The deal appears to give rebel leaders government positions.
Sudan’s government signed a ceasefire with Darfur’s largest rebel movement on Tuesday, marking what some analysts called a major development towards ending the six-year ethnic conflict in Darfur.
Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir signed a ceasefire and framework for further negotiations with Khalil Ibrahim, the leader of Darfur’s largest rebel group the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), in the Qatari capital Doha just days after JEM fighters and the Sudanese army clashed in west Darfur.
President Bashir said the agreement "marks the start of the end of the war in Darfur" and will bring "A new Sudan, stable and peaceful, a united Sudan, by the will of its people… Peace will prevail in Darfur before the coming elections."
A political deal in which a series of government and military posts will be offered to rebels, following sporadic negotiations that have dragged on for years, is being viewed as a sign that the Sudanese government has agreed to some form of power-sharing agreement with the rebels.
Rebel leaders have denied accusations that they agreed to the deal in exchange for prestigious jobs.
"This is not about getting government positions for JEM commanders and fighters," JEM negotiator Ahmed Tugud told Reuters. "We represent the people of Darfur … This is a new phase for the participation of the people of Darfur."
After many ceasefire agreements between the government and the Darfur rebels, it is not clear Tuesday’s deal will hold. But analysts said that with Sudanese President Bashir facing the first multiparty elections in 24 years in April, the deal has more chance of success.
"It looks good because the Justice and Equality Movement is the most supported of all the rebel movements," Stephen Van Neel, a former commander of international peacekeepers in Darfur and a senior researcher in the Security Sector Governance program at the Institute for Security Studies told The Media Line.
"On the other hand it’s not the first time they’ve signed a peace deal so one can be pessimistic,” he added. “The complexity that the international community is dealing with is that as long as we do not have an inclusive peace deal you will still not have peace in Darfur, and this deal is exclusively with the Justice and Equality Movement and doesn’t include the SLA and its various factions."
For over a year Doha has sponsored the Darfur peace negotiations between the Sudanese government and the two principal rebel groups: the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) and the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), which has said it will not negotiate with the government until there is an end to all violence in Darfur.
"This is just a peace deal signed on the back of the people," Dr Richard Rossin, Special Advisor to the chairman of the Sudan Liberation Movement Abdel Wahid Mohamed Al-Nur told The Media Line. "Nothing will change and this is not right for the people in the field. It’s impossible to make peace with a murderer."
Tuesday’s deal comes a year after the Sudanese government and JEM agreed to a series of "confidence building measures", including the government’s release of JEM prisoners. On Saturday Sudanese President Bashir revoked the death sentences of over 100 JEM prisoners accused of participation in a JEM-led coup-d’Ètat attempt in 2008.
The Sudanese government has said it is committed to reaching a comprehensive Darfur peace deal by March 15, a few weeks ahead of the national elections.
"Obviously there is a lot of jockeying going on ahead of the April elections," EJ Hogendoorn, Horn of Africa Project Director for the International Crises Group told The Media Line. "This is what’s often called a framework agreement in Sudan. It essentially says how to go forward towards a more comprehensive and binding agreement."
"It’s encouraging because it’s a ceasefire and in return for the ceasefire the JEM has received a promise from the government to release some of the prisoners of war and to commute their death sentences," he said. "But a lot of the more tricky details remain to be negotiated in terms of political representation, past abuses and so forth. So people are going both ways over whether this is just a stalling tactic or a meaningful improvement in their relationship. It’s too early to tell."
If successful, Tuesday’s deal could lead to the emergence of the Justice and Equality Movement as a national political party. JEM leader Ibrahim, who was a minister in the central government prior to joining the Darfur rebels, has called on the government to postpone the elections to allow Darfurian rebels to participate. The Sudanese government has so far refused.
Tuesday’s deal was signed in the presence of the Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, Chadian President Idris Deby, as well as U.N. and U.S. officials. Eritrean President Assais Afwerki is also in Doha for the talks.
"One of the problems is that all these countries are trying to take leadership on peace in Darfur," said Van Neel. "The Egyptians, the Libyans, the Americans and the Qataris all have their own initiatives but they are not coordinated."
Sudan’s western Darfur region has witnessed over seven years of ethnic conflict between dozens of African tribes and Arab tribes backed by the Arab-dominated Sudanese government. According to U.N. estimates over 300,000 Darfurians have been killed and 2.7 million made refugees since the rebel groups launched a revolt in 2003, accusing the government of marginalizing the region.
A number of international bodies have described the Sudanese government’s response to the revolt as genocide and the International Criminal Court has charged Sudanese President Bashir with seven counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity. The court issued a warrant for his arrest last year but despite Bashir visiting a number of African and Middle Eastern nations since, he has not been arrested. Qatar is not a member of the International Criminal Court and as such is under no legal obligation to arrest Bashir.
Darfur is named after the local Fur tribe, the largest ethnic group in the region, the name simply meaning "Land of the Fur."
Formerly an independent sultanate, Darfur was incorporated into Sudan by the British in 1917.
Today Darfur’s six million inhabitants, principally subsistence farmers and pastoralists, make up one seventh of Sudan’s population.
Darfur’s 80 tribes are often categorized into Arabs, non-Arab "Africans" and various tribes who have lost their native languages to Arabic.
Some see "Africans" in Darfur as those whose mother tongue is not Arabic, although in reality the line between those considered Arab and "African" is not that clear.
Darfur’s "African" tribes, such as the Fur, Zaghawa and Massaleit tribes, tend to be settled subsistence farmers and traditional cultivators who grow millet, sorghum and market vegetables. Darfur’s Arab tribes, on the other hand, are principally nomadic cattle and camel pastoralists.
Low-intensity tribal conflict between these sedentary and nomadic communities is nothing new in Darfur, but the war of the past seven years centers around a conflict over natural resources as the region faces an increasingly acute desertification crisis. With Saharan desertification spreading south through Darfur, pastoralist tribes have migrated south in search of grazing lands and water. Lack of employment opportunities or central government investment in the region has made matters worse.