The desperate plight of Sudan’s Darfur region
By Joyce Mulama
NAIROBI, June 19, 2004 (IPS) — “The toll on children is most worrying,” says James Elder, Communications Officer for the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), about the situation in Darfur, western Sudan.
Speaking to IPS Friday in a telephone interview from the beleaguered region, he noted that “There are high levels of malnutrition, especially among children?Many of them have died of malnutrition (but) it is difficult get the number of those dead due to lack of monitoring logistics.”
On the eve of World Refugee Day (Jun. 20), there seems little relief in sight for Darfur – where Arab militias are said to have launched a scorched earth campaign against the members of three black ethnic tribes: the Fur, Masaalit and Zaghawa.
Reports from the region indicate that villages have been torched, women raped and cattle stolen during the 16-month conflict, which the UN’s Under Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs – Jan Egeland – has apparently said amounts to ethnic cleansing.
The militias, also known as janjaweed (“men on horseback”), are reportedly backed by the Sudanese government, a charge Khartoum denies. Human rights groups point out that the Fur, Masaalit and Zaghawa are the same ethnic groups that two loosely allied rebel movements in the region draw their membership from: the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army and the Justice and Equality Movement.
At present, about a million people have been displaced in Darfur as a result of the conflict, while the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates that 158,000 have fled to neighbouring Chad.
According to Kitty McKinsey, the organisation’s Regional Public Information Officer, the situation of the refugees is appalling, “and is likely to get worse as more refugees continue to cross into Chad.”
“The refugees are in a desperate situation after walking for long without food. Most of them reach the Chad-Sudan border when they are almost collapsing,” she told IPS in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, shortly after returning from a visit to the area.
McKinsey said the UNHCR had not yet been able to get enough equipment and supplies to the eight camps that are housing the Sudanese refugees: “We have had to create temporary shelters with twigs. There is basically no water.”
But, in an ironic twist, this situation may now be disastrously reversed. “We are now worried because the rainy season is soon starting and the people have no proper shelter,” she noted.
The UN agency is also struggling to take care of those refugees who are still stuck at the border. “Here the situation is more depressing, as we have had cases of babies dying in their mothers’ arms because there is nothing for them to eat and drink,” McKinsey said.
The UNHCR has launched an appeal of 55 million dollars for emergency aid to Darfur, only a third of which has been raised.
Thousands of people are also reported to be streaming into the approximately 20 camps for internally displaced persons in Darfur, whose facilities are inadequate to deal with this influx. Certain camps host about 60,000 people, according to James Elder.
“We now have access to all the camps, but we do not have sufficient resources to provide the people with basic needs. We have sent out an appeal of 39.5 million dollars. If this is fully funded, we can make a difference in these people’s lives,” he told IPS.
The Darfur crisis has been repeatedly condemned by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, who is expected to visit Sudan in the coming weeks.
The Chairman of the Sudan Ecumenical Forum, which comprises churches, donors and international organisations, also spoke out Thursday against developments the region. Bishop Kevin Dowling likened the violence in Darfur to the 1994 Rwandan genocide, in which upwards of 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed.
Earlier this week, a Chadian official reportedly accused the janjaweed of trying to export the tensions in Darfur to Chad. This followed the killing of 69 militia who had crossed the border to raid a village in Chad. The Chadian area along the border with Sudan has the same ethnic composition as Darfur.
Violence in the region has undermined hopes of a peace dividend in southern Sudan, where a separate 21-year conflict between government and the Sudan People’s Liberation Army may be brought to an end next month.
“The situation in Darfur will make it difficult for the international community to fully invest in the country, and reconstruct the underdeveloped southern region,” Ben Parker, Spokesman for the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator for Sudan, told IPS in Nairobi.
“Now attention has been diverted to addressing the insecurity in Darfur, which has led to an influx of refugees, creating a humanitarian crisis,” he added. Sudan’s resources include oil, gold and uranium.
Various observers have pointed out the need for the African Union (AU) to take a leading role in resolving the Darfur crisis.
“This poses a litmus test for the AU, which recently launched the African Union Peace and Security Council, and which is due to put in place an African peace keeping force,” says Mitch Odero, a regional political and media analyst.
The AU sent a team to evaluate the situation in Darfur about four weeks ago, but has not made public its findings.