SUMMARY
The war in Darfur, the westernmost region of Sudan, is often said to have started in 2003 when the two rebel groups Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SLM/A) and Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) took up arms against the Government of Sudan. However, this was rather the beginning of one particular type of warfare, whereas other conflicts have been ongoing for a long time in Darfur. Darfur has been an important geographical area both in the war between Libya and Chad in the 70s and 80, as well as in large-scale communal conflicts between different tribes, often along Arab-African lines. These different types of violence highly influenced the foundation and organization of the Janjaweed militia. Janjaweed has been an important factor in the Darfur conflict particularly since 2003. In March 2003, SLM/A and JEM initiated an armed campaign against the Government of Sudan. The early stages of the campaign were a military success for the rebels, and in order to counter the rebels, the Government of Sudan armed the militia called Janjaweed. The Janjaweed militia had been active in Darfur the two previous years, but in 2003, the activity of the group increased to a completely new level. The militia was locally based, and better skilled in warfare in desert areas than the traditional army was. The Government of Sudan has a long tradition of using different militias in their war against insurgent groups. Even though the regime in Khartoum denies any link to Janjaweed, the tight relationship between the two actors is clear. For example, the most common atrocity in Darfur is joint attacks by government troops and Janjaweed militiamen. In the UCDP coding these joint attacks are attributed to the Government of Sudan whilst the attacks where Janjaweed acts on their own are attributed to the Janjaweed.
A large majority of the massacres in Darfur have been conducted by Janjaweed, either on their own or in coordination with the regular army. These attacks often include the burning of villages, killing of children, women and men, rape, and, looting. The background to this pattern of ethnic cleansing can be found in different Janjaweed statements. For example, in August 2004 a directive from the Janjaweed headquarter stated that the purpose of their warfare was to “change the demography of Darfur and empty it of African tribes”.
The leader of Janjaweed is Sheikh Musa Hilal who has his headquarter in northern Darfur. However, no part of Darfur has been spared from Janjaweed attacks. Instead all three regions of Darfur, West, South, and North, have been heavily attacked. There have also been attacks conducted in Chad. Cross-border attacks started already in 2003 and increased in the following years.
The Janjaweed first became active as a one-sided actor in the UCDP data in 2001, when the one-sided violence resulted in more than 25 civilian deaths. The threshold by the end of that year due to a large-scale attack by the group in Abu Gamra, a village in Northern Darfur, resulting in the deaths of 125 civilians.
