Africa: Sudan: US declares genocide in Sudan civil war
Secretary of State Collin Powell and the US House of Representatives officially labeled the current violence in Sudan as genocide and asked for greater committment from the UN and the international community to stop it. The label does not legally obligate the US to act, but the UN is obligated if it accepts the label.
The conflict is mainly between black rebel groups in the west of Sudan and arab Janjaweed militia groups. The Janjaweed have been accused of genocide and rape on a mass scale - 1 million black sudanese have fled their homes and over 50,000 have been killed since the fighting began in early 2003. The Sudanese government has been accused of supporting the Janjaweed, and witnesses have said tanks and other Sudanese military vehicles have been involved with Janjaweed attacks, materials that small militia groups would not be able to requisition. Given the racial origins of the two sides and Sudan's position as a doorway country between black and arab africa, genocide is almost certainly occuring.
The BBC has a overview of the Sudanese conflict, which it calls the "world's worst humanitarian crisis." Here is a basic overview of Sudan. Sudan is a poor agricultural country in Africa with limited industry, and has yet not attracted motivated foreign intervention.
posted by fullcircle @ 9/09/2004 04:36:00 PM
1 Comments:
Fucking ridiculous. Were Sudan to have rich oil reserves, the US and Europe would have been in country 12 months ago. I don't really think genocide will really propel the UN to act, at least not sharply and decisively. I find it amazing that public will in democracies around the world is pretty dead to Sudan.
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