Despite developments toward a peace agreement that includes all major armed movements, there remain many holdouts, a fact that makes progress in disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration a daunting challenge.

By Aderemi Adekoya, Chief of UNAMID’s Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) Section

During the past several years, armed movements of varying significance have participated in the peace process by signing key documents, including the original Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA), an assortment of other agreements and the recent Doha Document for Peace in Darfur (DDPD). Despite some positive developments related to a comprehensive peace agreement that includes all major movements, there remain many holdouts, a fact that makes progress related to Darfur-wide disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) a daunting challenge.

In the meantime, the Government of Sudan, through the Sudan DDR Commission, has been leading an interim DDR exercise for the groups originally committing to the DPA in 2006 and surplus members of the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Popular Defence Forces. However, the DPA broke down and funding the reintegration of ex-combatants, which is normally supported through voluntary contributions, has been a challenge in Darfur primarily due to the lack of a comprehensive peace agreement on which the reintegration would be based.

Notwithstanding the many challenges associated with DDR in Darfur, UNAMID is unwavering in supporting the Sudan DDR Commission to plan and implement national DDR, community security and arms control programmes. UNAMID support to the Sudan DDR Commission includes providing advice on policy development and, for interim demobilization exercises, technical assistance, mission expertise and resources all designed to support public information campaigns, medical screenings, HIV/AIDS counselling and security. In programmes designed to address community security and arms control, UNAMID has been supporting the Sudan DDR Commission to help reduce civilian small arms and light weapons proliferation and local conflicts that make areas of return insecure for former combatants who have completed DDR.

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Read the full article in the January issue of Voices of Darfur. Download the magazine (PDF) here.