[From the Genocide Intervention Network. More on this later. Congratulations and thanks everyone for calling the White House about SADA. And Happy New Year!]
Today, U.S. President George W. Bush signed the Sudan Accountability and Divestment Act into law. In a statement from Crawford, Texas, the President stated, “My administration will continue its efforts to bring about significant improvements in the conditions in Sudan through sanctions against the government of Sudan and high-level diplomatic engagement and by supporting the deployment of peacekeepers in Darfur.”
This robust new Darfur legislation authorizes state and local governments to divest from companies that support the Khartoum government at the expense of marginalized populations in Sudan and prohibit federal contracts with those companies.
EL FASHER, Sudan (AP)—The United Nations took partial control of the African Union’s peacekeeping mission in Darfur Monday in a move meant to stem violence that has killed 200,000 people and driven 2.5 million from their homes.
But the new mission lacks necessary equipment and is staffed far below its authorized level, with only 9,000 of a planned 26,000 peacekeepers. Many international observers fear it will prove as powerless as the AU force it replaced.
The roughly 7,000 troops who made up the African Union force have been augmented by 800 U.N.-affiliated personnel and 1,200 policemen—meaning the new force has little additional strength.
Yesterday, a joint report on Darfur was published on behalf of 35 non-governmental organizations from around the world, including Americans Against the Darfur Genocide:
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UN Security Council Should End Sudan’s Obstruction
(New York, December 19, 2007)—The new hybrid peacekeeping force for Darfur is being set up to fail, a group of 35 nongovernmental organizations warned in a report released today [PDF download here].
The 13-page report, “UNAMID Deployment on the Brink: The Road to Security in Darfur Blocked by Government Obstructions,” sets out five ways in which the government of Sudan is actively obstructing deployment of the force. Khartoum has delayed allocation of land and resources for bases, and refused to formally agree to the list of proposed troop contributions. It has instead rejected “non-African” troops from Nepal, Thailand and Scandinavia—critical units for which there are currently no alternatives. Sudan is also attempting to hamstring the force once it is deployed by inserting completely unacceptable conditions into the “status of forces agreement,” including the right to suspend UNAMID’s communications network in the case of government “security operations.” It is also refusing to provide authorization for night flights.
“Sudan is saying ‘yes’ and then doing everything in its power to obstruct and undermine the hybrid force,” said Steve Crawshaw, UN advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “The Security Council has responded to this defiance with hand-wringing but nothing more. What will it take to make the Security Council act on Darfur?”
The 35 organizations called for the UN Security Council, whose members have been briefed repeatedly on these issues, to take action now. The council should set out exactly what the Sudanese government needs to do to facilitate the force, and if it fails to comply within 30 days, it should impose targeted sanctions on Sudanese officials, including President Omar El-Bashir.
Every now and then some alleged “analyst” publishes a hit piece against the Darfur activist/advocacy movement and the biggest Darfur umbrella group, the Save Darfur Coalition. The latest comment of note comes from William Reed, whose Op-Ed ”How to Save Darfur” was published in the November 23, 2007 edition of The Washingon Times.
It’s always good to do background research on who’s writing these articles. In this case, Mr. Reed is the founder of the Give Peace a Chance Coalition, an organization which, in February 2005, gave a joint presentation at Stanford University alongside … guess who … the Sudanese ambassador to the U.S. The point of this presentation was to deny all claims that genocide was occurring in the Darfur region.
I remember watching this presentation myself. I was a Stanford student at the time. I remember seeing members of the Give Peace a Chance Coalition talk over PowerPoint slides of smiling Darfuri child after child after child, as if to say, ‘Forget about genocide! Everyone’s completely fine in Western Sudan and Eastern Chad!’
What am I trying to get at? Simply that you shouldn’t accuse the activists if you’re in bed with the murderers.
GENEVA (AP)—The U.N. Human Rights Council on Friday dissolved a group of experts tasked with monitoring abuses in the Darfur region after demands from African countries to ease political pressure on Sudan.
The unanimous decision to halt the mission of the seven rights experts comes a week after the group accused Sudan of failing to protect civilians in Darfur from rape, torture and other violence.
The task of overseeing the Sudanese government’s progress in protecting human rights in Darfur will now fall to the U.N.’s special envoy to Sudan, Simar Samar, whose mandate was extended for a year.
Rights groups condemned the decision not to renew the experts’ mandate.
December 10, 2007—The world’s leaders say they care desperately about Darfur’s suffering, until they get distracted. It took years of international hand-wringing before the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution to send in 26,000 peacekeepers to replace a current force of 7,000, to try to halt the killing. With the deployment now set for Jan. 1, major countries are ignoring the U.N.’s appeals for essential aircraft, and Sudan’s government—which unleashed the genocide—is again reneging on its promises to cooperate.
Khartoum is now refusing to accept some non-African peacekeeping units—including a Thai infantry battalion and a Nepalese special forces unit—in what is intended to be a joint United Nations-African Union force. It is also trying to limit the peacekeepers’ use of helicopters, refusing to provide land for a peacekeeping base and insisting on other untenable restrictions, including advance notice of all troop movements.
Khartoum never seems to run out of ways to demonstrate its contempt for the United Nations.
[A New York Times editorial published earlier this week:]
December 10, 2007—The world’s leaders say they care desperately about Darfur’s suffering, until they get distracted. It took years of international hand-wringing before the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution to send in 26,000 peacekeepers to replace a current force of 7,000, to try to halt the killing. With the deployment now set for Jan. 1, major countries are ignoring the U.N.’s appeals for essential aircraft, and Sudan’s government—which unleashed the genocide—is again reneging on its promises to cooperate.
Khartoum is now refusing to accept some non-African peacekeeping units—including a Thai infantry battalion and a Nepalese special forces unit—in what is intended to be a joint United Nations-African Union force. It is also trying to limit the peacekeepers’ use of helicopters, refusing to provide land for a peacekeeping base and insisting on other untenable restrictions, including advance notice of all troop movements.
Americans Against the Darfur Genocide worked with the San Francisco Bay Area Darfur Coalition last month to host a “Dream for Darfur” Rally, Symbolic Torch Relay, and Die-in in Oakland CA. Over 500 people showed up to this Nov. 18, 2007 event. Nineteen news outlets, including NBC, ABC, and CBS local affiliates, as well as The Oakland Tribune (in a front-page spread) provided media coverage, which highlighted China’s continuing sponsorship of the genocide in Darfur. The event photos above were taken by Bruce Kaufman.
Missed yesterday’s HBO premiere of the new Darfur documentary “Sand and Sorrow”? Watch a video stream of SAND AND SORROW in its entirety from 12/7 (today) to 12/9. Just go here:
Join thousands of activists and viewers across the country to watch the premiere of the HBO documentary Sand and Sorrow, a powerful film about the tragic and ongoing genocide in Darfur, on THURSDAY, December 6 at 8:00 PM ET/PT.
