The story of a West German 'mercenary' Rolf Steiner, who was the first 'mercenary' tried in Africa, Sudan 1971

 

The story of West German 'mercenary' Rolf Steiner, who was the first 'mercenary' tried in Africa, Sudan 1971

تدور النقاشات حالِيًّا حول مجموعة مرتزقة واغنر السوفيتية وانخراطها في إفريقيا. هذا صحيح بشكل خاص في السودان وجمهورية أفريقيا الوسطى وليبيا ومالي. لكن المرتزقة كانو منتشرون في أفريقيا منذ الستينيات. هذه هي قصة "المرتزق" الألماني الغربي رولف شتاينر ، الذي كان أول "مرتزق" يُحاكم في إفريقيا. وجرت المحاكمة في الخرطوم بالسودان عام 1971

Steiner on trial in Khartoum

Today, discussions are about the Soviet Wagner Mercenary Group and its African involvement. This is particularly true in Sudan, CAR, Libya, and Mali. But mercenaries have been common in Africa since the 1960s. This is the story of West German 'mercenary' Rolf Steiner, who was the first 'mercenary' tried in Africa. The trial took place in Khartoum, Sudan, in 1971. The story came to mind when I attended a regular Zoom meeting in Sudan on June 28, 2023, at Roman Deckert's invitation. Prof. Richard Lobban delivered a fascinating presentation on the Wagner group, particularly on Africa and Sudan. Prof. Fluehr-Lobban mentioned the trial, and it had the full transcript. Richard and Fluehr-Lobban attended the Khartoum trial as young journalists. At the end of the presentation, it crossed my mind that Richard Lobban, a freelance journalist, had walked 500 km and stayed for two weeks in the field with the Eritrean Liberation Front in 1972, which he wrote in an article I enjoyed reading. So I contacted them. The couple shared their experiences graciously. Their daughter Nicki did the great work of digitalizing the transcript. Fluehr-Lobban kindly shared with me trial documents, which I am sharing today.

Rolf Steiner was a professional 'soldier of fortune', born in Munich, Bavaria, on January 3, 1933. He participated in the Biafran Army during the Nigerian Civil War and later served with the Anyanya rebels in southern Sudan. Before that, he served in the French Foreign Legion in Vietnam and in Algeria.  He spent three years in prison and was eventually sentenced to death by the Sudanese courts, which was commuted to twenty years on "humanitarian" grounds. It was only through pressure from the West German government that he was finally released from prison and sent home on 31^st March 1974.

The doc can be downloaded below:

https://www.mediafire.com/file/60hlh2aix9y53yc/Consolidated+doc+on+mercenary+Rolf+Steiner.pdf/file

This document about the trial of West German Mercenary Rolf Steiner in Sudan 1971 contains three Parts*:

11. 1. Extract from a statement by H.E. Farouk Abu Eissa. Sudan Foreign Minister at a Press Conference, following the arrest of West German mercenary Rolf Steiner at Press Conference 18 January 1971 attended by the O.A.U. Secretary General H.E. Diallo Telli.

 2.     In the Twilight Zone between Kampala, Khartoum, and Cologne: New Findings on the Steiner-Affair by Roman Deckert

 3.   BOOK PROSPECTUS: MERCENARIES IN COLONIAL AND POSTCOLONIAL AFRICA: SELECTED CASES &THE TRIAL OF ROLF STEINER IN SUDAN, 1971  (including a complete official text of the original trial, with analysis and commentary by:  Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban, Richard Lobban,  and Scopas Poggo

 Excerpts: 

Addressing the General Court Martial and the Judge Advocate, on Thursday August 5^th. 1971, the leader of the Prosecution, Sayed Khalafalla El Rashid said:-

“This is a unique case- it could be the first of its kind in the history of the African Justice. As such it constitutes a serious event in African history- with vital far-reaching consequences to the African continent and developing countries. The mission of your court will be very difficult and at the same time a sensitive one. You will not try the accused who stands before you only- but you are looking into an international crime which plagued the Third World, disturbed its life and endangered its achievements.”

The activities of the mercenaries led the African Heads of State and government to meet in Kinshasa (11^th-14^th Sept. 67). They passed a resolution condemning the mercenaries and demanded their evacuation from Congo. The African leaders requested the United Nations to interfere to uproot the mercenaries' criminal activities. The resolution called upon all other states to issue legislation to ban the movements of mercenaries.

The Security Council, on the other hand, has already taken two resolutions on the question of mercenaries. The first Resolution (Res. 226 1966) was taken on 14^th October 1966. This Resolution, based on the statement by the representatives of the Democratic Republic of Congo that Angola was being used as a base of operation for foreign mercenaries against the Congo, urged Portugal not to allow foreign mercenaries to use Angola as a base of operations and called upon all states to refrain from interference in the domestic affairs of the Congo.

The second Resolution (Res. 239 1967) of 10^th July 1967 condemned any state which persisted in permitting or tolerating the recruitment of mercenaries and providing facilities for them. This resolution was based on a complaint from the Congo that mercenaries were being used despite the previous Security Council resolution and appeals.

The third Resolution by the Security Council was Resolution 241 (1967) taken in November 1967. In this resolution, Portugal was condemned for not abiding by the two previous resolutions.

In the meantime, the Organization of African Unity was actively engaged in finding ways to implement its resolution of September 1967 and the evacuation of mercenaries from Rwanda, where they had fled after the defeat in the Congo. A committee of ten states (Ethiopia, Congo, (Kinshasa) Central African Republic, Congo (Brazzaville), Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Zambia, and Sudan, had been elected in the meeting to find ways and means to solve the problem of the mercenaries. Sudan was made chairman of the committee.

This committee reached a resolution that the mercenaries should go back home on condition that they would never return to Africa. Their respective governments promised not to allow them to return to Africa once more. As a result of this decision, the mercenaries (118) were repatriated- they belonged to different nationalities in the following order: - 54 Belgians, 29 French, 16 Italians and the rest were Israelis, Portuguese, South Africans, Greeks, British, West Germans, Spanish, Swiss and Rhodesians.

------------------------------------

A Disclaimer by Roman Deckert

 Roman Deckert mentioned that he met and interviewed Steiner a few times and he was always very, VERY adamant that he was not a mercenary in what was then Southern Sudan, arguing that by its very definition a mercenary is fighting for money. To complicate matters further, he actually used to be a mercenary when he was in France's foreign legion, but in fact Roman did very thorough archival research in Germany (in the archives of the German Federal Foreign Office, the Stasi files and other  government records), the National Archives of the US and the UK, in Montreal in the private archives of Prof. Storrs McCall who was at Makerere at the time and collected many documents on the Southern Sudanese Anyanya and Anjidi rebels, He  got a comprehensive Steiner-related correspondence between then MI6-agenst Anthony Divall and Beverly Barnard and interviewed many contemporary witnesses and he states he  could actually never find any implication - let alone evidence - that Steiner received a salary for his activities in Southern Sudan. No doubt he got some of his expenses paid for by conservative Christian circles who were pro-Southern Sudan activists, but that surely does not qualify as a mercenary's salary. The lack of proof is obviously no guarantee for his innocence in that regard.

Roman states that Steiner was connected to Western intelligence agencies, first and foremost the French service. There were  also strong indications that the West German BND was very interested in getting info through him from the inaccessible areas of Southern Sudan at a time when Numeri had helped East Germany to achieve international recognition. There are also strong hints at CIA involvement and after all it was the MI6 agents Divall and Barnard who facilitated his first trip, before they turned vehemently against him. Despite all of this, again there are no strong enough signs that he acted as a paid intel operative, but rather as a person of interest for intel agencies to skim off info from him, especially since he again and again proved to be very stubborn-minded and hard to steer for any puppet-master. 

Roman added that Steiner always argued that he went to Southern Sudan as an idealist to support the underdogs of a suppressed minority but one strong indication in his favour may be that he refused to take a low profile on this political issue during the trial despite the pleas of his lawyer Salim Issa whom Roman interviewed in 2000.

Roman indicated that a decade ago he  was approached by a reporter from Germany's Sunday paper Welt am Sonntag. Though it is published by the right wing Springer publishing company (not the academic one but the one that also published Europe most-circulated tabloid, the horrible BILD) Roman  was very positively surprised that he went to great lengths to do a very thorough research. Unfortunately the 6-full-pages-long-read reportage is behind a paywall but even the main headline includes his claim that he was not a mercenary: https://www.welt.de/geschichte/plus246065626/Rolf-Steiner-Ich-bin-kein-Soeldner-ich-bin-Legionaer.html

In the above  and other documents Steiner claimed that he had a difficult childhood during the Nazi-regime because of an alleged Jewish background of his father and that he had some traumatising encounters while passing by the concentration camp of Dachau which all made him loathe Germany, wherefore he joined the Foreign Legion. Roman  cannot vouch for the truthfulness of those claims, but thinks that one has to take them seriously. Roman further added that while he did play a terrible role as an OAS member in Algeria (I lived in Algiers for a year and have no sympathies for him on that front, because he never really renounced it). Roman  could never find any Nazi tendencies despite the best efforts of East German propagandists to attribute that kind of stuff to him.  

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Interesting historical documents on Eritrea from the marxists.org website

 

Interesting historical documents on Eritrea from the marxists.org website

https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/eritrea/

 

Report of the International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur to the United Nations Secretary-General posted 25 February 2005

https://reliefweb.int/report/sudan/report-international-commission-inquiry-darfur-united-nations-secretary-general

Mohamed Kheir Omer's take on the current fighting in Sudan with some of the interviews I had on the matter

 

Mohamed Keir Omer's take on the current fighting in Sudan with some of the interviews I had on the matter:

Article: https://panafricanreview.com/will-the-historical-allies-of-sudans-islamist-regime-rescue-al-burhans-army/ March 7, 2024

-          Article: Sudan: Calling it a fight between the generals is simplistic | African Arguments

-          (168) No end in sight to the fighting in Sudan | Mohamed Kheir Omer | TVP World - YouTube

-          With TVP: Sudan society’s diversity favors the emergence of conflicts: expert | TVP World

-          With TRT: https://twitter.com/mkheirom/status/1655476706134687746?s=20

-          Radio Free Europe ran a program in Albanian on #Sudan entitled “Why Sudan Matters,” to which I contributed: https://twitter.com/mkheirom/status/1652049973515616256?s=20

-          With TRT: (168) RSF leader Hemedti confirms 24-hour ceasefire in Sudan - YouTube

-          With TRT: (169) How much influence do the US and Saudi Arabia have in averting the crisis in Sudan? - YouTube                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  With BBC World Service: On 22 May, will the new ceasefire hold 

   

-           

Agordat Massacre of 9th March 1975: An eyewitness account in Arabic by Faraj Hamid Faraj مـجـزرة أغردات

 

مـجـزرة أغردات 

يـوم ألاحـد ألاسـود التاسع من مارس عام ١٩٧٥م 

الموافق 26 صفـر 1395هـ 

 ِّ يرويها شاهد عيان ممن عايشوا أحداثها لحظة بلحظة

فـرج حـامـد فـرج

This day in Eritrean history, 9th of March 1975:

The killing of the Ethiopian spy, Tecleab Solomon, caused the massacre of about 400 persons in one evening in Agordat, on the 9th of March 1975. The Agordat massacre is simply one of the many massacres committed by the Ethiopian army or at times with the collaboration of fellow Eritreans; starting with the massacre of Ad Ibrihim in Barca in 1967. The Haile Sellasie regime started its scorched earth policy in 1967 particularly targeting Muslims and some of the worst crimes in the lowlands and Muslim villages in Akle Guzai was committed under his rule, under the direct supervision of Asrate Kassa, the then Governor of Eritrea. The Derg extended those massacres to all parts of Eritrea. We need to remind ourselves about those atrocities of Ethiopian occupation from time to time, to activate our memories that:

On that Agordat incident, I knew Tecleab and his family (not sure if they were from Eritrea or Tigray), rented one of the rooms in our compound for some years (when they came as immigrants), before they moved to another part of the town. His father and his elder brother were very decent people but he was rouge since his early years. He later ended up as a spy. He was regarded dangerous as he knew the town very well. A clandestine ELF cell in town lured him outside the town and was to deliver him to the ELF and was killed when he realized his fate and resisted. An army official who happened to visit the town by helicopter, ordered the massacre, as an act of revenge. Nobody realized that he was so important to the Ethiopian army.

Agordat Massacre of 9th March 1975: An eyewitness account in Arabic by Faraj Hamid Faraj

https://www.mediafire.com/file/h72wyzly8l8j8dv/Agordat+Massacre+by+Faraj+Hamid+Faraj+upd+2023.pdf/file

Ethiopia's first constitution of 1931

 Ethiopia's first constitution of 1931 

Can be downloaded at the link below:

https://www.mediafire.com/file/68e2kxxct740r5l/Ethiopia+Constitution+1923+EC.pdf/file

The TPLF's Communist Core: A 10-years Assessment at the Founding Congress of the Marxist Leninist League of Tigray (MMLT) 1985

The TPLF's Communist Core: A 10 years Assessment at the Founding Congress of the Marxist Leninist League of Tigray (MMLT) 1985 in Amharic

Can be downloaded at:

https://www.mediafire.com/file/fgdulvbdx1dmmkn/TPLF+Communism+Journey+1977+EC+Amharic.pdf/file

CIA's Assessment of Eritrea and the ELF 1967

 CIA's Assessment of Eritrea and the ELF 1967

Summary 

The insurgency in Eritrea with its separatist design is becoming an ever more pressing problem for the Ethiopian Government.  The Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF) has its origin in the areas of and Empire's heterogeneity and colonial past. It is gathering strength, resources, determination, and sophistication. It is assisted. by military, financial, and political aid from Moslem and, likely, Communist states, and is bolstered by the passivity if not defections among Christian Eritreans ever more disenchanted with an uncertain and ineffectual regime. 

The Imperial Ethiopian Government (IEG) early fumbled its opportunity to create a basis of true integration in a community of economic and political interest. Instead, the IEGs technique has unvaryingly been one of bribery, intrigue, and, when in doubt, coercion. Thus; Ethiopian ineptness and insensitivity, growing accord among Moslems involved in forging an Eritrean future, Christian disillusion, and foreign meddling, all compound to threaten the IEG's capacity to maintain its hold. 

Unless major changes occur in the Eritrean equation in the relatively near future, there is a distinct possibility of a loss of Eritrea to Ethiopia and of Kagnew Station to the United States, of acceleration beyond the limits of IBG control of the centrifugal forces elsewhere in Ethiopia, and of a major and adverse shift in the balance of power and influence in the Red Sea Basin. 

United States policy must take these ineluctable elements into full consideration, including the relatively little room for maneuvering we have between the IEG and the Eritrean Liberation Front, and the few resources we can effectively bring to bear. Within that frame, there are actions that we can take, first to reduce our immediate vulnerability in Eritrea and, second, to move the IEG away from an overly centralized approach to a more enlightened and effective one which will help close the now-growing breach.

The full report can be downloaded from the link below:

https://www.mediafire.com/file/vedkfb5g295xcxv/CIA+Assessment+of+Eritrea+and+ELF_1967.pdf/file

The Monitoring, Verification & Compliance Mechanism for CoHA between the FDR of Ethiopia and the TPLF

 

 THE MONITORING, VERIFICATION, AND COMPLIANCE MECHANISM OF The Permanent CoHA between the FDRE and the TPLF

https://www.mediafire.com/file/nvwazphczfdu2dv/Terms+for+monitoring+and+verification_pdf.pdf/file

Sudan's Political Framework Agreement Dec 2022 مشروع الإتفاق السياسي الإطاري

 Sudan's Political Framework Agreement between civilian components and the military signed on December 5, 2022   The English version:

https://www.mediafire.com/file/l8f9ypv3s5j3u85/Sudan+Framework_Agreement_Dec+5__2022.pdf/file

The Arabic version:                      مشروع الإتفاق السياسي الإطاري

https://www.mediafire.com/file/vl1s635he8d4fyr/Sudan+framework+agreement+Arabic+doc.pdf/file

THE CONTESTED LEGITIMACY OF ERITREAN STATEHOOD: THE EFFECTS OF ARAB INTERVENTION, (1941-1993) A 2003 MSC. Thesis

 

THE CONTESTED LEGITIMACY OF ERITREAN STATEHOOD: THE EFFECTS OF ARAB INTERVENTION, (1941-1993)  A 2003 MSC. Thesis By HABTOM ZERAI GHIRMAI

Abstract 

This report has contributed to understanding the diplomatic history of Eritrea‘s war of independence. Its primary purpose is to assess the genesis and effects of Arab interventionist policies in Eritrea critically. The underlying arguments are: Arab intervention was based on a flawed perception of Eritrea as an Arab nation, which could rather be explained in light of their ‗national interests across the spectrum of ideological, political, and security concerns. Second, that intervention was not critical to the victory of this largely self-reliant struggle. This work has also probed into the core of the matter to piece together a rough balance sheet of the interventions to show that they were even detrimental to the struggle. Though it has put much emphasis on the diplomatic circumstance that surrounds the struggle, as the formative years of the struggle had contributed to that end, as a way of introduction, this academic inquiry has started two decades before the start of the armed struggle, stretching the time frame from 1941 to 1993. The year 1941 marks the ending of Italian colonial rule and the start of the British Military Administration, and 1993 signifies the re-birth of the country as a legitimate sovereign by its admission to the United Nations. 

The Thesis can be downloaded at:

https://www.mediafire.com/file/1928j34yvqqo14w/Eritrea_Effects-arab-intervention-1941-1993.pdf/file

WHY REBELS COLLIDE: FACTIONALISM AND FRAGMENTATION IN AFRICAN INSURGENCIES PhD Thesis

 

WHY REBELS COLLIDE: FACTIONALISM AND FRAGMENTATION IN AFRICAN INSURGENCIES, a 2011 Ph.D. dissertation by Michael H. Woldemariam 

Abstract 

A common feature of modern civil wars is the tendency of rebel organizations to factionalize and fragment. Yet how can we explain patterns of factionalism and fragmentation in civil wars? How do normal, private disagreements within rebel organizations become full-fledged disputes that lead to a complete collapse of cooperation in war? Given the importance of rebel factionalism and fragmentation to civil wars' scale, duration, and outcomes, such questions warrant careful consideration. This dissertation uses case studies of seven Ethiopian rebel organizations nested within a statistical analysis of an original dataset of Ethiopia’s civil wars to develop an argument about the dynamics of factionalism and fragmentation within rebel organizations. The argument is then tested more broadly, using statistical data analysis on militant organizations in the Middle East. The project relies on over two years of fieldwork in Ethiopia, Somaliland, and African refugee communities in Europe and North America.

The evidence suggests that rebel factionalism and fragmentation are caused by territorial gains and losses, as battlefield shifts alter the incentives that rebel elites have to cooperate with one another. Counter-intuitively, territorial stalemate promotes cohesion and is the only sustainable basis for organizational stability in war. The core argument, along with several corollaries, contributes to a small but growing literature on the internal politics of rebel organizations and offers lessons for policymakers who seek to influence the dynamics of today’s civil wars.

The thesis can be downloaded at: 

https://www.mediafire.com/file/nrcfzjevr69q3no/WHY+REBELS+COLLIDE_FACTIONALISM+AND+FRAGMENTATION.pdf/file

البعثة التعليمية الأزهرية في إريتريا ١٩٥٢ الى ١٩٦٦ ، دراسة وثائقية Al-Azhar Educational Mission in Eritrea:1952-1966

 

 

 

البعثة التعليمية الأزهرية في إريتريا ١٩٥٢ الى ١٩٦٦ ، دراسة وثائقية

Al-Azhar Educational Mission in Eritrea (1952-1966)

Documentary study

This study deals with the religious, social and cultural role played by the ‘Al-Azhar Educational Mission’ sent to Eritrea 1952 – 1966, and it also highlights the role played by Al-Azhar in teaching Eritrean students at the Islamic Institute in Asmara which was the only one of its kind in East Africa.

https://www.mediafire.com/file/dqb03paea0e9k9m/البعثة+التعليمية+الأزهرية+في+إريتريا+١٩٥٢+الى++Al+Azhar+Educational+Mission+1952+-1966.pdf/file

Assessing the Peace Accord for Tigray November 2022

 

Assessing the Peace Accord for Tigray 

By Concerned Pan-African Scholars 26 November 2022

Overview 

1. This memorandum outlines the background, process, and outcomes of the negotiations between the delegations of the Federal Government of Ethiopia (FGE) and the leadership of the Tigray region (representatives of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, TPLF, and the people of Tigray), under the auspices of the African Union High-Level Panel, between 24 October and 12 November 2022. Defying pessimistic expectations, the parties reached an agreement in Pretoria, augmented in Nairobi. They have succeeded in ending active hostilities between the two. If the deals hold, this can relieve the humanitarian catastrophe and begin the political dialogue.

The document can be downloaded at the link below:

https://www.mediafire.com/file/0am87px2bfgmj42/Tigray+Peace+deal-Assessment.pdf/file

LACK OF POLITICAL SPACE OF THE ERITREAN DIASPORA IN THE ARAB GULF AND SUDAN

 

THE LACK OF POLITICAL SPACE OF THE ERITREAN DIASPORA IN THE ARAB GULF AND SUDAN: TORN BETWEEN AN AUTOCRATIC HOME AND AUTHORITARIAN HOSTS by Nicole Hirt and Abdulkader Saleh Mohammad, 2018

Abstract

One-third of Eritrea's citizens live in exile, and their government uses coercion, intimidation, and manipulation of patriotism to maintain financial flows from the diaspora through a rehabilitation tax and by delegating welfare responsibilities to its citizens abroad. Over one million Eritreans reside in Arab states, yet, we know little about their attitudes toward the homeland regime. Contrary to their compatriots in Europe and North America, they do not have political asylum and depend on work contracts for residence permits. This makes them vulnerable to the demands of transnational Eritrean institutions, which issue vital documents in exchange for the fulfillment of financial obligations. The diasporic political space is doubly restricted since authoritarian host states neither permit political activities nor do they provide reliable protection from the Eritrean regime. This article explores the extent to which Eritreans in the Arab Gulf and Sudan can avert coercion by their home government and how these states disempower diasporic contention.

https://www.mediafire.com/file/soexkjlh7ivetej/Eritrea_Lack_of_Political_Space.pdf/file

European Divergent Approaches to Protection Claims Based on the Eritrean Military/National Service Program

 

An article on European Divergent Approaches to Protection Claims Based on the Eritrean Military/National Service Program

In: International Community Law Review Author: Sara Palacios-Arapiles Date: 08 Aug 2022

https://brill.com/view/journals/iclr/24/4/article-p335_4.xml?language=en

Abstract

Drawing on data from the United Kingdom, Sweden, Germany, and Switzerland, this article shows that during the process of interpreting the refugee definition and applying it to the context of the Military/National Service Programme (MNSP), the definition is subject to various interpretations and applications. As a result, the treatment of similarly situated Eritrean asylum applications differs from one country to another. The article illustrates that asylum courts from the selected jurisdictions sideline relevant factors that classify the MNSP as slavery by failing to engage normatively with the international law definition of slavery. The findings suggest that a defective incorporation of international legal instruments in the assessment of protection claims based on slavery contributes to conflicting interpretations and applications of the refugee definition and can unduly de-legitimise Eritrean applications for refugee status as ‘unwanted migrants’.