Sudan crisis deepens
Editorial, by St. Louis Today
Nov 29 2004 — AMERICAN ENVOY JOHN C. DANFORTH is riding the equivalent of two wild horses at
once as he works through the United Nations to try to rein in dual conflicts in
Sudan. The first horse is Darfur, an area in the western region where
government-backed Arab militiamen engage in what the Bush administration says
is genocide against African rebels.
Mr. Danforth suffered a serious diplomatic setback last week when the U.N.
General Assembly thwarted a resolution that would have denounced the killings
and other rights abuses in Darfur. The inaction amounted to moral and political
cowardice, particularly among African countries. Once again, they followed
their pattern of refusing to criticize human rights abuses by another African
nation.
The conflict in Darfur has been spinning out of control for 20 months as
government-backed fighters, known as the Janjaweed, engage in wave after wave
of terror against Africans, burning villages, killing and maiming men, raping
women and causing at least 1.4 million people to flee farms and villages. The
death toll is said to exceed 70,000, and tens of thousands more are dying of
malnutrition and disease.
The other horse is the 21-year Sudanese civil war between the north’s Arab
Muslims and black African Christians and animists in the south. During the past
two weeks, Mr. Danforth persuaded all 15 members of the Security Council to
agree to a resolution tackling the north-south war. Getting unanimous support
came at a high price. Focusing on the big picture meant backing away from an
earlier U.N. threat of sanctions against Sudan over Darfur.
Mr. Danforth argues that getting the Security Council to work for peace in the
larger conflict would pave the way for ending the smaller but no less tragic
developments unfolding in Darfur. We hope he’s right. A glimmer of hope is seen
in the fact that factions in the north-south struggle have agreed once again to
do what they promised earlier: honor a cease-fire and a power-sharing accord.
Trouble is, the parties have been given until the end of this year to set the
accord in motion. By then, who knows how many more lives the conflict in Darfur
will claim? It’s essential that pressure be put on the Sudanese government to
hold the Arab terrorists in Darfur in check and make sure they don’t prevent
food and medicine from reaching the needy and the sick.
The developments in Sudan also raise questions about the administration’s
willingness to follow through on its charge of genocide in Darfur. If it is
genocide, then the United States has an obligation under the Geneva Conventions
to insist that the perpetrators are brought to justice. No serious effort has
been made to prosecute the Janjaweed.
The last time slaughter on a massive scale visited Africa was 10 years ago,
when machete-wielding Hutus killed some 800,000 Tutsis in Rwanda. After the
fact, there were plenty of apologies from the West and at the United Nations
for having done nothing. Rwanda is worth remembering as Darfur heads down a
similar destructive path.