the family's religion should have been taken into account.

Kashif, whose family comes from the south Sudanese town of Yambio, was arrested while walking to the market near her home in the Khartoum suburb of Kalatla last week, Doro told Reuters.

'She is just a young girl but the policeman pulled her along in the market like she was a criminal. It was wrong,' said Doro....

In many ways.

Sharia Alert from Sudan, from the Sudan Tribune with thanks to Twostellas:

Oct 17, 2005 (KHARTOUM)— The Sudanese government has affirmed that it has reservations on some articles of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), particularly those which contradict Islam.

The minister of justice, Mohamed Ali al-Maradi, said in a press statement following his meeting with the special rapporteur on human rights in Sudan, Ms Sima Samar, that Sudan would not accept any article that contradicts the Islamic religion.

He added that women rights are guaranteed in all legislation and the constitution which enable women to assume public work and posts on equal footing with men.

Why not? He knows a dhimmi when he sees one. At least they had enough spine to ban him, although they tolerated Omar Bakri and Abu Hamza long enough. From the TimesOnline, with thanks to Scaramouche:

HE CLAIMS to hate everything the West stands for. But yesterday it emerged that Osama bin Laden sought asylum in Britain even as he was planning the September 11 attacks on the US.

The al-Qaeda leader wanted to abandon his base in Sudan at the end of 1995 and asked some of his followers in London to sound out whether he would be able to move to Britain.

Michael Howard, who was then Home Secretary, recalls how his aides told him of the asylum request from the Saudi-born militant of whom the world knew little of ten years ago. A number of his brothers and other relatives, all members of the wealthy bin Laden construction empire, owned properties in London by the mid-1990s....

The astonishing approach to the British authorities happened only months after bin Laden had secretly organised a terror summit in Manila in January 1995 to begin planning how hijackers would turn passenger planes into flying bombs. He called it the “Bojinka plot”, which is Arabic slang for an explosion.

By this time bin Laden had also transferred some of his considerable personal fortune to London for his followers to establish terror cells here and across Europe.

His name rarely appeared in the British media even though by late 1995 his network had already bombed a number of US army bases abroad and plotted assassination attempts against Pope John Paul II and President Clinton.

Mr Howard said yesterday: “In truth, I knew little about him, but we picked up information that bin Laden was very interested in coming to Britain. It was apparently a serious request. He already had people operating here, and who knows how history could have been rewritten if he had turned up here?”

Bin Laden never got a chance to make a formal application as Home Office officials investigated him and Mr Howard issued an immediate banning order under Britain’s immigration laws.