Tweets of the Week

As I See It 

Adel Al-Baz

1. America is practically polishing General Burhan’s shoes, urging him to save the Geneva negotiations that they hastily initiated but are now stalled in the Alps. Secretary Blinken calls the president every two days, and Burhan repeats the same conditions. Meanwhile, Special Envoy Tom Perillo wakes up every morning with no job but to tweet, pleading with the Sudanese government to attend the negotiations. For the president to meet their demands, he is expected to do the following:

Attend the Geneva talks, not as the Chairman of the Sovereignty Council or Head of Government, but only as the Commander of the Army, despite being recognized by the people, the region, and the world as the president. Can you imagine? He’s expected to shed all these titles and rush to Geneva just to appease the Americans? Why would he do that? What would they do to him—or us—if he refused, more than what the Janjaweed have already done?

Attend without any real commitment to implementing what was agreed upon in Jeddah. If there was full commitment, the rebels would have to agree to vacate civilian properties, and the Geneva talks would focus on discussing the mechanisms, timelines, and procedures.

Go to Geneva without any guarantees that what might be agreed upon will be implemented.

Abandon all his allies in the joint forces, leaving them in the dark, even though they fought alongside him and continue to do so to satisfy America and its Janjaweed allies. And they will never be satisfied!

Ignore the feelings of the entire Sudanese people, who have been killed, displaced, and had their women raped and their wealth looted, just to satisfy Secretary Blinken and Tom Perillo.

Betray the army, with which he has vowed not to negotiate until the invading aggressors are removed from citizens’ homes.

Break his promise to restore the dignity of Sudanese people that was trampled by the Janjaweed and their allies, and return from Geneva with a ceasefire agreement, only to tell the people, “I stopped the fighting but lost your dignity in the Alps!”

**2. The government agreed to open the Adré crossing on the Chadian border, ending the pretext that the crossings are closed. Let’s see what they will do now. Special Envoy Tom mentioned promises of a billion dollars from donors for relief efforts. Previously, the same donors promised $2.5 billion at the Paris Conference, of which less than 30% materialized. A few months ago, 13 international relief organizations issued a statement complaining about insufficient funding, stating they received less than 17% of the promises. We shall see these lies unfold, and the government will monitor the behavior of organizations that support the rebels. In three months, we will revisit this issue.

**3. During our last visit to Port Sudan, where we met with President Burhan, I told him that the most important thing right now is leadership unity. All leaders in the state must appear united in their positions because this greatly influences public opinion to stand behind the armed forces and affects the unity of the forces themselves. I remembered this when reading the statements of Lieutenant General Kabashi during his meeting with the media delegation in Port Sudan, as well as those of Lieutenant General Gabbir. It seems all the leaders are now united on one position regarding the Geneva negotiations, which puts an end to the malicious whispers that Kabashi has a different stance from the leadership.

4. One of the oddities of this war is that the Janjaweed and their foreign agents, including countries and organizations, claim they control 70% of the country and that the army is defeated. But when you challenge them to take over and relieve us of this burden, they start stammering. When you ask them, “If you are victorious, why rush to negotiate?” The victor imposes his terms, not the defeated. Now, it is the army that has conditions. Have you ever heard of a defeated party setting conditions before a victorious one? The rope of lies is short, and soon, on the battlefield, all these lies will be blown away like dust.