My journey to the province of Darfur began in Chad. At the moment it's the only way into the western part of the Sudan. As I approached the border I was met by thousands of Sudanese people emerging from a sandstorm. They had just got out of Darfur. Women, children, elderly men, all refugees fleeing their own government. Their stories were harrowing.

WOMAN (Translation): When the Arabs came to the village they killed our young women and took the young men with them. This is all we have to eat.

WOMAN 2 (Translation): Our village was burnt down, our sons and husbands killed, we have nothing, we are on our way to Chad, we have nothing here.

On the Sudan-Chad border I heard on an FM radio what the outside world is not supposed to know. The Sudanese government is attacking its own civilians. This is a recording of Sudanese airforce pilots flying over Darfur last month.

SUDANESE PILOT (Translation): We searched it, there's nothing at all. Anywhere you pass through you must burn straight away so they don't come back. Don't leave anything behind you - you don't want any surprises.

REPORTER: Today, President Bashir of Sudan says the war in the west of his country was officially over, and the humanitarian crisis was under control. I am now crossing into Darfur, a state that has been sealed off from the international media for over a year, to meet the leaders of the rebel groups fighting the government in Sudan.
I was travelling with the Sudanese Liberation Army, one of two rebel groups that have recently sprung up in Darfur to fight the Khartoum Government. Sudan has never been short of insurgents but this is an entirely new conflict. This force is largely Muslim, like President Bashir's Government, but they claim they are being persecuted by the Government simply because they are Africans, not Arabs. So what you have in Darfur is Muslim fighting Muslim, Arab fighting African.
My guides were sometimes a little haphazard in their approach to military matters. They are a good-humoured bunch of soldiers, despite two years of close and bitter fighting with the government.
At 7:30 the next morning, while some are performing morning prayers, their commander, Mohammed Adam, indulged in his favourite breakfast, Johnny Walker whiskey. After two days of travelling I finally met with Mini Minawa, the military leader of the SLA.

MINI MINAWA, SLA LEADER: You know in Darfur, is very difficult situation in Darfur right now. It is really ethnic cleaning in Darfur. The Government of Khartoum is trying to depopulate the area from the African people. The Government wants to replace the African tribes with the Arab tribes in the area.

Because the Khartoum Government is minority Arab, it's intent on putting down any African rebellion, be it Christian or Muslim. There is no doubt the SLA has a well-equipped arsenal. The Sudanese Government states that the rebels receive their arms from Eritrea and even Israel. The SLA says it wishes this was true, but that its weapons are captured from government forces. They feel misrepresented, even ignored by the world's media, so they seized every opportunity to put on a show for my camera. A rough-and-ready military parade was organised. Then their chief spokesman, amid much ceremony, delivered a message that would have been comical if it wasn't so serious.

SLA SPOKESPERSON: The people of Darfur are facing a situation similar to that of the Jews during the Second World War from the Nazi regime or the one faced by the modern and civilised world from the international terrorism represented by al-Qa'ida. We appeal to UN to put in place a mechanism that protects civilians and allows the delivery of relief to arrive to the displaced, to be observers in any peace talks that leads to the resolution of the conflict in Darfur because we don't trust the Khartoum Government and believe that it will not abandon its agenda of ethnic cleansing.

The rebels fight a classic guerrilla war, they avoid major military confrontations with the Government forces and use hit-and-run tactics. But it's difficult to tell who is winning in Darfur. The Government claim that the rebels have been defeated. Yet the rebels say they are holding their own.
I asked to be taken into one of the many deserted villages I was seeing in Darfur. As we ran in, we didn't know if the Government forces were still here. It turned out that Jejira village was almost empty and it was here that I met Sahara, the local English teacher. She had only come back by chance to pick up some family belongings. I asked her to tell me what had happened.

SAHARA ABDEL RAKMAN, TEACHER: My name is Sahara Abdel Rakman, I am the teacher in this school. The enemy did this. Our ruler Omir Bashir, all his cars and the airplane and the enemy here. Look here, all the cases.

Sahara showed me how the soldiers that had attacked her village had put a bullet through all her water and cooking bowls.

SAHARA ABDEL RAKMAN: British very kind, tell us to help us, we no bowls, no blankets, no water, no help, no seeds, no nothing. I am teacher, I work here in the school, but look at myself, my clothes, no eating, no dressing, no water, no nothing. We are trembling, we are weeping and trembling because our mother. we haven't nothing, nothing, we haven't land. my country, my country.

500 people used to live here, now there are only two. Just outside the village we found hastily dug graves and a pile of bodies. It was impossible to say if they were civilians or soldiers. I was about to meet some of the people responsible for the atrocities at Jejira. The rebels had captured Sudanese Government troops, and took me to meet their prisoners. This is the first time Sudanese soldiers have been interviewed about the Darfur conflict.

PRISONER 1 (Translation): I moved from Khartoum and was captured in Jejira on the 14th January. In Khartoum, we never heard about the trouble in Darfur. Only now have we discovered the trouble with the Africans.

PRISONER 2 (Translation): My name is Baka I am from the Blue Nile country where I used to be a fisherman.

PRISONER 3 (Translation): My name is Didiri Mohammed. I am from the Nuba tribe. I was captured in Khartoum market and taken to become a soldier.

PRISONER 1 (Translation): When we came with the local militiamen, they told us the village of Jejira was full of rebels. They described it as a military camp. When we attacked, we only found civilians fleeing. The militia then started looting the village and burning the village.

Peace talks between the Darfur rebels and the Government are due to start in Chad this week. The young soldiers of the SLA yearn for peace and a normal life.

BOY SOLDIER (Translation): If peace comes I want to go back to school and be free and happy where I live.

SLA SOLDIER (Translation): I want peace so much I just want to live like a normal human being.

SLA SOLDIER 2 (Translation): There's no equality in Darfur. That's why I carry a gun, and that's why I fight the government. We need peace here in the west as much as in the north.

Under pressure from the United Nations and aid groups, Khartoum has recently agreed to open up humanitarian corridors into Darfur. But for the 100,000 refugees who've fled, their villages destroyed, it's too little too late. From what I've seen in the west and the north, there's no one left to feed in Darfur. The exodus has already happened.

MARK DAVIS: Yesterday, the government in Khartoum boycotted the start of peace talks with the Darfur rebels, reportedly in protest at the presence of international observers.