CIA Recruits Sudanese to Infiltrate Arab Jihadi Groups

The CIA, faced with the impossibility of infiltrating white Americans into radical groups in the Middle East, is recruiting Arab-speaking Sudanese citizens, in spite of sanctions against the country over the killings in Darfur, it emerged yesterday.

Sudanese recruits have been providing information about individuals passing through Sudan to Somalia and elsewhere in the the Horn of Africa and Iraq. The Sudanese government is reported to have detained suspects in Khartoum at the request of the US.

The US state department issued a report describing Sudan as a "strong partner in the war on terror". A state department official said the Sudanese had done things that had saved lives but acknowledged there was a contradiction: "The bottom line is that they are bombing their people ... Dealing with Sudan, it seems like they are always playing both ends against the middle."

A former high-ranking official, quoted in the Los Angeles Times, acknowledged the importance of the intelligence: "If you've got jihadists traveling via Sudan to get into Iraq, there's a pattern there in and of itself that would not raise suspicion. It creates an opportunity to send Sudanese into that pipeline." A US official still in post told the paper: "Intelligence cooperation takes place for a whole lot of reasons. It's not always between people who love each other deeply."

US intelligence agencies do deals with all sorts of governments in the Middle East and central Asia, not only for intelligence-gathering but for secret detention centres and as fueling stops in rendition cases. Iran provided information to the US to help its overthrow of the Taliban in 2001.

Another ex-CIA official said: "There's not much that blond-haired, blue-eyed case officers from the United States can do in the entire Middle East, and there's nothing they can do in Iraq. Sudanese can go places we don't go. They're Arabs. They can wander around."

But relations have been soured by Darfur, a high-profile issue in the US, with campaigners calling for sanctions against Khartoum.

Although Mr Bush has taken a lead on sanctions, critics claim he has not gone as far as he could have and blame this on intelligence cooperation.

Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the national security council, said he did not believe sanctions would ruin intelligence cooperation. "We certainly expect the Sudanese to continue efforts against terrorism, because it's in their own interests, not just ours," he said.

In Sudan yesterday, the government rebuffed appeals by the new French foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, to allow a UN-African Union force into Darfur.