Trip to Sudan creates clarity

Editorial, The San Antonio Express-News

No one should have been surprised, least of all Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, when Sudanese government security forces manhandled members of her diplomatic entourage and an American reporter during her recent visit to Khartoum.

Rice has probably seen more evidence of the government-supported violence in Darfur than almost any world leader. She knows firsthand the duplicity of Sudanese President Omar el-Bashir.

Yet she, her State Department and the White House she serves have been disturbingly silent about the ongoing genocide that has killed an estimated 200,000 people and created more than 2 million refugees.

During the past year, the level of violence in Darfur has diminished somewhat, as Rice noted in an interview on National Public Radio before departing for her trip. The principal reason for that apparent improvement, however, is that there are simply far fewer residents left to bomb, kill and rape.

Leaving Khartoum, Rice departed for the immense Abu Shouk refugee camp. Some residents there, the Associated Press reported, planted pink and magenta flowers outside their ramshackle huts to welcome the American diplomat.

The Sudanese government greeted Rice with fists and shouts. The destitute refugees of Darfur greeted her with flowers.

Perhaps this juxtaposition of opposites will compel her to speak more forcefully about the events in Darfur.