Sudan arrests nine Darfur activists-civic leader
* Civil society worries about new crackdown
* Rights group says Khartoum using referendum as cover
* Attack on Darfur village kills four
KHARTOUM, Nov 1 (Reuters) – Sudan arrested nine Darfur activists including a prominent human rights lawyer, just weeks ahead of a southern referendum on secession, a civil society leader said on Monday.
“The total number arrested is nine activists — all of them from Darfur,” said civil society leader Elbaqir Mokhtar. “One of them is a very active lawyer in the Darfur lawyer’s association,” he added.
He said the arrests appeared to be targeting the Human Rights and Advocacy Network for Democracy (HAND), for which most of those detained worked. Mokhtar said there was no information about charges against them or where they were being held.
A source in Sudan’s National Security and Intelligence Services said they had no information about the arrests.
New York-based Human Rights Watch said the government was using the cover of the Jan. 9, 2011 southern referendum on independence as a cover to continue its military operations in Darfur and crack down on rights activists.
“This spate of arrests signals a new crackdown on Darfuri activists at a time when the Khartoum government is stepping up attacks there, while the world’s eyes are on the referendum,” Jehanne Henry, a senior researcher at the group said.
Mokhtar said the arrests began on Saturday but continued until last night.
President Omar Hassan al-Bashir’s government forced many prominent human rights activists to flee Sudan in 2009 after the International Criminal Court indicted him for war crimes in Darfur. The court added genocide to the charges this year.
But Khartoum had somewhat eased its harsh policies ahead of the emotional southern referendum.
Mokhtar said the arrests cast doubt on whether Khartoum would allow civil society to work freely ahead of the referendum. “It’s now really raised alarm bells that probably what is coming is going to be worse”.
Many northern Sudanese worry that if the south separates, which most predict is likely, Khartoum will become more hard line in its crackdown on dissenters.
Darfur’s joint U.N.-African Union peacekeeping mission also said on Monday that armed men had attacked Tina village in North Darfur killing four people and injuring several others.
It said in a statement it had evacuated injured from Tina in after an attack by unknown armed men on civilians there. It gave no further details.