DARFUR
...as Genocide Unfolds...
By Mimi
In Darfur, genocide is taking place in slow motion where systematic murder, rape, and mutilation are occuring on a vast scale, simply based on the tribe and ethnicity of the victims. The world has turned a blind eye to the more than 450, 000 dead and the 2.5 million civilians forcibly displaced from their homes.
While the world contemplates the legal definition of genocide and whether the Darfur conflict qualifies as being one, Janjaweed militias backed by the Sudanese government carry out abduction, torture, executions, rape and attack women, force teenage girls into sexual slavery, bomb, burn, loot and raid villages, all the while drought and famine continue to ravage the region.
Conflict in the The Darfur (which means Land of Fur) a barren and impoverished western Sudanese province, began in 2003 after rebel groups, the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), and the Justice and Equality Movement (Jem), claimed that the government oppressed black Africans and neglected them in favor of Arabs and they began attacking government targets. The Sudanese government admits to mobilizing “"self-defense militias" following rebel attacks but denies any links to the Janjaweed accused of trying to "cleanse" black Africans from the region.
Genocide is defined as a calculated effort to destroy a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. If world governments accept events in Darfur amount to genocide, they would be obligated to intervene in compliance with The Genocide Convention adopted by the UN in 1948 that calls on members to prevent and punish genocide. Thus, the debate over its meaning is political but how many more atrocities and crimes against humanity must occur before the world intervenes?
Although some 7,000 African Union military forces are present, they have been mostly ineffective, as they lack the manpower, equipment, logistics, intelligence and expertise required to successfully combat genocide. The UN has been similarly incompetent challenging the genocide itself since Sudan is protected on the Security Council by Russia and especially by China, both major importers of Sudanese oil. UN officials argue that the organization is merely the sum of its member states and the secretariats are impartial civil servants waiting for instructions from the Security Council and if member states lack the political will or means to stop a conflict, there is nothing it can do except for humanitarian aid.
The UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees ) and other humanitarian agencies are struggling to handle the 2 million internally displaced people inside Darfur, plus more than 200,000 refugees in 12 UNHCR-run camps across the border in Chad.
Sudan’s President Omar El Bashir has continued to state that he would not permit an international force to be deployed in Darfur, and that he would confront a U.N. force in Darfur “as Hezbollah beat Israeli forces.” The Sudanese government’s reluctance to accept the UN interference could be because it fears that a U.N. presence with U.N. Security Council backing would play a much larger role in protecting civilians and demanding accountability, including the arrest of alleged war criminals, thereby hampering its own policy of “ethnic cleansing” in Darfur.
A journey of a thousand miles begins with one step. Stopping the Darfur Genocide begins with YOU. Each one of us has the moral obligation to help stop the ongoing mass killing and ethnically-targeted violence in Darfur. Please, act now.
Ten things you can do right now...
"Scandal is an importunate wasp, against which we must make no movement unless we are quite sure that we can kill it; otherwise it will return to the attack more furious than ever."
Nicolas Chamfort (Comment this)
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While it may appear countries like USA and Britain are not in tune with events in Darfur, several citizens of these nations have been vocal and have really taken actions (e.g DarfurFast - http://www.timetoprotect.org/darfurfast) in the face of several constititional and bureaucratic limitations (eg Diverstiments of American companies doing business in Sudan - http://www.inosphere.com/sudan/home.asp). Even the social network site, Myspace (http://www.myspace.com/rockfordarfur) is planning a concert to pumb-up the medial focus on the Drafur genocide, and raise funds.
But what are African nations doing for Darfur, well, aside from sending 7000 peacekeepers to man a region half the size of Nigeria? Na-dah!
I appreciate your shout-out for Darfur, and urge your readers and Africans in general to step up and play their parts. (Comment this)
imnakoya, I agree with your point regarding the complacency of other African countries. Their inaction is very frustrating and disappointing, especially when this disaster in Darfur is coming on the heels of the Rwanda disaster.
The problem with African countries is that there is not a leader who has taken it upon himself or herself to put this issue at the forefront of the African agenda as it should be. Part of the reason, I think, is because the more developed or advanced African countries have their own internal issues like corruption, political instability, and global economic competition etc... which basically cripples their ability to act on matters like this. It looks like they are waiting for the West to resolve it as usual. But I don't know if they realize that the West will, in most cases, use tragedies like this to their advantage and promote their stereotype agenda about Africa and Africans. We need one uniting representative voice that can bring leaders together to solve our own problem instead of looking to others for solution. (Comment this)
Betty, Alem, Ketsee - Thank you, I hope all of our raised voices will save lives.
Imnakoya- That was an insightful comment. I enjoyed reading your blog, hope to see you here more often.
Mimi- Nice name ;)
The al-Bashir regime has mastered genocide and ethnic cleansing in the Nuba Mountains and in the southern Sudan, where over two million black Africans died over the course of the 21-year long civil war between the north and the south. In the south, the government wants to confiscate rich oil reserves under the lands of the Nuer, Dinka, Shilluk, Nuba, and other black African groups. In Darfur, the regime is driven by the racist ideology of the “Arab Gathering,” a secretive elite reminiscent of the KKK and Nazi Party, that wants to “arabize” Sudan and drive out black Africans in order to confiscate their grazing lands, water resources, and cattle herds.
In Darfur, victims are chosen because of their ethnic and racial identity. Fur, Masseleit, and Zaghawa black African villages were destroyed, while Arab villages nearby were left untouched, thus the systematically organized killings in Darfur are that of genocide and the primary cleavage is ethnic "Arab against Africans".
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The UN and other humanitarian organizations have been screaming for the US to declare it a genocide so the rest of the world can pay attention. I remember the then Secretary of State Colin Powell being basically begged and pleaded with to declare it a genocide. Finally, when pressure started mounting, he and the administration could not lie the fact and admitted it.
Second, they also conveniently failed to mention a recent US envoy appointed by Bush which is headed by Andrew Natsios, a former USAID director at the State Dpt, who once said that
“Africans don’t know what Western time is.” trying to jusify his policy of anti infection drugs for aid. He also said, “You have to take (AIDS) drugs a certain number of hours a day, or they don't work. Many people in Africa have never seen a clock or a watch their entire lives.” This is the kind of people the US trusts to lead the effort to save lives in Darfur. It really is a sad sad situation.
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