'We are friends, we are not the enemy'

By Rick Ruggles, Word-Herald Staff Writer

Sudanese immigrants know a lot more than they care to know about terrorism, hatred and violence.

That's why they fled their homeland and came to the United States.

So it is particularly galling for them to ba vaguely linked to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York City and Washington, D.C.

"We don't have a connection with any of these things," said Kuoth Bayak, president of the Southern Sudan Community Association in Omaha. "We are friends, we are not the enemy."

Sudanese immigrants in Omaha held a service Saturday for the victims of the terrorist attacks. They met at Calvary Baptist Church, 3903 Cuming St., to sing, pray and talk about the tragedy.

Osama bin Laden, who is considered responsible for the terrorist attacks, lived in Sudan for several years.

United States forces two years ago attacked targets in Afghanistan and Sudan with cruise missles. The attacks were intended to slow terrorist activity by bin Laden for the bombings of two U.S. Embassies in Africa.

In Sudan, the American forces destroyed a chemical plant that allegedly produced ingredients for bin Laden's nerve-gas program. Later, a commission headed by the chairman of Boston University's chemistry department found no trace of any compound related to nerve gas at the site.

Bayak said that about a week ago, an Omaha apartment building where some Sudanese immigrants live was spray-painted with hateful and threatening messages. The building is near 51st Street and Sorensen Parkway.

Bayak said some Sudanese have been attacked elsewhere in the United States since Sept. 11.

Sudanese immigrants in Omaha say their war-battered nation is divided in many ways, one of which is by religion. Christians in the southern portion of the country have been persecuted by Muslims in the northern part, they say. Bayak said most of the immigrants here at Christians.

Omaha's Sudanese community has grown to an estimated 4,000, up from less than 100 five years ago.

Bern Yuot, a pastor for South Sudanese Seventh-day Adventists in Omaha, said two of his friends were hanged by Sudanese terrorists in a Kenyan refugee camp nine years ago.

"I tought I came to a land that was unreachable," Yuot said of the United States. Now, he said, terrorism is here.

"It's horrible," he said. "It's terrible."

The sanctuary began to fill Saturday afternoon. Bayan wore a white shirt and a blue tie with red-and-white stripes. He held a Bible in the Sudanese Nuer language and and a songbook from which he led the gathering in Buer-language hymns.

They prayed for the victims and for themselves, strangers in a complicated nation. They offered sympathy, saying they understood terrorist violence all too well.

They also offered a simple message, expressed by Bayak from the pulpit.

"We are here to say, 'We love you, United States,'" he said.