MuseumDESCRIPTION:
Roger Winter is one of the leading voices on Sudan. Roger worked for several years as the Executive Director of the United States Committee for Refugees. In 2001, Roger became a high ranking official for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) where he was involved in negotiations to end the conflict in Southern Sudan. Roger speaks to Jerry Fowler about the common threads between the issues of Darfur and Southern Sudan.
TRANSCRIPT:
JERRY FOWLER: My guest today is Roger Winter. After many years as head of the United States Committee for Refugees, in 2001, Roger became a high-ranking official at the United States Agency for International Development, or A.I.D. In that capacity, he was deeply involved in negotiations to end the conflict in southern Sudan and then, was a leader in calling attention to the crisis in Darfur, beginning in 2003-2004. He later served a Special Envoy on Sudan for the State Department. Roger, welcome to the program.
ROGER WINTER: Thanks. Good to be here.
JERRY FOWLER: Well, it is an honor to have you. I mean, you are really one of the heroes, not just in responding to Darfur, but in responding to the long ignored crisis in Southern Sudan. So, we appreciate the chance to talk to you. Actually, I wanted to begin with a broad view of Sudan. Your involvement with Sudan long predates your service in government. How did you first get involved with Sudan?
ROGER WINTER: I first went to Sudan in 1981. That had to do, at the time, with refugees from Uganda, who had flooded into the south of Sudan. But then, right after the Civil War in the south of Sudan began in 1983, I was involved. Once the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement began to hold territory in the south, I began to visit their areas, primarily for humanitarian reasons. But we were very interested in what ultimately became this idea of the protection of the civilians in the midst of conflict. Because the rules, within a sovereign state, were not very clear about obligations. So that is what we focused on. And a lot of the next 20-some years, we are focused on civilians in south Sudan.
JERRY FOWLER: And when you say, “The rules were not very clear,” it is the idea that civilians are being affected, but they have not crossed an international border. So who has responsibility for them?
ROGER WINTER: Right. That was the problem, then. There was, essentially, no real definition. And it is still a problem. It is a little clearer now. You have some legal standards, but they are still fairly weak and, of course, they depend on coalitions of states, like the United Nations, to actually take action to enforce whatever requirement they have previously enacted. They don’t always do that. We have seen it in the case of Darfur, where you find states generally, even in collectives like the United Nations, reluctant to enforce obligations on other states.
JERRY FOWLER: And why do you think that is? The standards seem to have developed quite a bit, especially, in the last 15 or 20 years. The reluctance, though, seems to be the enforcement of these standards.
ROGER WINTER: Yes, I would say, Sudan, in particular, benefits from the fact that several members of the Security Council are very supportive of the Sudan government for various reasons, most particularly, China and Russia. But there are other reasons. Sudan is not a pariah in many sense of the word. It is in the west, perhaps. But if you think about it, the great bulk of the organization of Islamic countries, the Arab League, the African Union, and others, the so called old non-aligned states. They do not like interference in a situation like Sudan is facing right now. And so there is a lot of support within the international community to not be too Western. Sudan starts screaming about U.N. forces, for example, going into Darfur and calls it colonialism or re-colonization and so forth like that. A lot of governments, sort of, hear that or at least choose to hear that.
JERRY FOWLER: So that creates, kind of, a paradox for responding for the United States and for other western countries. If you ignore the problem, it gets worse. But if you speak out about the problem, if you put pressure regarding the problem, it generates some sympathy and support for the offending government.
ROGER WINTER: Yes, I would say that the mix of views here that we are talking about has been particularly problematic in the case of Darfur and Sudan. We have a situation where even a government like the government of the United States, which has spoken toughly about Darfur, has been very limited in the practical actions it has taken to deal with genocide in Darfur. And that creates a whole stream of other problems. If you are going to, in effect, threaten action, like Plan B. If you do not do right, we are going to implement Plan B. But then, there is no Plan B of any substance. What you basically do is show the emperor has no clothes. For me, at least, I think what it does is it emboldens the bad guys to do bad things and to hold out for their position in international diplomacy.
JERRY FOWLER: I would like to unpack that just a little bit, this idea of speaking toughly, but then, having limited practical actions. Based on your experience inside the government, why does that happen?
ROGER WINTER: I think the uniqueness of the current situation may, obviously, result from the war in Iraq or, perhaps, the war in Iraq and in Afghanistan, as it were. And perhaps, the larger problem of what would it mean to take a forceful action against another state, which is viewed as Arab or Islamic or somewhat of, at least, of both. And that may have pinned the U.S. down a little. Honestly, I can only think of that kind of reason in this case, that there are other larger issues of international or a national security type that caused this level of inaction. But what I would say is don’t pretend you are going to take a forceful action. Don’t pretend there’s a forceful Plan B. Because what that does is it sets you up for repeated failure. I think that’s a bit of what’s happened here.
JERRY FOWLER: Lets us turn back to Sudan. You are talking about going to Sudan in the 1980’s and the war started up in the south in 1983, or we should say restarted, because it had been an earlier version of it. A lot of people who first became aware of Sudan, with regard to Darfur, do not necessarily think about it in the context of the larger Sudan. What is the thread that connects the conflict in the south and the central part the Nuba Mountains with the conflict in Darfur?
ROGER WINTER: I think the marginalized populations of Sudan, in general, have a problem in the center - the center being Khartoum, the seat of political power. Now, in the case of Sudan, you have had different kinds of governments over time. But in 1989, there was a coup that was a radical Islamic coup that deposed an elected Sudan government. They did their coup in order to abort a peace agreement between the north and the south. They came in with a radical agenda. They have not really changed that agenda. They did, in fact, sign a peace agreement with the south, ultimately, after years and years of war, but that was because they could not outright defeat the south. Darfur has the same problem. In many ways, people who are new to Sudan don’t really realize that the same style of vicious conflict that you see in Darfur was the practice in the south. Over a period of years, the body count in the south was in the neighborhood of two and half million people. And so if Darfur is genocide, and it is, the war in the south was, essentially, the same kind of war. But we were not using that term at the time. So what I’m trying to say is, the problem for both Darfur and the south, and for that matter, the people in the east, the so-called Beja population, and to some degree, people in Nuba in the far north, they have a common problem with this small select group of people who represent just a very few Arab - riverine Arab tribes - holding power. If you do not see the totality of the Sudan through that kind of lens, you lose it. What do I mean by lose it? People who are reacting to Darfur these days tend to see it as a human rights and a humanitarian problem. And of course, it is both of those. However, it is also a larger political problem with its roots back in Khartoum. You have to understand that political overlay. It’s not just a war between parties. It’s a government out of control with a radical agenda that is affecting all the marginalized populations of Sudan.
JERRY FOWLER: You spent a lot of time dealing with government officials in Khartoum, especially in your time with the U.S. Government. You were going there regularly, interacting with them. What is it like dealing with them? How do they come across, in other words? I guess, give people a sense of - you sit in the room, whether it is with President Bashir or with other officials - What is the atmosphere like?
ROGER WINTER: Actually, the people in the government that I have dealt with have almost always been unfailingly hospitable. They are, also, how do I want to say that? It is a very sharp, intellectually sharp, crowd of guys. I say, “Guys,” advisedly here. There are very few women, in key positions who are from the north. They generally come across as wanting to be constructive. But what happens is their words frequently are, I would say, deceptive. The actions that they take often belie the words that they speak. And so, for example, in the negotiations that revolved around, United Nations interests in Darfur, there are lots and lots of promises that get made that do not get fulfilled in any kind of appropriate time frame. And I think part of their approach is an approach of stalling. And I think, we see that with the Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended the war in the south also. They continue to stall on certain things. And ultimately, that puts the whole Peace Agreement, for the south, at risk.
JERRY FOWLER: I want to talk about the agreement in the south briefly. But when you say, “they stall,” do you think this is a calculated unified strategy? Or is it the case of differences within the government, where one person may sincerely want to move forward, but then they get stymied by other forces that are not as amenable?
ROGER WINTER: There are people in the government that are not part of the National Islamic Front. But for the people who have real power in Khartoum, they are the people of the National Islamic Front, otherwise, called a National Congress Party. And what I would say is that they tend to act in a fairly well coordinated and unified perspective. And yes, from my own perspective, I think that buying time has been quite an objective strategy on their part. For example, it is true, with the Peace Agreement in the south that they couldn’t defeat the Sudan People’s Liberation Army, but they entered into a Peace Agreement that actually bought them six and a half years of legitimate life. So they take actions that may be viewed as inimical to their long-term intentions, but they do it because it provides an opportunity to do something different down the road. Commitments on Darfur, I think, frankly, are no different. People in Khartoum often make commitments, make statements that buy time. Buying time can be buying nine or ten months. And by that time, the political climate way well have changed or shifted in some degree. I think that is what they are looking for.
JERRY FOWLER: To some degree, when they buy time, the ability of the international community or countries outside Sudan to focus on what is happening there seems to be limited. People, kind of, come together and there is a build up of pressure. Then, if they take a step to relieve that pressure, the focus ends, and it takes quite a while before the focus comes back.
ROGER WINTER: I think that is the point I was trying to make. The international focus gets lost very often. Other things happen; therefore, the political environment changes. And I view the Khartoum Government of National Congress Party crowd as actively using that as a strategy, consciously.
JERRY FOWLER: Now, you spent a long, long time in the non-governmental world as an activist and an advocate. And then you were in government when Darfur started. And there has developed over time this public outcry about Darfur. What effect do you think that is had on the way the United States Government has approached this issue?
ROGER WINTER: I think the largest factor shaping it is what I mentioned before, the wars in Iraq, that kind of thing. But the visibility of Darfur, perhaps, most triggered by Colin Powell’s use of the word “genocide” which helped create a huge constituency. What I would personally call a post- Comprehensive Peace Agreement constituency to some degree, at least. It created the kind of popular activism that could be wished for every emergency of this kind, because it was a politically capable organized approach towards advocacy on these issues. I know, for a fact, that the Administration takes that kind of thing very seriously. On the other hand, by taking it seriously, perhaps it sort of engages in, suggesting things that buy time, also. My view is that the Plan B threat that the U.S. made turned out not to be much of a Plan B, when all is said and done. But it did, in fact, buy a chunk of time. Maybe, this is endemic with governments, you know, in some senses of the word, at least. But I think that we’ve seen that pattern. What has happened as a result of that? In my view, the steely eyed guys in Khartoum, who are very powerful, who are all personally rich and so forth, who are not going to lose what they have gained, have looked us in the eye and they have read us. They have made a judgment about what America will and will not do. So their politics are hard and steely, where ours, with our popular support for dealing with the issues of genocide and the south for that matter, tend to fluctuate over time.
JERRY FOWLER: Well, this Comprehensive Peace Agreement was signed in January of 2005, and ended the war in southern Sudan, at least, for now. Is there a danger that it is going to come unraveled?
ROGER WINTER: I think, first of all, the C.P.A., as it’s called, is a stunning kind of Peace Agreement in its provisions. And people ought to understand that. I will not go into the details of it. But it is quite an unusual thing. It offers, at the end of a transition period, a referendum on the part of the south for independence so the south could actually become legally independent. The problem is that over the six and a half year span for implementation of the entire agreement, we’ve had major changes take place in Sudan, including the death of Dr. John Garang, who was the leader of the south, in forging this Peace Agreement. What we’ve seen since then is the crowd in Khartoum, the National Congress Party, in my view, consciously not implementing a number of the critical elements of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement. I would argue further that they have chosen those elements strategically. It means keeping their military in charge of the oil fields. It means a number of things like that that position them. So if they take the decision, if they have not already, to abort the C.P.A. before a referendum takes place. Or perhaps, even before not too distant elections take place. Then, what you have is the implementation of a strategy that aborts this whole peace process. And would argue, almost guarantees that the war in the south starts again. Then, you have really got a problem in Sudan, because you would have Darfur and you would have this war in the south, which Sudan inflames. It’s a horrible thought that has to be avoided. And I think this is one of the main reasons why people who are concerned about Darfur need to also be concerned about the south. Because they’re both similarly situated in terms of having the problem with the crowd in Khartoum that’s, you know, the problem.
JERRY FOWLER: You have had a lifetime of activism and service inside and outside the government. What would you say to young people who think they might want to follow in your footsteps?
ROGER WINTER: I must tell you that I am very fortunate to have been involved, not only with Sudan for all these years, but Rwanda and actively involved during the genocide, traveling and reporting on the genocide as it was happening and in similar circumstances, primarily, in Africa. I was talking to my grandson just yesterday. He is 16, and he’s thinking about work. And I suggested to him don’t exclude thinking about things that change the world for the better. And that is the way I feel about this particular field, this human rights, humanitarian, you know, anti-atrocity, kind of work that I’ve done for the last 30 years or so. It is not only working for a better world. It is the most satisfying, in personal terms. You engage at such a level of intensity that it adds to your entire life. At least, that’s my view of it.
JERRY FOWLER: Roger Winter is the former Assistant Administrator at the Agency for International Development, and former Special Envoy on Sudan for the State Department. Roger thanks so much for taking the time to be with us.
ROGER WINTER: Pleasure. Take care.
