12/13/2007

The United States must work with its allies in Europe to increase pressure on the Government of Sudan to cease obstructing the humanitarian operation in Darfur, and particularly push for an immediate renewal of the Moratorium and an end to the harassment of civil society organizations. As part of its wider tactic to control and stifle the humanitarian response in Darfur, the Government of Sudan uses bureaucratic impediments as a way of grinding down both international and local non-governmental organizations. The time and resources spent on processing visas and permits not only limits the ability of international NGOs to run their programs, it has a demoralizing effect on everyone involved in the overall humanitarian response.

• It is estimated that international NGOs provide at least 80% of humanitarian assistance in Darfur. International donors, particularly the U.S., which is the largest contributor to the international response in Darfur, are in effect paying for compliance with bureaucratic procedures when they could be paying for lifesaving assistance. At the same time, the difficulties facing Sudanese civil society organizations are largely ignored by the international community.


• The Moratorium must be renewed now in order to prevent the humanitarian response in Darfur from grinding to a halt. The “moratorium on restrictions” for humanitarian work in Darfur was instituted in 2004 as a result of the Joint Humanitarian Communiqué signed by the Government of Sudan and the United Nations to alleviate the bureaucratic difficulties that international NGOs faced in setting up operations to respond to the growing emergency in Darfur. The Moratorium established a set of fast-track procedures to expedite the processing of visas, permits, and customs clearance of goods and equipment. When the Moratorium was first established, it was only renewed every few months. In 2007 the Government of Sudan extended the Moratorium for one year, until January 31, 2008.


• Each time the Moratorium is renewed it costs the international NGO community approximately $250,000 in fees associated with the required paperwork, which of course does not include the time and resources lost on bureaucratic procedures or on staff who are prevented from working while their paperwork is processed. At the moment, all visas for international NGO staff in Darfur will expire at the end of January when the Moratorium ends. If the Moratorium is not extended immediately for at least another 12 months there will be a large backlog of visas and permits that will have to be processed for close to 1,000 international NGO workers in Darfur. This will leave a gap in staffing, and will seriously jeopardize the continuation of humanitarian programs in Darfur.


• The international community must find ways to support local civil society organizations in Sudan. They need financial assistance and support from international donors and organizations to advocate on their behalf with the Government of Sudan when it subjects them to harassment. National intelligence and security forces target civil society organizations, particularly those that work on issues such as gender based violence or human rights. Civil society organizations often have their registration suspended for periods of time and staff are brought in for questioning and sometimes subjected to mistreatment or torture. One NGO told the RI team that their office was closed down by the government for several weeks for no apparent reason, cutting off services to the local population.


• In the past few weeks the Government of Sudan has started to question the funding sources of many civil society organizations. Their leaders are concerned that the government may be intending to fully implement sections of the “Organization of Humanitarian Voluntary Work Act, 2005”, which regulate their international funding. If this is enforced then civil society organizations will be required to obtain approval for their international funding proposals from the government, which may prevent them from being able to obtain any funding at all.


• Civil society organizations in Sudan are unable to build their capacity due to lack of funding. International donors will not fund administrative costs, which prevents local organizations from establishing new offices or hiring more staff. At the same time, they are unable to access funding available in Sudan because they must compete with much larger and better resourced UN agencies and international NGOs.


• The harassment that civil society organizations face means that they are often silenced in what they can say about the situation in Darfur. But they play an important role in linking women activists through local networks and in focusing on vulnerable populations such as youth. Promoting the development of a strong civil society in Sudan is an essential element of creating the conditions for future reconciliation in Darfur.