Al-Bashir Joins the Resistance

Al Manar has continued its coverage of Sudanese President Al-Bashir, reporting on his travels to other African nations as “defiance.”
On March 23rd, Al Manar covered Al-Bashir’s first trip outside of Sudan for a one-day visit to Eritrea. A similar story ran today about Al-Bashir’s trip to Cairo and meeting with Egyptian President Mubarak.

The articles shared a similar format. Both articles first featured quotes from the host nations about the illegitimacy of the ICC indictment. The story about All-Bashir’s visit to Egypt quoted Egypt’s foreign minister who said that many Arab and African states do not support ICC proceedings and that Egypt and Sudan must work together to

“secure the humanitarian situation in Darfur, so as not to allow any foreign party to claim that there is a humanitarian crisis in Darfur."

Similarly, the story on Al-Bashir’s visit to Eritrea featured the following quote from an Eritrean government document:

"The drama being orchestrated by the so-called ICC amply demonstrates the anti-people stance and defamatory conspiracy on the part of external forces. Eritrea sees the decision by the ICC as irresponsible and as an insult to the intelligence of African countries."

The articles then also quoted Sudanese officials who said that Al-Bashir’s ventures outside of Sudan were a deliberate show of defiance and that Al-Bashir would continue to travel to African, Arab and Asian countries. While both articles mention the charges Al-Bashir is facing, neither offers any details which would give the charges any credibility in the eyes of the reader.

Al Manar’s reporting equates Al-Bashir’s travel abroad with acts of defiance. As mentioned previously, I believe the repeated appearance of the word defiance in Al Manar’s coverage of Al-Bashir’s response to his indictment is meant to frame Al-Bashir as someone to be admired for his resistance to Western dominance. This notion of resistance is very important in Al Manar and Hezbollah’s rhetoric and I believe Al Manar is trying to frame Al-Bashir as part of this greater struggle against Western oppression in order to garner sympathy and admiration from its audience.