thank you for your cooperation

I write letters to Sudanese government offices on a regular basis. Most are completely procedural, nothing unusual about them, just day-to-day work – requesting a visa, an approval, a travel authorization, a customs clearance, or a clarification. I often end these letters with something similar to, “Thank you for your cooperation and assistance…” Usually I don’t think too much about such platitudes, but there are moments when my conscience pangs.

While the government office I am addressing might happen to be cooperative at the moment, the institution as a whole is certainly not. (That is, if it can be described as a cohesive institution. As others have noted, the government of Sudan is built around several centers of power who often pursue divergent agendas and at times seem to conflict.) As documented summarily on this blog, Sudan’s government has repeatedly and forcefully sought to impede the work of the UN peacekeeping force and the humanitarian community. I see evidence of it almost daily.

I will sit in a meeting with OCHA (the UN’s Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs), being told that we should be happy to know that the UN has finally renewed a document governing basic principles of peacekeeping and guarantee unlimited humanitarian access in Darfur. Then that same week, if not the next day, I know I will hear of several NGOs being stopped at a government checkpoint, being refused access to a camp where they work every day providing vital medical care. Or I will hear that the government has refused humanitarians access into an area where they have been destroying villages for the past week.

Sure, I am well aware that Sudanese government has a habit of violating both written and verbal agreements, that they continue to ignore a growing number of strongly-worded Security Council resolutions. But the baseness of it all seems to reach new depths when one must pander to these same people on a daily basis in order to get anything done.

“Thank you for your partnership in providing assistance to the people of Sudan.”