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Minni Minawi pleads his case for international intervention in his people's battle

Minni Minawi does not look like a warlord. The former primary schoolteacher is a slender, softly spoken Sudanese, in a grey pinstripe suit that would blend into any Hong Kong street. One of his aides is wearing Manchester United socks.

Yet 34-year-old Minawi is the  leader of the Sudan Liberation Army,  one of two rebel factions locked in a ferocious battle with the Sudanese government in Darfur.

The UN estimates the conflict has killed 50,000 refugees and displaced 1.4 million people. Now, Mr Minawi said it could threaten the country's oil exports, 70 per cent of which go to China.

The Darfur issue is partially a fight over resources. The region is notoriously undeveloped, and local African tribes said the Arab-dominated central government has withheld their rightful share of oil revenues.

In turn, the nomadic, cattle-herding Arab tribes accused the largely pastoral African local government of discrimination in land disputes.

Tensions were exacerbated by a peace deal in the oil-rich south, where a civil war has raged for 21 years.

The China National Petroleum Corporation helps pump 345,000 barrels per day from the area, and Sudan hopes to increase output to 500,000 barrels per day in 2005.

Although the amounts are relatively small, Sudan's value lies in its vast swathes of unexplored territory, which some believe may hold more oil than the Gulf of Guinea. However, the rebels feared that the peace agreement in the south may marginalise the poverty-stricken west even further.

'We are fighting for a fairer distribution of oil revenues,' said Mr Minawi, who claims to command about 30,000 men. 'We want the attacks and burnings in the civilian area to cease.'

Witnesses report that the janjaweed militias, blamed for much of the destruction, work in collusion with the Sudanese army and air force, bombing and strafing villages. The rebels' arms come from Chad and captured government soldiers.

Mr Minawi spent last week in London, trying to persuade the British government to classify the ethnic cleansing in Darfur as genocide, which will legally oblige them to intervene.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell has already described Darfur as genocide. However, both President George W. Bush and challenger John Kerry have ruled out sending troops to Darfur, preferring to offer logistical support to African Union troops.

'Even if we do get a UN resolution proposing oil sanctions on Sudan, China will veto it,' said one British official. Wang Guangya,  China's UN ambassador, has voiced his opposition to sanctions.

Although almost alone in his opinion, Mr Minawi seems confident that the situation in Darfur will be classified as genocide and the international community will intervene. If no assistance arrives, he said targeting oil installations in the south is one option.

'Oil is a war material for the government and whatever we attack is government property. The oil does not benefit the Sudanese people. Someone will attack them [the installations] soon if this policy continues.'

If the peace process in the south is derailed by violence in the west, Khartoum faces fighting a war on two fronts, disruption of its oil production, and international intervention.



The schoolteacher warrior of Darfur