LIBYA/FILE: Chad president Idriss Deby and rebel leader Mahamat Nour Abdelkerim sign peace accord in Libya with leader Muammar Gaddafi present

Chad's president and the leader of a rebel faction that tried to oust him earlier this year signed a peace accord in Libya late on Sunday (December 24), but other Chadian insurgents dismissed the deal and vowed to fight on. Several rebel groups bent on overthrowing President Idriss Deby have been fighting a low-intensity war in the desert, mountains and scrub of eastern Chad, occasionally striking further west. Rebel military chief Mahamat Nour Abdelkerim said at the signing ceremony in Tripoli that his movement was "in a great struggle," as Deby and Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi looked on. Chad's government said the two sides had agreed to end all military activity and media campaigning against each other, to release each other's prisoners and to grant an amnesty to fighters from both sides. It said Nour's forces would be stationed at a location agreed by both sides until they could be integrated into the national army. Nour, whose forces raided the Chadian capital N'Djamena in April, called on the other rebel groups to sign the peace agreement and join the Chadian government. Deby has accused Sudan of backing and arming the rebels fighting to end his 16-year-old rule as well as Arab Janjaweed militia raiders from over the border, accusations that Khartoum denies. The Tripoli talks were the initiative of Gaddafi, who has been pressing Chad and Sudan to settle their differences as part of international efforts to bring peace to Sudan's western region of Darfur. Deby met Nour last weekend and discussed the possibility of the former army captain returning to the government side. The Chadian government said the two men would return to N'Djamena together. However, other rebels groups said Nour was an isolated figure and dismissed the reconciliation as a non-event. The rebel alliance still under arms includes the Union of Forces for Democracy and Development (UFDD), the Rally of Democratic Forces (RAFD), and the Platform for Change, National Unity and Democracy (SCUD). Makaila Nguebla, a spokesman in Dakar for the National Rally for Democracy (RND), another of the groups in the rebel alliance, said on Sunday the insurgents would fight on.

ITN Source | December 25, 2006

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