HIGHLIGHTS OF NIF ROLE IN THE GREATER HORN OF AFRICA

PAIC: Al-Turabi's Internationalism
Under al-Turabi's guidance, the Sudanese government created an open-door policy for Islamic militants, which led the U.S. State Department to designate Sudan as a state sponsor of terrorism. In 1990-1991, al-Turabi established an international umbrella organization for political Islamist militants -- the Popular Arab Islamic Conference (PAIC), over which he presided as Secretary General. He formed the PAIC with the immediate aim of opposing U.S. involvement in the First Gulf War, which had received support from moderate Arab states. Al-Turabi envisioned the PAIC, which was headquartered in Khartoum , as a counterweight to the conservative Saudi-dominated Organization of Islamic Conference representing the governments of 56 predominately Muslim countries.
Al-Turabi's sense of Arab nationalism limited, however, the appeal of the organization and circumscribed its effectiveness in "black" Africa . The word Arab in the name, Popular Arab and Islamic Conference, posed a problem for non-Arab Muslims interested in the organization. Black African, Asians, European and North Americans delegates to the 1995 PAIC conference demanded that "Arab" be deleted from PAIC, contending they did not fit into an organization that was labeled Arab. The majority non-Arab delegates voted for a change of name, whereupon the Arab delegates walked out in protest. Al-Turabi intervened by postponing the issue with the promise of taking it up at the following year's meeting, but the name change never took place.
After al-Turabi's fall from al-Bashir's grace, the Sudanese government closed down the office of the PAIC in February 2000. According to the PAIC Assistant Secretary, Ibrahim al-Sanusi, the government's closure of the PAIC in Khartoum amounted to an attempt to further erode the influence of al-Turabi, who had been forced out as speaker of the parliament the previous December. The PAIC contended that al-Bashir had succumbed to pressure from the United States and other countries to rein in hard-line elements within his ruling elite.

Arabic Forum