TWO VIEWS OF SUDAN’S USE OF TALISMAN-GENERATED OIL REVENUES
July 1, 2000

Predictably, Talisman’s Jim Buckee has a rather different take on things, but let’s give him his say:

“[Khartoum’s portion of the oil revenues will go] to support agricultural infrastructure.”
Jim Buckee to the editorial board of The Globe and Mail, reported in The Globe and Mail, December 17, 1999

[Which leads naturally to a view of things reflected in earlier commentary: “Increasingly, Sudan is becoming a source of relative regional stability and we hope it will play an even greater role in the future.” Jim Buckee in The Ottawa Citizen, October 18, 1999]

The trouble with Buckee’s analysis is that it flies in the face of a great many contrary, and highly informed, views. Amnesty International declares bluntly in its report on oil development in Sudan: “There is a clear connection between the new-found oil wealth and the government [of Sudan’s] ability to purchase arms.”

This is a conclusion massively supported by the Harker Report, by the August 1998 Human Rights Watch report on arms transfers to Sudan--and most tellingly, by repeated statements emanating from Talisman’s business partner, the ruthless National Islamic Front regime in Khartoum.

Very recently, for example, there has been a significant updating of Hassan Turabi’s April 1998 declaration that oil revenues would be used to build factories for tanks and missiles to achieve a “final solution to the military problem” with the south:

News Article by AFP posted on July 01, 2000 at
10:38:57: EST (-5 GMT)

“Sudan to achieve self-sufficiency in weapons: spokesman”

KHARTOUM, July 1 (AFP) - ****Sudan will be capable of producing all the weapons and ammunition it needs by the end of the year thanks to its ***growing oil industry***, the armed forces spokesman said in remarks published Saturday.

***Khartoum***, which has been fighting a civil war against rebels
since 1983, "***will this year reach self-sufficiency in light, medium
and heavy weapons from its local production,"*** spokesman General Mohamed Osman Yassin was quoted as saying by Al-Share Al-Syasi newspaper.

Yassin told a gathering of student army conscripts that ***Sudan
was now manufacturing ammunition, mortars, tanks and armoured
personnel carriers,*** but he did not specify whether any foreign
expertise was involved.

He added that ***Sudan embarked on the military industry project
during its "unprecedented economic boom, particularly in the field
of ***oil exploration and exportation*** and the remarkable progress in light and heavy industries."

Sudan began exporting crude oil last August and inaugurated a
refinery Friday which will produce butane gas for export.
******************************************************
News Article by REUTERS posted on June 16,
2000 at 07:31:23: EST (-5 GMT)

“Sudan's Bashir to celebrate coup by producing arms”

KHARTOUM, June 16 (Reuters) – President Omar Hassan al-***Bashir said Sudan would mark the eleventh anniversary of the coup that brought him to power by making its own weapons***, the independent al-Wifag newspaper said on Friday.

"***Sudan will celebrate the festival of the revolution this year with the production of tanks and heavy equipment by Sudanese hands***," Bashir was quoted as saying during a public address on Thursday at Umruwaba province in Northern Kordofan state. The coup celebration is due on June 30.

Bashir did not say how Sudan would finance its weapon industry. ***Last August, Sudan began to export crude oil,*** but the sales' proceeds are unclear. [They’re not unclear at all! Sudan has no other way to pay for weapons factories but oil revenues---ER]