Stick-wielding Al Bashir launches charge on South

Khartoum: Sudanese President Omar Al Bashir likes to wave a stick when he speaks in public, and he does not speak softly.

Whether rallying his armed forces against internal rebels and the army of newly-independent South Sudan, or defying a war crimes arrest warrant from The Hague, the leader of mostly Muslim Sudan projects a career soldier's voice of command.

Sending his military this month to recapture a disputed border oil region seized by South Sudan, the former paratroop commander unleashed a barrage of belligerent rhetoric against the ex-rebels who now rule his independent southern neighbour.

Calling South Sudan's ruling Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) "insects" — a play in words on their Arabic name — Al Bashir vowed to "liberate" the southern state that became the world's newest independent nation in July last year. Its secession meant Sudan is no longer Africa's largest country.

The South's government would only learn from "disciplining with a stick", Bashir shouted, flailing the air with his own trademark stick for emphasis. He warned that any who raised their hand in an attack against Sudan, would have it "cut off".

South Sudan said on Friday it would withdraw its troops from the contested Heglig oil region, raising hopes the neighbours had pulled back from the brink of all-out war.

Three days later, Sudanese war planes bombed a market in the capital of South Sudan's oil-producing Unity State. The South's army called it a declaration of war and Al Bashir, who denied the raid, ruled out a return to negotiations.

In power since 1989 and one of the African continent's longest-serving rulers, Al Bashir has deployed a combination of steely determination and wily pragmatism to face off a series of domestic and external challenges to his rule and person.

Rebellion

After Sudanese troops and militia fought a bloody campaign against a rebellion in the strife-torn western Darfur region, Al Bashir in 2009 became the world's first sitting head of state to be indicted for crimes against humanity and war crimes by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague.

Publicly reviled as a war criminal by campaigning Hollywood stars like Angelina Jolie and George Clooney, Al Bashir steadfastly rejects the charge that he is responsible for atrocities allegedly committed against local tribes by the Sudanese army and allied Janjaweed militia, the feared "devils on horseback".

He told US interviewers in 2009 he viewed the ICC as "a political court and not a court of justice".

Bashir called it a "tool to terrorise countries that the West thinks are disobedient" in the interview with Time magazine and News Hour with Jim Lehrer on PBS.

His comment on Darfur, where Washington says "genocide" was committed, killing thousands and forcing some 2 million from their homes, was: "In any war, mistakes happen on the ground".

Those who know Al Bashir say he reacts with rage when he feels slighted, as apparently occurred when South Sudanese troops seized the Heglig oilfield earlier this month.

"I know the personality of Al Bashir ... When he feels treated badly or mistreated, he gets really very angry," said Al Tayeb Mustafa, who is a relative and strong supporter of Bashir and whose Just Peace Forum party publishes Sudan's most widely read newspaper Al Intibaha.

Destiny

ICC chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo has said Al Bashir's destiny is "to face justice". But although Sudan's president has sometimes changed his travel plans to avoid the threat of arrest on the court's warrant, he has still found governments in Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere willing to host him.

And to judge by the thousands of Sudanese who filled Khartoum's streets on Friday to celebrate the recovery of Heglig, Al Bashir still commands popular support with his bombastic, stick-waving rhetoric, his impromptu dances and his regular use of colloquial Arabic.

Decisively re-elected in 2010, Al Bashir has shifted in his years in power from initially overseeing Sudan's transformation into a radical Islamic state which provided a refuge for Al Qaida leader Osama Bin Laden, to later improving international ties through a 2005 peace deal which ended the north-south civil war.

Battle scenes: Warplanes bomb South

Sudanese warplanes bombed South Sudan's oil-rich border regions overnight, wounding several, as violence persisted despite international calls for restraint, officials said.

Bomber aircraft hit Panakwach and Lalop in the South's Unity state, as well as on the border post of Teshwin, a contested zone that has seen heavy fighting in recent days, state governor Taban Deng said.

The air strikes, some reaching around 25km from the frontline, followed bombing raids on the state capital Bentiu earlier on Monday, and continued until the "early hours" yesterday, Deng said.