In recent years, the presence of arms in refugee and internally displaced person (IDP) camps in the Darfur region has led observers to describe them as militarized. Though the term is evocative, it is imprecise and does not adequately describe the complex situations in which many displaced Darfurians are living.
Beyond 'Janjaweed': Understanding the Militias of Darfur is not a comprehensive account of the scores of tribal militias that have been armed by, or cooperated with, the government. Its subject is not the human rights violations committed in the course of the counterinsurgency. Rather, it seeks to disentangle the militias and to begin to understand their motivations and grievances.
Rhetoric and Reality: The Failure to Resolve the Darfur Conflict, based on interviews with mediators, government officials, humanitarian workers, and militia and rebel leaders, traces the troubled history of peace efforts after Abuja.
The Other War: Inter-Arab Conflict in Darfur examines the background to and the development of the fighting between camel-herding Abbala and cattle-herding Baggara, the main players, and some of the possible repercussions.
Also available in ARABIC.
DDR in Sudan: Too Little, Too Late? takes a critical look at the ongoing DDR programme in Sudan. It reviews the historical background of the programme as well as the key players working to implement it. It examines the programmatic design from a technical perspective and reviews progress to date as well as some of the noteworthy implementation challenges faced.
Renouncing the Rebels: Local and Regional Dimensions of Chad–Sudan Rapprochement reviews the specific circumstances of the recent Chad– Sudan rapprochement and the series of events that took place to bring this extremely divisive six-year conflict to a close. The study focuses specifically on the effects of the rapprochement on the armed opposition movements and the internal crises facing each country.
Creating Facts on the Ground: Conflict Dynamics in Abyei analyses the dynamics of the conflict in Abyei and looks at the implications of these clashes for the Abyei referendum, the demarcation of the territory’s borders, and the North–South peace process more generally. It focuses on the 2011 escalation of the conflict, setting it in the context of historical patterns of violence in the territory.
Although the international community generally holds that the Darfur conflict has experienced profound and propitious improvement since 2010, Forgotten Darfur: Old Tactics and New Players thus argues that, as the conflict enters its ninth year, there is no clear-cut prospect of a decisive end to violent confrontation. Its key findings include the following:
New War, Old Enemies: Conflict Dynamics in South Kordofan describes the first year of renewed war (June 2011– July 2012) based on field research in South Kordofan and South Sudan in February and May 2012. It focuses on the conduct and dynamics of the current conflict and the primary armed actors, identifying shared weapons and ammunition holdings based on detailed accounts of materiel seized, as well as photographs and first-hand physical inspections.
The emergence of a national border into a complex environment containing many groups with different histories and narratives—especially during the second civil war—has deeply affected all of the communities in the region.