Sudan:
A Cry for Compassion Continued...
Recently there has been a glimmer, if only a glimmer, of hope. Several renewed ceasefires have marked the recent evolution of relations between the Khartoum and the Sudanese People’s Liberation Army. At last these enemies appear close to signing a comprehensive peace deal mapping out wealth and power sharing agreements as well as the status of three disputed regions of Sudan. The wealth sharing agreement has been signed, and the power sharing agreement is essentially a carbon copy of that agreement. Arrangements for two of the three disputed regions have been agreed upon as well. The end of overt hostilities would appear to be in sight. So why is there yet no conclusion to the treaties? Why, with a peace agreement so clearly within reach, is the Khartoum regime failing to take the last steps toward peace? Regime activity in Darfur, a large province in far western Sudan, provides an answer. There, Khartoum is conducting a vast military campaign directed primarily against civilians of the African tribal groups of the region. Darfur is the new "South" of Sudan as the war there has escalated especially rapidly these last four months. Khartoum is using many of the same tactics and much of the same hardware seen over the years in the fighting in the South. They have also retained the assistance of the Janjawid, Arab militia groups, usually traveling and fighting on horseback, who terrorize, loot, and burn villages. The justification offered by Government of Sudan is that these destructive means are necessary in order to put down the region’s two major rebel movements, the Sudan Liberation Army and the Justice and Equality Movement. Khartoum’s forces are, however, reportedly arbitrarily attacking all of Darfur’s civilians, and not just the rebels. This is, again, governmentally sponsored terrorism. Having
refused to negotiate a political settlement to the long-standing political
problems of Darfur, and having refused any meaningful international
sponsorship for the negotiation of a humanitarian cease-fire, the Sudanese
Government in Khartoum, true to form, has opted instead for a military
"solution." Over the years they have masterfully restricted
humanitarian and international observer access within Sudan. Their modus
operandi remains the same in Darfur. Using the carrot of a peace agreement
with the South to hold the international community at bay, they have
reallocated their war machine to Darfur. Their thinking seems to be
that as long as an imminent peace deal is on the table, those within
the international community with the power to say or do something about
the genocide in Darfur will be silent.
And genocide
it is. The ‘g’ term has been used sparingly because of its
implications for international intervention. The U.N. has been more
willing to use the term ‘ethnic cleansing.’ Corroborating
statistics from several watchdog organizations, however, tell the tale.
Nearly one and a half million Sudanese have been displaced from their
homes. Over 110,000 have fled across the border to neighboring Chad
where they compete with the people of Chad for scarce water, pasture,
food, and firewood. And this, all a development within the last 13 to
14 months. In an October 2000 Washington Post article Irving Greenberg wrote, "One does not lightly invoke the specter of genocide--the intentional physical destruction of national, ethnic, racial or religious groups as such. But the horror that afflicts Sudan is staggering: government toleration of the enslavement of women and children; mass starvation used as a weapon of war; churches and mosques destroyed; hospitals and clinics bombed; widespread discrimination and persecution on account of race, ethnicity and religion. Primary responsibility for this devastation belongs to the Sudanese government, a military regime based in the north." Little, other than the locus of the genocide, has changed since Greenberg wrote those words. Professor Eric Reeves of Smith College put it well on March 11, 2004 to the House Committee on International Relations, Subcommittee on Africa, “The regime is guilty of genocide, as the Sudan Peace Act has unambiguously found. The regime is now, every day, lying repeatedly, egregiously, shamelessly about the realities of Darfur, about the nature of the military conflict, and about the extremity of the humanitarian crisis. This is so even as Khartoum’s cynical assurances are fully confounded by reports from Doctors Without Borders, Amnesty International, a wide range of UN officials, Roger Winter of USAID, a recent European Union assessment mission, and all too many horrific accounts from within Darfur and along the Chad-Sudan border.” Reeves is skeptical about our ability to halt what Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres) has recently described as the now "catastrophic mortality rates" in Darfur unless we immediately marshal preparations for humanitarian intervention in Darfur. In Sudan, as Easter nears, Christian women will rise before dawn. As they walk to the tombs, they will cry out for the loss of their brothers and sisters and children and parents in this long Good Friday of Sudan. The Easter God will hear their cries, to be sure, but, God willing, so too may others who can offer some hope to the long-suffering Sudanese. Addendum:
Those affected by the war since January 2003 is now well above 4 million. There are over 250,000 refugees from Darfur in Eastern Chad residing in camps, while another 2 million are displaced throughout the arid landscape of Western Sudan. No one knows how many have been killed but estimate are that over 200,000 have died as a result of the ongoing genocide. These figures are shameful reminders of our own obligations and responsibilities as members of the most affluent and influential society on the earth. The suffering is a burden -- it is ours to bear. Download
a State Department map of the region's refugee camps. Ryan Spencer Reed is a photojournalist based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. After graduating from Calvin College in May of 2002, he traveled through Sudan, Kenya, and Chad documenting the civil unrest in those countries. Visit Reed's Web site. More:
Read Reed's dispatches from Chad to his friends back home. For
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