Background Information of Sudan

Sudan is the largest country in Africa and located just south of Egypt. Since its independence from Britian in 1956, Sudan is in and out of civil wars. Although the wars last the longest among the history, it has been largely ignored. Map of Sudan

There has been two civil wars in Sudan. The first began soon after independence in 1957 when the southerners who had been administered seperately from the northerners during the British period and who had been the vicitims of slave raids from the Arab north tried to gain independence from the Arabizing government. Southeren guerrilla groups were fighting against the imposition of Islamic law on the mainly non-muslim inhabitants of the south. This war ended in agreement with former President Nimeiri in 1972. The southerners were given formal autonomy to run their own affairs.

The war began again in 1983 partly as result of attempts to move the northern boundary to incorporate the new oil fields at Bentiu. Another cause was the attempted introduction of Islamic Sharia law into areas where most were non-Muslim (Christian and Traditional religion). Some have argued that there is also an element of Class War in that some of the northerners, suffering from landlesssness from the monopolization of land by a small group of merchants, have joined the war against the government. Southerners formed a Sudan People's Liberation Movement and Army (SPLA). They started by attacking the oil installations, state mechanized farms and the Jonglei canal which they regarded as northern enterprises intended to reduce southern land to control by the northern elite. The war escalated when an extreme Islamic government seized power from a moderate democartic regime in 1989. (Extracted from here)

To understand more on the causes of the wars, following materials can be referred,

Report by Paul H. Liben or Analysis from CADAIS (Center for the Advancement of Democratic Awareness in Sudan)

Result of these wars are:

Around 0.5~1 million were killed in the war 1955~1972; around 0.5~2 million were killed in the war 1983~now; more than 4.5 million were displaced

For more information of Sudan and Africa, go to next page

Click here to enter My Photo Gallery. These photos were taken in Jan of 2001 at Khartoum, Madani of Northern Sudan.

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