In the shadow of Sudan’s misery, President Donald Trump has done conspicuously little. He insists he’s the world’s greatest peacemaker — claiming credit for resolving conflicts that, in some instances, are either still raging or never existed in the first place. But ending the world’s greatest humanitarian disaster has not been a priority for his administration. The White House was more focused on gutting USAID, an agency that propped up critical elements of the humanitarian complex aiding Sudanese people. It also wants to fast-track deportations of unwanted migrants to neighboring South Sudan, which itself is in the grip of a brewing civil war. There’s no simple solution to ending the war in Sudan. The two rival forces — the Sudanese military under the country’s army chief Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan and Hemedti’s RSF — are entrenched in their fiefdoms and backed by a tangle of foreign powers. The former counts on aid from countries like Egypt and Iran, while the RSF, which lost its foothold in the capital Khartoum in March, was reinforced by shipments of weapons from the United Arab Emirates. Turkey, Russia and even Ukraine have played roles in supplying the warring parties. Saudi Arabia and Qatar, too, have extensive interests in the region. According to documents seen at the U.N. Security Council, RSF fighters touted British-manufactured small arms, among other materiel, that were likely first exported to the UAE. A recent report in the Wall Street Journal cited the assessment of U.S. intelligence agencies that the UAE also sent sophisticated weapons like Chinese drones to boost the sagging fortunes of the RSF, which seemed on the precipice of losing the war after its retreat from Khartoum. Now, it’s on firmer ground. It remains in control of much of Sudan’s gold mines, whose ore often makes its way to markets in Dubai. The UAE denies any role in supporting the RSF’s military campaign. “The war would be over if not for the UAE,” Cameron Hudson, a former chief of staff to successive U.S. presidential special envoys for Sudan, told the Journal. “The only thing that is keeping [the RSF] in this war is the overwhelming amount of military support that they’re receiving from the UAE.” A host of analysts believe Trump could do more to lean on the UAE, a monarchy to which he has many close connections. After relative silence, lawmakers in Congress are also starting to speak up. Sen. James E. Risch (R-Idaho), the chairperson of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called on the U.S. to officially designate the RSF as a foreign terrorist organization. “The horrors in Darfur’s El-Fasher were no accident — they were the RSF’s plan all along,” he said in a statement Tuesday. “The RSF has waged terror and committed unspeakable atrocities, genocide among them, against the Sudanese people.” Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-New Hampshire), Risch’s Democratic counterpart on the committee, pointed the finger at the U.S.’s Gulf ally. “The UAE has been an irresponsible player who has contributed to one of the worst humanitarian crises that we have on the planet right now,” she told reporters Wednesday. There’s little hope for any Trumpian art of the deal in Sudan. “The U.S. is not a hegemon here, but a secondary player in a crowded field of ambitious middle powers,” noted Sudanese analyst Elfadil Ibrahim, arguing that ending the war would require “sustained engagement and … a willingness to exert real pressure on external patrons, as well as a long-term commitment to supporting a genuinely inclusive political process.”For a White House that loves its quick deals and photo-ops, such an effort is unlikely. And so a sprawling tragedy that has claimed more than 150,000 lives and displaced millions keeps unfurling. “The Sudan crisis is, at its core, a failure of protection, and our responsibility to uphold international law,” Fletcher, the top U.N. humanitarian official, said Thursday. “Atrocities are committed with unashamed expectation of impunity … the world has failed an entire generation.” |