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According to C O N F I D E N T I A L USUN NEW YORK 000306 leaked cable on Sudan”International Criminal Court Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo told Ambassadors Rice and Wolff on March 20 that Sudanese President Bashir needed to be isolated. Ocampo suggested if Bashir’s stash of money were disclosed (he put the figure at possibly $9 billion), it would change Sudanese public opinion from him being a “crusader” to that of a thief”.

According to a Guardian report on the Sudan WikiLeaks, “If Ocampo’s claim about Bashir’s fortune is correct, Sudanese funds being held in London banks amount to one tenth of annual GDP in Sudan, which ranks fifteenth from bottom in the UN’s index of the world’s poorest countries. Robert Palmer, a campaigner at anti-corruption organisation Global Witness, said: “$9bn may sound like an inconceivably large amount of money for the president of Sudan to control. But we have uncovered evidence of substantial funds being held in a European bank by an oil-rich country in the past, where the head of state had a worrying level of personal control over the funds. In Sudan’s case, the figure is almost the same amount as has been transferred from north to south Sudan under the oil revenue sharing part of the comprehensive peace agreement since 2005.”

This is not the first WikiLeaks revelation to have implicated the “West”. WikiLeaks cable ABUJA 001907  alleges that Shell has inserted staff in Nigeria’s Ministeries to gather intelligence and to get close to political power brokers. This cable perhaps helps explain why oil spills in Africa and more specifically in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria are taken less seriously. The conduct of Shell in the cable also puts the execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa, the Nigerian environmentalist, into perspective, an execution that Shell has always denied it “contributed” to.

It does afterall take two to tango. This suspected but worrying trend indicates that perhaps the national interests of “Western” countries and China take precedence over the activities of corrupt African leaders. That to some extent may be understanderble as most leaders are voted into power to protect thier country’s interest, especially abroad. However, it is abhorrent to push what is morally right aside often with a large doze of hypocricy. It is loathsome to turn a blind eye whilst the likes of Bashir stash thier stolen wealth into Western banks whilst ordinary Africans suffer and see very little return on thier immense natural resources.

The plethora of live aid type concerts, sanctions against “corrupt regimes” and constant publications of corruption tables, always invariably putting African countries at the bottom is beginning to look rather bogus and phoney.

Full Details of Sudan WikiLeaks below:

Tuesday, 24 March 2009, 22:17

C O N F I D E N T I A L USUN NEW YORK 000306

EO 12958 DECL: 03/23/2019

TAGS PGOV, PREL, UNSC, PHUM, SU, XW

SUBJECT: (C) ICC’S OCAMPO ON SUDAN: GO AFTER BASHIR’S MONEY

AND CALL FOR HIS ARREST; REASSURE CHINA

Classified By: Ambassador Alejandro D. Wolff, for reasons 1.4 b/d

1. (C) International Criminal Court Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo told Ambassadors Rice and Wolff on March 20 that Sudanese President Bashir needed to be isolated. Ocampo suggested if Bashir’s stash of money were disclosed (he put the figure at possibly $9 billion), it would change Sudanese public opinion from him being a “crusader” to that of a thief. Ocampo reported Lloyd’s Bank in London might be holding or knowledgeable of the whereabouts of his money. Ocampo suggested simply exposing that Bashir had illegal accounts would be enough to turn the Sudanese against him, “as with Pinochet.”

2. (C) Ocampo said Bashir invents conflict to create a better negotiating position, and thought Bashir was using the expulsion of the NGOs to divert attention away from his arrest warrant. Ocampo suggested the U.S. and the international community also needed to push for Bashir’s arrest to isolate him. Ocampo likened Bashir’s situation to “a bleeding shark being surrounded by other sharks,” with no loyalty, only greed, motivating those competing for power. By promoting the possibility of Bashir’s arrest, Bashir would be further marginalized within Sudan’s ruling elite, Ocampo thought.

3. (C) Ocampo suggested it would be beneficial to reassure China that its access to oil would not be jeopardized. If China believed Bashir was becoming a destabilizing influence, Ocampo said China might be more open to his removal as long as his replacement would guarantee support for China’s economic interests.

Wolff

Nii Thompson