Esther Anderson
"The scale of the tragedy in Darfur would be difficult to believe if it were not for the terrible fact that it is a reality. More than 1 million Sudanese from Darfur are existing — barely — in desperate circumstances ... This humanitarian crisis has as its genesis a human rights crisis. One led into the other as night follows day. It is not impersonal, unswayable elements that are behind this tragedy; this tragedy is entirely [hu]man-made." — Acting High Commissioner for Human Rights, Bertrand Ramcharan on June 3.
For months, aid and human rights agencies have warned of the massive humanitarian crisis developing in the Darfur region of west Sudan. This has escalated to the point where it is now estimated that approximately 1 million people have been driven from their homes, almost every village in rural Darfur has been destroyed, and 100,000-350,000 people are at risk of starving to death. At least another 150,000 have escaped across the border to refugee camps in Chad to escape what the UN has described as a "scorched earth policy of ethnic cleansing".
How has it come to this? Why, despite the lesson of Rwanda, and the protestations of "never again", has another attempted genocide been allowed to progress so far?
Sudan, a country the size of west Europe, is the site of two separate conflicts. In addition to the conflict in Darfur, there is a long-running civil war between the Arab Islamic government in Khartoum, north Sudan, and the largely African, Christian/Animist south. Around 2 million people, mostly civilians, have died in this war and up to 4 million have been displaced since 1983.
In late May, a peace accord was signed between the government and the main southern rebel group, the Sudan Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA). During the negotiations to reach the accord some policy makers have ignored the issue of Darfur, for fear of derailing the north-south peace process.
The 15-month conflict in Darfur has resulted in what the UN and independent aid agencies have described as "the worst humanitarian catastrophe in the world". Darfur, an impoverished region, had been an independent state from the 16th Century to the second decade of the 20th Century, when it was coercively annexed to modern day Sudan.
Most of the 6-7 million Darfurians are settled farmers from Muslim African tribes, but they share Darfur with cattle-raising Muslim Arab nomads. During the past decade, desertification has greatly diminished water resources and pasture, increasing the tension between African and Arab residents of Darfur. This has been accentuated by government political and economic marginalisation of the region.
In early 2003, two African rebel movements — the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) and the smaller Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) — formed to fight what the SLM describes as "policies of marginalisation, racial discrimination, exclusion, exploitation and divisiveness" and also to protect their communities against a longstanding campaign by government-backed militias (janjaweed) recruited among groups of Arab extraction in Darfur and Chad.
In early 2003, the SLM and JEM attacked military installations. The Sudanese government responded by bombing towns and villages, and increasing the recruitment and arming of Arab militias in a campaign to drive Sudanese Africans from their land.
Human Rights Watch, the International Crisis Group and Amnesty International accuse Sudanese government forces and government-backed Arab militias of "horrifying military attacks against civilians" including mass rape, branding, torture and killing of black civilians throughout Darfur, fouling of wells and destruction of villages, livestock and food supplies.
The Sudanese government continues to conduct indiscriminate bombings and other aerial attacks against clearly civilian targets and has failed to make its forces and pro-government militias accountable. These tactics are depressingly similar to those used for many years by the government to drive central and south Sudanese from their land for oil exploration. The death toll since February 2003 is estimated at 30,000. More than 3 million have been affected by the conflict. Even those who have fled to overcrowded camps in Chad continue to be attacked by janjaweed militia.
It is now too late to stop the "ethnic cleansing" in Darfur. On May 12, a UN official told Agence France Presse, "there are no more villages to burn". Between 100,000 and 350,000 displaced people are likely to die of starvation and disease. The Khartoum government has restricted access by aid organisations in an apparently deliberate starvation policy.
To quote the International Crisis Group's website: "The Khartoum government, its tactics well honed by years of practice in the south and Nuba mountains, continues to apply layers of obstruction." In May, 2004, the government lifted some restrictions on humanitarian visits to the refugees, but imposed other restraints.
The UN undersecretary-general, Jan Egeland, said recently: "People are dying because we were denied access for so long. People will be dying because we are still not able to get through all the things that we should be able to."
Militia attacks also have hampered distribution of emergency food and medicine. A ceasefire signed on April 8 continues to be violated.
Although the Sudanese government has repeatedly denied any involvement in attacks on civilians in Darfur, the UN and aid and human rights agencies have confirmed its central role in this nightmare.
Can anything be done to end the suffering in Darfur? Human Rights Watch and the International Crisis Group have called for the international community to insist that the Sudanese government not only disarm the janjaweed, but also demobilise and withdraw them, and charge those responsible for war crimes. Resources must be committed to bolster humanitarian relief and human-rights monitoring in Darfur.
Th UN Security Council should pass a mandatory resolution under Chapter VII of the UN Charter that names the government of Sudan as the perpetrator of the problem, demands specific actions and spells out targeted sanctions if Khartoum fails to comply.
The Security Council should also pass a resolution demanding that Khartoum at once implement its promise to provide immediate and full access for aid operations. To quote the International Crisis Group website: "Time and again the government has allowed full access only in response to multilateral, public pressure. Multilateral pressure is needed now if Khartoum is going to move on the peace and humanitarian access fronts."
From Green Left Weekly, June 30, 2004.
Visit the Green Left Weekly home page.