Sudan turmoil may kill 350,000 in Darfur – ICG
NAIROBI, May 23 (Reuters) – Starvation and disease may kill 350,000 Sudanese if the world fails to quell violence stirring a refugee crisis in the Darfur area of Africa’s largest country, an influential think tank said on Sunday.
“Urgent international action is required on several fronts if ‘Darfur 2004’ is not to join ‘Rwanda 1994’ as shorthand for international shame,” the International Crisis Group said in a report, referring to the 1994 genocide of 800,000 Rwandans.
“What U.N. officials have already called the worst humanitarian situation in the world today could claim an additional 350,000 in the next nine months, mainly from starvation and disease,” it added.
The United Nations has said an estimated one million people have been displaced by the conflict in Darfur, and calls it the largest humanitarian emergency facing the world. It says about 120,000 refugees have crossed into neighbouring Chad.
Rebels and rights groups have accused Sudan’s government of arming militias of Arab heritage to loot and burn black African villages, and accused Khartoum of carrying out ethnic cleansing, a charge the government dismisses. Khartoum refers to the militias, called janjaweed, as outlaws.
The ICG estimates 30,000 people have been killed since the conflict erupted early in 2003.
Western powers should mount an aggressive diplomatic campaign to ensure Khartoum implements a promise to provide immediate, full access for aid operations to war-hit populations, including by opening the rail line so the UN can deliver food and medicine from Port Sudan, ICG said.
It recommnded that the United States and EU impose targeted sanctions such as travel bans and asset freezes against officials of the Khartoum government most directly responsible for the conduct of the conflict in Darfur.
The ICG added: “There is just enough time to save the hundreds of thousands of lives directly threatened by government-supported Janjaweed militias and looming starvation, but only if the world acts very urgently”.
“If ‘never again’ means anything, then it’s now or never in Darfur”.
“The international community must act urgently — and be prepared to use force if necessary — to save hundreds of thousands of civilians whose lives are at risk.”
The report called for immediate action, especially from the U.N. Security Council, to stop the killing, prevent starvation, reverse ethnic cleansing and encourage a peace process.
The African Union, U.S. and EU members should intensify efforts to implement the Ceasefire Commission called for in the 8 April 2004 agreement between the Darfur rebels and Khartoum.
The ICCG said that if government bombing in Darfur recurs, the Security Council should authorise a no-fly zone to protect civilian populations.
“A political resolution is also needed. There must not be a repeat of much of the last 20 years in southern Sudan, when two million people perished as the aid faucet was turned off and on at the whim of the Khartoum government, and little was done until recently to deal with root causes.”
If the Sudan government does not cease support for and disarm the Janjaweed militias, or says it is unable to do so, the Security Council should authorise the use of military force to achieve this, the ICG said.
Government and southern rebel leaders meeting in Kenya are in the final stages of negotiating an end to more than two decades of conflict in the south but their efforts do not cover the separate war in Darfur.