Sudan coup plot evidence 'a lie'

[Talon]

Sudan coup plot evidence 'a lie'

Sudan's opposition Popular National Congress (PNC) has denied involvement in a plot to topple the government.

The party of detained Islamist PNC leader Hassan al-Turabi say evidence, including the discovery of arms caches and military uniforms, was fabricated.

The PNC's Europe representative denied they were arming rebel movements in Sudan's troubled Darfur region.

Some 70 PNC members have been arrested since Friday and one has died in detention, he said.

The dead body of Shumuseldeen Idries, a PNC student leader, was delivered by security services to his father's home on Saturday, the day after his arrest.

"There's a legal medical report saying that his death is an act of torture," PNC's El Mahboub Abdul Salam told the BBC's Network Africa programme.

'Against weapons'

He insisted the PNC believed in peaceful resistance against the government of President Omar al-Bashir, who came to power an Islamist-backed coup in 1989.

"We are against using weapons against the government," Mr Mahboub said, claiming the government is trying to deflect attention away from the crisis in Darfur.

Sudan's First Vice President Ali Osman Taha accused Mr Turabi, a former ally of President Bashir, of coordinating with "Zionist circles" to overthrow the government.

Mr Turabi has been in detention since March in connection with previous allegations of plotting a coup, linked to the conflict in the region of Darfur.

Security forces say they seized 100 Kalashnikovs, 10 RPG mortars and other weapons from an arms cache in a suburb of the capital Khartoum over the weekend.

Mr Mahboub says that although the PNC and rebel movements in Darfur share the same ideology - the belief in the decentralisation of power and wealth - the PNC does not back their armed resistance.

Violence has escalated in Darfur since the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) and the Justice and Equality Movement (Jem) rebel movements took up arms against the government in February last year.

Tens of thosuands of people have been killed in the conflict, with many atrocities blamed on the pro-government Janjaweed militia.

According to the BBC's Alfred Taban in Khartoum, censorship, which was stopped last year, has been re-imposed on the local media.

Security forces issued a directive prohibiting the publication of any denials of the alleged plot, our correspondent says.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/3659268.stm