Updates

I am going to be unable to provide updates today, so please check out Passion of the Present to keep track of breaking news.

Darfur: Momentum Growing on Darfur Accountability Act

An update from Save Darfur

Members of the Save Darfur Coalition have been meeting with top House and Senate lawmakers and their aides over the last two weeks in an effort to spur action on legislation designed to help the people of Darfur. Representatives and Senators on both sides of the aisle have spoken out forcefully on the need to do more to stop the ongoing genocide, and momentum for the Darfur Peace and Accountability Act (H.R. 3127 in the House, S. 1462 in the Senate) is growing.

In the House, there is hope that H.R. 3127 will be brought up for a vote before the full International Relations Committee soon, with expectations of a vote before the entire House quickly thereafter. In the Senate, the Foreign Relations Committee held a hearing on Darfur on September 28th in which Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick and NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe General James Jones testified before the Committee on what is already being done, and what else we could be doing, to bring an end to the genocide in Darfur.

Uganda: ICC Ready to Indict LRA

From Reuters

The International Criminal Court is expected to issue arrest warrants shortly against leaders of a notorious Ugandan rebel force accused of raping and maiming children over two decades, a U.N. official said on Thursday.

Remnants of the Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army recently took refuge in the Congo, and would be disarmed and evicted by force, if necessary, according to William Lacy Swing, head of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

"We understand that the International Criminal Court will be issuing international arrest warrants imminently for a number of key LRA leaders and sending these directly to the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ugandan governments," Swing told the U.N. Security Council, according to his written notes, obtained by Reuters.

The LRA, led by a Christian mystic, Joseph Kony, is not on the Security Council's agenda but news that his deputy, Vincent Otti had moved fighters to the Congo, has brought it to the council's attention.

Some diplomats say the warrants could be issued as early as this week or next, and follow sealed indictments to a three-judge pre-trial chamber of the International Criminal Court, based in The Hague, Netherlands. The indictments and warrants would be the first by the new global court.

International Justice: Belgium Seeks Arrest of Chad's Ex-Leader

From the AP

Belgium has issued an international arrest warrant for Chad's former leader Hissene Habre, charging him with atrocities during his 1982-90 rule, the Justice Ministry said Thursday.

Human rights campaigners said the decision would serve as a precedent for prosecution of other exiled leaders accused of abuses.

Habre, who lives in exile in Senegal, is being pursued under a Belgian law that allows prosecutions for war crimes even if these are committed outside the country.

"This is a great day for Habre's thousands of victims and a milestone in the fight to hold the perpetrators of atrocities accountable for their crimes," said Reed Brody of Human Rights Watch.

Brody said Habre could become the first ex-president to be extradited to face human rights charges in another country's national courts.

Habre, 63, is accused of torture, murder and other crimes in his eight-year reign. A commission set up in Chad in 1992 accused Habre's regime of 40,000 political killings and 200,000 cases of torture.

Congo: US Rejects UN Call for More Troops

From the Financial Times

The US has rejected United Nations calls for an additional brigade of peacekeepers for its overstretched mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo, as the central African country gears up for its first multiparty elections in more than 40 years.

Kofi Annan, UN secretary-general, has asked the Security Council for an extra 2,580 troops to quell unrest by Mayi-Mayi militia in the north and centre of the largely lawless, but strategically important, southern province of Katanga. A referendum on a new constitution is due in late November, and already delayed elections are scheduled for next year.

But the US says the UN should instead use troops from neighbouring countries if needed. "We must prioritise," said a US official. "We cannot do everything. We have advocated sharing troops for the election."

Chad/Sudan: More on Deby's Accusations

From IRIN

One analyst said that in blaming the Janjawid - and not directly fingering the Sudanese government - Deby appears to want to paint himself as neutral in the long-standing conflict in Darfur and maintain a delicate balancing act.

“This was a nice show of neutrality,” said Roland Marchal, Africa specialist at the Sciences Po university in Paris. “Deby was very prudent not to implicate the government of Sudan. In the end, he is responsible for the country’s relations with Sudan.”

The Chadian president said it was too early to say whether the attackers were backed by the Sudanese government.

"I cannot figure it out. These people were armed to the teeth with weapons and so many munitions,” he said. “Who gave it to them? Is it the government of Sudan, or another? We’ll find out.”

Sudan: Discord in East Threatens Peace Accord With the South

From the Economist

“WE'VE learnt the lessons of Darfur,” says Sheikh Ali, who runs the town of Hameshkoreib, in eastern Sudan, for the rebel Eastern Front. “This government only listens to people who carry guns.” What he means is that, while Sudan's main southern rebel movement has, after some 30 years of on-off fighting, won a deal that promises autonomy and perhaps even eventual independence for the south, other disaffected regions must now fight for similar concessions. While strife in Sudan's western province of Darfur continues, a growing rebellion in the east is further weakening the central government in Khartoum—and could even cause the delicate north-south deal to unravel.

As the main southern group, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), withdraws its forces from the country's eastern belt as part of its agreement signed earlier this year with the government in Khartoum, eastern rebels are replacing them. The Eastern Front's bases are over the border, in Eritrea. Sudanese government forces and tribal militias are limbering up for a showdown on the Sudanese side of the border. There are growing fears that the government in Khartoum is planning to unleash the militias, just as they did in the west, when mounted Arab levies known as the janjaweed were allowed, and probably encouraged, to commit an array of atrocities against the disaffected Darfuris, leaving perhaps 180,000 dead.

The Eastern Front was set up last year as an alliance between two eastern tribal rebel groups, the Rashaida tribe's Free Lions and the Beja Congress. They were later joined by the Darfuris' Justice and Equality Movement (JEM). The rebels' gravest threat is to block the flow of oil, which is exported through Port Sudan at a rate of 300,000 barrels a day. The government also plans to build a second refinery nearby that would double the output of Sudan's refined oil within three years. That plan, too, could be stymied.

Uganda Blasts UN, Congo for Not Disarming Rebels

Reuters

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni on Thursday called neighbouring Congo and U.N. peacekeepers "sponsors of terrorism" for failing to disarm Ugandan rebels camped in Congo's eastern jungles.

If the peacekeepers did not take action, then Uganda would, he said, without elaborating. Congo's military has already expressed concern that Uganda may launch military strikes against the rebels.

The mineral-rich but lawless east of the Democratic Republic of Congo is home to about 1,000 rebels from Uganda's Allied Democratic Forces (ADF). And earlier this month, as many as 400 heavily armed guerrillas from Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) crossed into another part of northeastern Congo.

"It is not acceptable to continue the way things are now. Congo is in effect giving bases to terrorists, under the supervision of the U.N.," Museveni told a news conference.

Senior Congolese military officers and members of the U.N. peacekeeping force MONUC held talks with the LRA rebels at the weekend.

A Congolese regional commander said afterwards the rebels were refusing to give up their weapons and would be forcibly disarmed. He gave no date for when this would happen but said he wanted to pre-empt any Ugandan military action.

"Congo and MONUC are sponsors of terrorism and they must stop," Museveni said.

Museveni said he expected MONUC to disarm the LRA fighters, who entered Congo this month with their deputy leader Vincent Otti.

"If they do not disarm them, Uganda will do something, definitely," he told reporters at State House. "We cannot allow them to come back and disturb our people again."

Congo/Uganda: LRA Accused of Attacks, Poaching

From AFP

Members of Uganda's notorious Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) are terrorizing civilians and killing wildlife in the restive eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC officials said Thursday.

[edit]

A Garamba-based official with the Congolese Institute for the Conservation of Nature (ICCN) confirmed the poaching incidents and said the rebels were also assaulting the residents of the town of Aba just outside the park.

"They are holding the local population hostage," the official told AFP on condition of anonymity. "Many Aba residents have fled into the bush.

"People are scared because of the LRA and Ugandan troops massing on the other side of the border," the official said.

Darfur: More on the Attack

From UNHCR

UNHCR expressed grave concern Thursday over an unprecedented attack on a camp for thousands of internally displaced persons in Sudan's West Darfur region that reportedly left 29 people dead and another 10 seriously wounded.

Initial reports received by UNHCR indicate a group of 250-300 armed Arab men on horses and camels attacked Aro Sharow camp, in northern West Darfur, on Wednesday afternoon, sending thousands of camp residents fleeing into the insecure countryside. The attackers reportedly burned about 80 makeshift shelters – about one-quarter of the camp's households.

Aro Sharow is located 16 kms north of the town of Saleah. Between 4,000- 5,000 internally displaced Sudanese were believed living in the camp, and most reportedly fled into the surrounding countryside. The nearby village of Gosmeina was also reportedly attacked and burned. Initial reports indicated there were 29 dead and 10 seriously wounded.

High Commissioner Antonio Guterres called on the Sudanese government to do everything it could meet its responsibility to protect the internally displaced in Darfur. "As long as this insecurity continues, the international community cannot provide the assistance that is so desperately needed by hundreds of thousands of people," said Guterres. "The government of Sudan has a responsibility to ensure security for all of its citizens."

UNHCR, which carries out protection monitoring in West Darfur, has three offices in the region, with five more planned. But the Jebel Moon area around Aro Sharow has been a no-go zone for the United Nations for several months because of continuing insecurity. A UNHCR team did manage to visit the camp last October. Many residents of the Jebel Moon area had earlier fled to the Chad border in 2003-04, then returned to Jebel Moon in May 2004 following a government -announced peace agreement.

Aid workers familiar with the region said the Aro Sharow residents stayed in the camp at night for safety reasons, but would return to their nearby villages during the day to cultivate their fields.

The attack follows a series of worrisome security incidents throughout Darfur. UNHCR is concerned that the deterioration in security is preventing the provision of vital aid to tens of thousands of internally displaced people in Darfur and could prompt them to flee again – possibly to neighbouring Chad, which is already struggling to cope with more than 200,000 refugees from Sudan.

There are an estimated 2 million internally displaced people in Darfur, including 715,700 in West Darfur; 770,800 in South Darfur, and 480,000 in North Darfur.

Darfur: 29 Reported Dead in Attack

From Reuters

Twenty-nine people were reported to have been killed in an unprecedented attack on a refugee camp in the north-west of the Sudan region of Darfur, the United Nations said on Thursday.

The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said that according to initial reports the Aro Sharow camp was attacked by 250-300 "armed Arab men on horses and camels" late on Wednesday.

Another 10 people were reported to have been seriously wounded and the nearby village of Gosmeina was also reportedly attacked and burned, the agency said. The death toll referred only to camp dwellers.

"The UNHCR is gravely concerned," it said in a statement, adding that it was the first time a camp had been attacked since conflict erupted in the vast Sudanese region over two years ago.

Between 4,000 and 5,000 people were believed to be living in the camp and most of them fled into the surrounding countryside which the U.N. considers unsafe, the agency added.

The attackers had apparently burned about 80 makeshift shelters, around a quarter of the camp's households.

Congo/Uganda: LRA Ignores Deadline to Leave

From IRIN

Some 400 Ugandan rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) who in September crossed from Sudan to the Garamba National Park in northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are the latest of several foreign groups which the government says must leave the country by Friday or face serious consequences.

"The logistics are in place if all the combatants were to decide to repatriate voluntarily," Emmanuel Gusu-wo, the assistant administrator for disarmament at the UN Mission in the DRC (MONUC), told IRIN on Wednesday. "The only thing missing are the combatants."

Chad/Sudan: Deby Says Janjaweed Responsible for Attack

From DPA

Chadian President Idriss Deby has accused Sudanese militiamen of being behind an attack on Thursday that left dozens dead near Chad's eastern border with Sudan.

"We are absolutely certain that the perpetrators were Janjaweed militias, but we still do not know the reasons for the attack,'' he told Radio France International (RFI).

Earlier this week, the Chadian government announced that a group of unidentified men in uniform had crossed into Chad from Sudan killing herdsmen and stealing livestock.

Pro-government Arab militias also known as Janjaweed have been fighting with African rebels in Sudan's western Darfur region for the past two years.

The conflict has forced up to 2 million Sudanese from their homes including more than 200,000 who fled to Chad.

"If the situation in Darfur is not dealt with, we could have a crisis similar to Rwanda or Congo in the Great Lakes,'' Deby added.

Rwanda/Congo: Rebels Appeal for Talks

From AFP

Rwandan Hutu rebels in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo called Thursday for urgent talks with the DRC, Rwanda and Uganda ahead of a looming deadline set by the three nations for them to disarm and return home.

Just 48 hours before the expiry of the deadline to leave the DRC or face possible attack, the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) appealed for emergency meeting to discuss its unfulfilled March pledge to do so.

"The FDLR proposes to urgently meet the tripartite group to find ways and means for the full implementation of the Rome declaration," rebel chief Ignace Murwanashyaka said in a statement received here.

Sudan: Pronk to Travel to Abuja to Speed Up Peace Talks

From the UN News Center

Stepping up efforts to reach a peace agreement in Sudan’s Darfur region by the end of the year, the top United Nations envoy to the country will be travelling to Abuja, Nigeria, on Friday for weekend consultations among the parties to the peace talks and the African Union (AU) mediation.

Special Representative to the Secretary-General Jan Pronk told a press briefing in Khartoum that he remained optimistic that the parties will reach a peace settlement by year's end to the conflict that has raged in the Darfur region since 2003 between Government forces, allied militias and rebels.

He noted that so far the warring factions have remained at the table during the six rounds of peace talks held in Abuja, and have agreed to discuss security and ceasefire-related issues using the UN framework. Beyond the upcoming weekend negotiations, the special envoy will return to Abuja in October for more talks.

Because of intermittent rebel and militia activity, Mr. Pronk strongly urged the Security Council to beef up the AU forces from 5,000 to roughly 12,000 in anticipation of creating a safe trip home for the many internally displaced persons (IDPs) now staying in camps.

Sudan: Statement by Security Council

From the UN Security Council

The members of the Security Council held consultations on 21 September on the situation in the Sudan. They expressed serious concern at recent reports of a resurgence of violence in Darfur.

In addition the members of the Council condemned the rise in banditry, as outlined in the Secretary-General's report.

The members of the Council welcomed the launch of the sixth round of the Abuja talks. They reiterated their full support for the talks and for the African Union chief negotiator Salim Ahmed Salim. They stressed that only a political solution can achieve durable peace and reconciliation in Darfur. They called upon the Sudanese Liberation Movement/Army, the Justice and Equality Movement, and the Government of the Sudan to negotiate in good faith with a view to reaching a peace agreement in Darfur by the end of 2005.

They emphasized the need for all parties to show calm and restraint and fully to honour the ceasefire, and urged that progress in the talks not suffer, due to violence in Darfur or to divisions within the two sides.

They welcomed the formation of the new Sudanese Government of National Unity.

The members of the Council urged all parties to conclude the Status of Forces Agreement to allow free and unrestricted movement of United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) personnel in Sudan.

The members of the Council remain firmly committed to the cause of peace in all of the Sudan, including through the full implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement and the resolution of the conflict and the humanitarian crisis throughout the country.

The members of the Council reiterated their appreciation and support for the continuing efforts of the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) operating on the ground in Darfur. They urged all parties to immediately halt all obstructive acts against AMIS personnel, and also urged an end to all restrictions on humanitarian organizations in Darfur.

The members of the Council called on all donors to honour their Oslo pledges to contribute to the consolidation of peace in the Sudan.

Darfur: More From Egeland

Maybe the UN should make Egeland the Special Representative to Sudan since he seems to be the only one willing to speak the truth - from the UN News Center

The level of violence has escalated again sharply and the situation has become dangerous enough in western Sudan's Darfur region that the United Nations relief agencies have temporarily suspended operations in parts of the country, the UN's top relief coordinator said today.

"As we speak, we have had to suspend action in many areas, tens of thousands of people will not get any assistance today because it is too dangerous, and it could grow," Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland told a press briefing in Geneva of the conflict between the Government, allied militias and rebels that has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced more than 2 million since 2003.

In the last few days, humanitarian workers have been harassed, attacked, robbed or abducted, civilians are being killed and raped every day with impunity, and truck drivers are now refusing to deliver aid in many areas, he said.

Mr. Egeland warned that if the violence continued to escalate and if it continued to be so dangerous to the 11,000 unarmed humanitarian workers – the vast majority from non-governmental organizations (NGOs) – the UN might not be able to sustain their operations providing food, medicine, shelter materials, and creating schools for 2.5 million people requiring assistance.

"My question is, is this a repeat of the so-called safe areas of Bosnia again? We keep people alive, we give them food, we give them medicine, schools, but we do not protect them, or protect our own unarmed staff. Then the massacres happen," he added.

Uganda: UPDF Deploys at Congo Border

From New Vision

Thousands of heavily-armed UPDF troops have deployed at the Uganda-Congo border in the West Nile region to secure the area as LRA rebels who fled to Congo recently lay down weapons.

The 409 Brigade yesterday patrolled the border. About 400 LRA led by Joseph Kony’s deputy, Vincent Otti, crossed to Congo for asylum.

The Congolese regional military commander, Gen. Padiri Bulenda, who met them on Sunday, said they will be forcibly disarmed.

Arua-based UPDF spokesman Capt. Anech Mubangizi yesterday urged local leaders and the population to be vigilant.

“These rebels will not go far because the UPDF has learnt their tactics. If they are surely seeking asylum, why do they refuse to disarm?” Anech asked.He challenged the rebels to hand in their arms if they were serious about denouncing rebellion. “They have been deceiving us that they want peace talks,” he said.

Darfur: Pronk Says Peace Deal Possible This Year

This guy is a joke - from VOA

U.N. Special Representative to Sudan, Jan Pronk, says he is optimistic about peace talks between Darfur rebels and the Sudanese government. But Mr. Pronk admitted that a peace deal may not end the violence, due to a splintering of rebel factions and the continued presence of Arab militias known as Janjaweed.

"I think it is still possible to have a peace agreement," said Mr. Pronk. "It is not a minute possibility. It is a very concrete possibility. Again, the talks in Abuja are not bad at the moment. It is going to the right direction. They are not divided in Abuja. The situation is much better than people are saying. It is not lost."

Darfur: Zoellick Sees Hope in Talks for Ending Crisis

From the Washington File

Ending violence in Sudan's Darfur region, where more than 150,000 people have died in the past three years, is in the hands of negotiators for rebel factions and the Sudanese government who are now meeting in Abuja, Nigeria, Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick told a Senate hearing September 28.

Zoellick, who recently visited Darfur and other parts of Sudan, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that "AU [African Union]-sponsored peace talks between GOS [the government of Sudan] and rebels [fighting in Darfur] have made modest progress" since they began earlier this year in Nigeria.

The number two official at the State Department told Committee Chairman Richard Lugar (Republican of Indiana) that he hoped the talks – which resumed in Abuja September 16 -- would provide a lasting solution to the crisis in Darfur, which has displaced up to 2 million people, including 200,000 living in 12 refugee camps in neighboring Chad.

Even though the signing of a Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) in January between the Khartoum government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) brought the 20-year-long North-South conflict under control, rebel factions in Darfur, such as the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) and the Justice and Equity Movement (JEM), still are battling it out -- with each other and with Sudanese government-backed militias called Jingaweit -- while negotiations continue in Abuja.

Zoellick told the lawmakers that although "large-scale organized violence has substantially subsided," with the Sudanese military having "pulled back" from Darfur, "Jingaweit and other militias have not been disbanded and continue to contribute to the violence." SLA/JEM rebels also have been active, he said, "attacking humanitarian convoys and fighting over livestock."

Darfur: SPLM to Offer Peace Plan

From UPI

Sudan's new Foreign Minister Lam Akol Ajawin announced that his former rebel group, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), will offer a plan for peace for Darfur, according to reports by Sudan JEM news agency. Ajawin said, he "has a proposal for a peaceful settlement to the Darfur issue which will be submitted to the council of ministers for presentation to the Darfur armed movements as a government proposal."

Though specific details of the proposal were omitted, Ajawin implied that the SPLM will follow a similar course taken by the former government on southern Sudan. Ajawin said, "The SPLM has good ties with the armed movements of Darfur and we want the people of Darfur to enjoy peace in the way the south now enjoys."

Somalia: Piracy Reaching Alarming Levels

Along with Somalia's numerous other problems, it also has to worry about pirates

Somalia's pirates are nothing if not brazen - not only seizing a ship carrying U.N. food aid but using it to hijack another ship off the coast of their lawless land in the Horn of Africa.

Piracy on the Somali seas has reached alarming proportions, analysts say. But the weak Somali government says there is little it can do.

Shipping companies "should try and avoid the waters of Somalia," Abdirahman Yusuf Meygag, an aide to Somali Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi, told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

This year has seen a steep rise in piracy along Somalia's nearly 2,000-mile coastline, with 15 violent incidents reported between March and August, compared to just two for all 2004, according to the International Maritime Bureau, a division of the International Chamber of Commerce that tracks trends in piracy.

Darfur: Zoellick's Testimony Before Foreign Relations Committee

From the AP

Large-scale organized violence has declined substantially in the Darfur region of Sudan, but the situation there remains "fragile and dangerous," a senior State Department official said Wednesday.

Robert Zoellick, the State Department's No. 2 official, said the Sudanese government's military forces have pulled back. Still, Zoellick said, government-backed Arab militias "have not been disbanded and continue to contribute to the violence."

Rebels in Darfur remain active, attacking humanitarian convoys and fighting over livestock, Zoellick said in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Taking a swipe at both sides in the conflict over Darfur, Zoellick said, "There are no angels in this part of the world."

Progress toward peace in Darfur, he said, could well hinge on successful implementation of the January peace agreement designed to end the long-running civil war between northern and southern Sudanese.

The United States has provided $1.1 billion to support peace and humanitarian relief for all of Sudan, Darfur included, in the fiscal year ending this week, Zoellick said. He noted that the United States has provided 68 percent of all food aid donated to Darfur.

Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware, the committee's ranking Democrat, said it was important for the administration to pinpoint future budgetary requirements for the region because of the high reconstruction costs at home from hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

He said meeting domestic humanitarian needs may take priority over helping to ease foreign crises in Darfur and elsewhere.

Committee chairman Richard Lugar of Indiana, a Republican, said the United States has been bearing too much of the Darfur burden.

"Although many nations have responded, the resolve and unity of the international community have not been commensurate to the horrors of the crisis," he said.

Lugar said the appetite of some countries for decisive action has been diminished in some foreign capitals because of Sudan's status "as an oil exporter, a major arms importer and an Islamic government."

You can get Sen. Lugar's opening statement here and General James L. Jones' testimony here (both PDFs).

Niger: Dependency Myth Stops Aid From Reaching People in Need

From AlertNet

Aid agencies sometimes cite concerns about creating a culture of dependency on aid in disaster-hit countries as justification for withholding relief, according to a new report that says this was a key reason why the humanitarian community was slow to respond to Niger’s food crisis

In fact, the report’s authors say, there is scant evidence that relief undermines local initiatives in responding to crises. Rather than fretting about issues of dependency, they say, the aid world should strive to make aid less unpredictable and more dependable.

“If you did depend on relief, you’d often be dead,” said Paul Harvey, co-author of a new report by the Humanitarian Policy Group (HPG) of London-based think tank Overseas Development Institute.

“If people in Niger had sat on their arses, they’d be dead.”

The HPG report says aid to west Africa – hit by drought, locusts and high food prices – was slow to materialise because governments and aid agencies were worried that free food aid would disrupt local markets and hook people into dependency on long-term aid.

“If the need for relief is genuine, then the possible negative effect on next year’s harvest is clearly a risk worth taking,” Harvey said.

Anarchy and the UN

As Darfur descends into anarchy, the United Nations appears unable to do any more than express concerns and continue to ask the parties involved to cease their violent attacks.

After rebels attacked and took control of the town of Sheiria last week, the Sudanese army said it was prepared to retake the town, to which the rebels replied that they would "repulse anything from the Sudanese government's army."

The upsurge in violence forced thousands more out of the villages, swelling the ranks of the internally displaced that already numbers nearly 2 million.

As the violence was raging, even the UN's own Special Representative Jan Pronk, a man who tends to see everything in Sudan through rose-colored glasses, was forced to admit that the violence was spiraling out of control. He was joined by the US government, which stated that the "uptick in violence ... is of concern to us" and the UN's genocide advisor, Juan Mendez, who acknowledged that Khartoum had done little to disarm militias or end the "culture of impunity" that exists in Darfur.

Pronk went on to state that the UN must give the Sudanese government and rebels an ultimatum to compel them to reach some sort of peace agreement and even made the startling admission that, thus far, the UN has utterly failed to deal with Darfur

Pronk said that when the Darfur conflict began U.N. humanitarian officials agitated for the Security Council to take up the conflict, which it refused to do.

A "massive force" was needed [in 2003] then to guarantee security but instead several thousand African Union troops and monitors had to carry the burden. And now the council needed to plan for how to keep the peace in case a peace deal was signed.

Pronk was quoted elsewhere as saying

He said the war situation in Sudan was "everybody’s failure" and could have been avoided if the international community had acted quickly.

How could the present day situation have been avoided?

"I think there should have been intervention in 2003," Pronk said, adding that while the occurrence of genocide in the country was debatable, "There was mass slaughter of people. It needed humanitarian intervention."

Of course, the international community did not act quickly, nor are they acting quickly now.

In fact, while Darfur burned, the BBC reported that American and British intelligence officials, along with representatives of the UN, China and 12 African nations were in Khartoum discussing cooperation on counter-terrorism operations in the region.

Hosting the conference is part of a sustained diplomatic push by Sudan to shake off its pariah status ... When the opportunity for this second regional conference on counter-terrorism came up, Sudan competed for the right to host it ... The decision of the CIA to agree to come to Sudan shows the pragmatism of the intelligence community against the continuing political desire of America to punish Sudan for what has happened in Darfur.

Khartoum continues to work to "shake off its pariah status," with Sudanese Ambassador Khidir Haroun Ahmed publishing an op-ed in the Washington Times today claiming that "After two decades of brutal civil war, Sudan is emerging as a reminder that engagement, dialogue and intensive diplomacy can resolve seemingly intractable problems and permit a country to look to the future with optimism."

Meanwhile, the violence and anarchy Khartoum unleashed is now spilling over into neighboring Chad, a country that is already host to an estimated 200,000 refugees from Darfur

A group of unidentified armed men in military uniform crossed into Chad from Sudan early on Monday, killing 36 herders and stealing livestock, the Chadian government said.

The violence, in addition to threatening the people of Darfur, is also threatening the relief work that sustains them, as U.N. Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland noted yesterday

"If it (the violence) continues to escalate, we may not be able to sustain our operations for 2.5 million people requiring life-saving assistance," he said, adding: "In Darfur, it (aid distribution) could all end tomorrow. It is as serious as that."

As Eric Reeves never fails to remind us, in December 2004, Egeland warned that 100,000 people could die a month if humanitarian organizations are forced to suspend operations in Darfur.

Despite all of this, Pronk still managed to recently declare that progress was being made on implementing the Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the North and South and on efforts to reach peace in Darfur.

Such a statement is utterly feckless and shameful.

As Gerald Caplan, author of "Rwanda: The Preventable Genocide," wrote last week

But what we are learning from Darfur, which we never remotely imagined, is that even naming a genocide is an utterly inconsequential exercise in hot air ... despite the apparent concern of many western leaders, despite the pressure from elements of civil society, the catastrophe in Darfur is explicitly allowed to continue ... As always, everything takes precedence over the suffering and death of hundreds of thousands of distant, exotic others. It won't be the last time."

After two years, 400,000 deaths, and an estimated 3.5 million now entirely dependent on humanitarian aid, it must be stated that the UN and every one of its member nations have failed the people of Darfur and, in all likelihood, will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.

Uganda: 4,000 Children Still Unaccounted For

From DPA

At least 4,000 children who were among some of the tens of thousands abducted by the Ugandan rebels from the north of the country cannot be traced, a Ugandan human rights group said in a report obtained Wednesday.

The report by Uganda Human Rights Commmission (UHRC) also accuses government forces of torturing civilians in the war-ravaged region, using methods that included suspending weights on genitals for extracting information or instilling discipline.

The war is waged by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) guerillas who have displaced over 1.5 million people and abducted nearly 30,000 children and youth whom they have forced into their army. The LRA has also forced abducted girls into sex slavery.

Many of the children had come back home after escaping from the LRA or being rescued by government forces but according to UHRC, "by the end of 2004, out of the 26,000 children abducted by the LRA, 4,000 were still unaccounted for in northern Uganda.''

"Responsibility to Protect" Would Have Stopped Rwanda

Don't believe it

The international community has learned from its failure to act on events such as Rwandan genocide and conflict in Bosnia, Jack Straw said last night.

The foreign secretary insisted the new agreement among United Nations member states to take action even when global security was not threatened would change the face of international conflict.

"The international community now has the responsibility to protect. Had that been in place then history would have been very different," he told a fringe meeting at the Labour party conference.

Congo: Peace Process at Risk

From Amnesty International

Amnesty International today warned that the political, military and ethnic tensions building in the North-Kivu province of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) signal the possibility of a renewal of widespread armed conflict that could destabilize the country’s fragile peace process and further erode the already poor human rights and humanitarian situation.

In a comprehensive report published today, North-Kivu: Civilians pay the price for political and military rivalry, Amnesty International documents how supposed partners in the DRC’s transitional power-sharing government have contributed to a deterioration in the situation in North-Kivu -- including the inflammation of ethnic tensions -- in order to advance their own factional political, economic or military interests. The neighbouring powers of Rwanda and Uganda have also continued to have a detrimental effect on events in the province.

"North-Kivu is currently the stage on which national and regional political and military antagonisms are being played out -- and the end result is looking increasingly tragic for the people of the region," said Kolawole Olaniyan, Director of Amnesty International's Africa Programme.

The report is available here.

Darfur: An Optimistic Future

The Washington Times, for some reason, agreed to run this ridiculous op-ed from Sudanese Ambassador Khidir Haroun Ahmed

After two decades of brutal civil war, Sudan is emerging as a reminder that engagement, dialogue and intensive diplomacy can resolve seemingly intractable problems and permit a country to look to the future with optimism. Unfortunately, some observers fail or refuse to see things as they are.

[edit]

Fortunately, the situation in the Darfur region of Sudan is casting less of a shadow over all other achievements. Today, every reliable report coming out of Darfur indicates that the situation has stabilized and the mortality rate has returned to pre-war levels. This was confirmed by the most recent report by the U.N. special representative for Sudan, Jan Pronk, but we recognize that more needs to be done.

In an effort to further stabilize and improve the situation, the government has agreed to expand the presence of African Union (AU) forces in the area and to the deployment of NATO logistical personnel to that area. We are moving quickly, in cooperation with the international community, to address the issue of displaced persons and to deliver emergency food and provide other services. The government has grounded its air force in that region and redeployed security forces to December 2003 positions. The AU's mandate has been expanded to include protection of the civilians in the Internally Displaced People Camps. Peace talks on Darfur should soon be convened, if the various rebel groups finally agree to work with the AU and attend these negotiations that have the unconditional support of the government.

Juxtaposed with the formation of the new government of national unity there is increasing hope that the conflict in Darfur will be resolved in the near future. Further and importantly, we recently agreed to work more closely with the United States and others to take concrete steps to protect and expand women's rights, specifically in Darfur. We noted these recent positive actions and stressed our commitment to take further steps to address all issues of concern during Rep. Christopher Smith's visit to Sudan during the week of Aug. 15.

[edit]

We hope that critics and skeptics will now see the situation for what it is: the beginning of a new era in Sudan. Further, we hope that people of goodwill will support a policy that removes the existing political and economic barriers to improving bilateral relations as quickly as possible. This goal is most important to demonstrating to all the people of Sudan that peace brings a tangible peace dividend.

Darfur: Hell on Earth

From Oxfam

Kalma Camp in Sudan is home to 120,000 people who have lived through some of the most hellish experiences imaginable. Annette Salkeld tells of the daily challenges they face and how Oxfam is helping them to get on with their lives.

From a few kilometres away, you can tell you are coming up to Kalma camp in South Darfur, Sudan, as the scattered baobab trees and acacias of the desert plains give way to a stark, sandy expanse, with little more than tree stumps dotted over land.

This harsh environment has felt the impact of the influx of more than 120,000 people from the surrounding region, who have fled their homes in the face of some of the worst conflict seen in recent years. This is a very brutal conflict, which has seen the civilian population directly targeted. The suffering is immense and on a scale hard to imagine.

Darfur: 'Never again' Means Fighting for Justice

From the Miami Herald

''This is Rwanda in slow motion,'' explains [John] Prendergast who has spent a good part of the last 20 years of his career focused on conflict resolution in Africa. The Jewish Community Relations Council invited him to speak last week to raise awareness and promote action to stop the Genocide in Darfur. This former director of African affairs during the Clinton administration likens this genocide to the Holocaust and most recently Rwanda in the '90s when more than 800,000 Tutsis were massacred over the course of 100 days by the majority Hutus after a coup.

Back then the world didn't react -- ambivalent, in part, and confused over whether the killing in Rwanda was in fact genocide.

This time there is no confusion. One year ago, almost to this day, President Bush concurred with then-Secretary of State Colin Powell calling the killings in Sudan's Darfur region genocide. The United States, under the 1948 U.N. convention on genocide, is committed to preventing such killings and punishing the killers if it deems a genocide is taking place. And yet, the killings continue one year later. Never again?

''Shame them,'' says Prendergast to his all-Jewish audience. ''Shame them into doing something,'' he continues acknowledging that grass-root efforts by Jewish organizations have brought the Sudan conflict to the forefront of our consciousness. Because it isn't enough to wear a yellow star and watch videos of the dying to honor the victims of the Jewish Holocaust. ''Never again'' means making the world aware that the only response to genocide isn't designating a day of remembrance but designating everyday to fighting injustice for those who can't fight for themselves.

Darfur: Violence Threatens Relief

From Reuters

Violence is rising sharply again in Sudan's Darfur and could force the United Nations to halt aid to over two million desperate people, the U.N.'s humanitarian chief warned on Wednesday.

All parties to the Darfur conflict -- the Khartoum government, rebels, Arab militias -- were at fault, said U.N. Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland.

He also criticised the international community for easing pressure for an end to the violence. "In the last few days we have seen colleagues being harassed, attacked, robbed or abducted every day. It cannot continue," Egeland told journalists.

"If it (the violence) continues to escalate, we may not be able to sustain our operations for 2.5 million people requiring life-saving assistance," he said, adding: "In Darfur, it (aid distribution) could all end tomorrow. It is as serious as that."

As Eric Reeves has repeatedly reminded us, Egeland warned in 2004 that 100,000 could die a month if humanitarian organizations are forced to suspend operations in Darfur.

Chad/Sudan: Gunman Kill 36 in Border Raid

An update on the earlier story - from Reuters

Gunmen on horseback coming from Sudan attacked a village in neighbouring Chad, killing 36 people and stealing their cattle, the Chadian government said on Tuesday.

It said the Chadian military had repelled the attackers, killing eight and capturing seven. Two Chadian soldiers were killed in the clashes.

"Armed horsemen wearing military uniforms and coming from Sudan penetrated yesterday into Chadian territory between 8 and 9 o'clock in the morning," a government statement said.

"The attackers killed 36 herders and tried to take away several head of cattle," it said, adding the army had retrieved the stolen animals. The government said the attack took place in Madayouna, a village in the eastern Ouaddai region bordering Sudan's troubled Darfur region. "The mopping up operation is continuing to clear the area and restore tranquillity for its inhabitants," it added.

Sudan: ICC Investigation Hobbled

Via Passion of the Present we get this

An attorney with the International Criminal Court vowed Tuesday that The Hague-based agency will overcome Sudan government roadblocks to an investigation of alleged crimes against humanity in the Darfur region.

Sudan has "made it clear" it will not cooperate with the probe and "is a state that doesn't want to hear about the court", ICC senior appeals counsel Fabricio Guariglia said at the International Bar Association conference in Prague.

"But it can be done," Guariglia said. "It's only a matter of finding out how."

[edit]

Guariglia said the court investigation in Sudan, which began in June, is the only current ICC case in which a government has refused to cooperate.

Separate probes of alleged crimes against humanity in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo have been welcomed by those governments, he said, although investigators face enormous challenges in each country including personal safety and witness protection in "highly volatile" regions.

In Congo, Guariglia said he expects arrest warrants connected to massacres to be issued "pretty soon". In Uganda, he said, investigators are focusing on "massive" atrocities by the Lord's Resistance Army.

The prosecutor for the 3-year-old ICC is also conducting an analysis to determine whether an investigation should be launched in Central African Republic.

But in Sudan the ICC faces "completely different challenges", Guariglia said. "This will be a different game."

Sudan: Turabi Says New Unity Government a Fraud

From Reuters

Sudan's new government set up in line with a peace deal will push the south towards secession because the president has failed to share real power, opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi said on Tuesday.

Turabi ruled out the possibility that his own party, one of the largest in Khartoum, would join the government announced last week arguing that it was only offered a few seats in the unelected parliament and no cabinet posts.

And he criticised Salva Kiir, leader of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) since the death of John Garang in July, for not negotiating hard enough with Khartoum over government posts.

"That's not a government of national unity," he said. "It was a setback for the spirit of unity between north and south," said Turabi, adding it made southern separation more likely.

Chad/Darfur: Almost 50 killed in Attack on Chadian Village

From AFP

Almost 50 people have been killed in a village in eastern Chad during an attack by an armed group from neighbouring Sudan and subsequent clashes with Chadian forces, the government spokesman said on Tuesday.

The attack took place in the eastern Wadai region on Monday morning, Hurmaji Musa Dumgor said in a statement.

"Armed and uniformed horsemen from Sudan infiltrated Chadian territory on Monday between 8am and 9am (7am and 8am GMT)... and took to massacring Chadian people and stole their livestock," he said.

"The Chadian armed forces responded rapidly," he added, saying the soldiers had killed eight of the attackers and captured seven.

The horsemen had earlier killed at least 36 villagers in Madayun, according to army sources.

Eastern Chad borders on the Darfur region of Sudan, where tens of thousands of people have been killed and more than a million displaced since rebels rose up in February 2003, prompting a fierce response from government forces and allied militia.

The most notorious of these allies are the Janjaweed, armed men on horse- and camel-back widely condemned by human rights groups for their atrocities against civilians.

Zimbabwe: Life Ends At 40

Passion of the Present links to this shocking piece

More than 65 percent of crisis-weary Zimbabweans do not expect to reach the age of 40, according to the United Nations.

According to the world body’s 2005 Human Development Report, 65.9 percent of Zimbabweans do not expect to survive to the age of 40 due to rising poverty and the impact of HIV and AIDS.

Average life expectancy for the southern African country, which is currently mired in an unprecedented economic and political crisis, was estimated at 36.9 years.

Uganda: ICC Keen on Kony Probe

From the New Vision

The International Criminal Court (ICC) will not investigate or try the war crimes committed in northern Uganda prior to July 1, 2002, officials have said.

They said over the weekend that the court would also not hand down death sentences to those convicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The head of the ICC’s Public Affairs Unit, Claudio Perdomo, told journalists in Kampala that investigations into the atrocities in the Kony war that has lasted 19 years are still on. She, however, said the Court was mandated to investigate crimes committed only in the last three years.

Perdomo said the Court would not try all the people accused of crimes, especially children. She said those who committed crimes before they attained 18 years of age would not be answerable for those crimes.

She said the Court would determine who the masterminds of the atrocities were and try them and punish them on conviction.

“Not every party accused will be tried,” Perdomo said. “Children cannot be tried and neither will those who committed crimes be answerable for things they did when they were under 18 years,” she said.

Congo/Rwanda: Rebels Disarm, Prepare to Return

From AFP

The leader of a splinter group of Rwandan Hutu rebels operating in the volatile eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has said his fighters are disarming and preparing to return home.

Seraphin Bizimungu said members of his breakaway faction of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), had turned in their weapons and begun educational courses to ready themselves for re-integration into Rwandan society.

"Today we have opened a pilot assembly camp to begin the process of a peaceful return of refugees and ex-fighters," he told reporters at Luvungi, about 60km south of Bukavu, capital of the DRC's South Kivu province.

Congo: Annan Urges More U.N. Peacekeepers

From the AP

Congo has made encouraging progress in preparing for elections set for next year, but there still are not enough peacekeepers on the ground to secure the vote properly, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a report Monday.

Annan repeated his call - made in a similar report a month ago - that the U.N. Security Council add some 2,500 peacekeepers to its current 16,700-strong force to secure the volatile Katanga region for the election.

That proposal faces strong resistance from some council members including the United States, which is already shouldering a quarter of the costs of the mission, among the largest in the U.N. system.

Congo/Uganda: Uganda Gives Rebels in Congo Ultimatum to Surrender

From Reuters

Uganda issued an ultimatum to rebels hiding in the jungles of eastern Congo to surrender by Friday or face attack, the country's army commander said.

But a government amnesty was still on offer for Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) rebels who surrendered, Uganda's army commander Lt-Gen Aronda Nyakairima said in an interview published on Tuesday.

Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni accuses Kinshasa and U.N. peacekeepers of failing to disarm more than 1,000 ADF fighters thought to be camped in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

The rebels who aim to topple Museveni's government launched deadly raids on villages in western Ugandan in the late 1990s and were blamed for several bombings in the capital Kampala.

"We have been telling the Congolese authorities these guys are not just refugees but people with military structures, armed and recruiting with the mission of resuming military training," said Nyakairima.

"The president has given (the rebels) a deadline of September 30 to surrender or be attacked. The attacking forces will be DRC integrated forces, not even us," he said.

Responsibility to Protect: Protect the People

Tod Linberg on the responsibility to protect

The language is not elegant, but the moral principle applied to all governments is: No mass killing and other atrocities on your territory; it is your job as sovereign power to prevent it or stop it. If you can't do it on your own, the international community pledges to help you, and you had better be willing to accept whatever help is necessary to get the job done. If, however, you are the problem, then the international community is prepared to intervene as needed, by whatever means, including military means, to stop the atrocities. The standard is not the effort a government expends (or pretends to be expending), but actual effective protection of people at risk.

The need for such a principle in international affairs is perfectly clear, summed up by reference to such killing fields asSrebrenica,Rwanda, Kosovo and Darfur. The doctrine of non-interference in the internal affairs of other states, a classical principle of international law, can serve as a double-sided excuse for inaction in the face of unspeakable crimes: First, as asserted by a state responsible for the perpetration of mass killings, to keep others out on the grounds that what's going on is none of their business; second, as a convenient principle according to which outsiders may avert their eyes, excusing their inaction on the grounds that there is nothing they can legitimately do.

The responsibility to protect is not self-executing. Nations will be called upon to act in accordance with it, and whether they do so or not will be for them to decide when the time comes. But they are now on record with a powerful general statement to which they have assented as a guide to their conduct. It will be harder to excuse their inaction, even if they would prefer not to act.

I say the responsibility to protect is a revolution in consciousness in international affairs for two reasons. The first is that the concept de-centers the state as the actor par excellence in international relations in favor of people, actual human beings, who are not after all subject beyond question to the whims of their rulers. With the privileges of statehood, such as the principle of non-interference, come responsibilities, protection first among them. Any government attempting to assert the former while ignoring the latter, at the expense of its own people, is in danger of losing its privileges.

The second and related revolutionary element of responsibility to protect is that it de-territorializes the enforcement and protection of the rights of man, or human rights. It is not only your government, that which asserts its sovereign power over you who live within its jurisdiction, that will either act to protect or fail to protect your rights, starting with the most basic right, your right to live. Others are called upon to act to protect you when your government does not. Where formerly there was no recourse for you but to try to flee, now you have a claim on the international community at large.

I know that we are not yet in a world in which we can make good on all such claims. But with the adoption of the responsibility to protect, we are a step closer.

Darufr: Disarm Janjawid Militia, UN Official Urges

From IRIN

The Janjawid, a militia group allegedly allied to the Sudanese government, must be disarmed if peace is to return to the country's western region of Darfur, a senior UN official said on Monday.

"The disarmament of the Janjawid would help the government reach a peaceful solution," Juan Mendez, the UN Secretary-General's Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, said in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum.

"Without disarmament of the Janjawid, there is no possibility of reaching a positive solution to the Darfur crisis," he added.

Darfur: UN Reviewing Human Rights Violations

More on Juan Mendez's trip to Sudan - via VOA

U.N. Special Advisor on the Prevention of Genocide, Juan Mendez, says the situation in the war-torn Darfur region remains serious.

Mr. Mendez says there is a disconnect between promises made by the Sudanese government to calm the violence, and gains that have actually been made on the ground.

Mr. Mendez told reporters in Khartoum that nearly all African villages in the region have been destroyed, and that killing, rape and lawlessness continue. New problems have also arisen in the troubled area, threatening the lives of displaced people, known as IDP's.

[edit]

Disarming the Janjaweed was seen as a key component of ending the violence. Mr. Mendez said the Janjaweed have not been disarmed.

"The most we know is that some weapons have been produced. But it is not clear that an organized fighting force is no longer active. On the contrary, we heard credible reports that, not only are they still very highly organized, but that they may be able to obtain cards assimilating them to the security forces, so that they will be treated as security forces, official security forces, and thereby escape serious investigation," said Mr. Mendez.

Darfur: Sudanese Official Denies Genocide

From Xinhua

Sudanese Minister of Justice Mohamed Ali al-Mardi on Monday denied genocide or ethnic cleansing in Sudan, the official SUNA news agency reported.

The denial came in a meeting between al-Mardi and visiting UN chief Kofi Annan's special adviser on the prevention of genocide, Juan Mendez.

Al-Mardi referred to the ongoing prosecution by the Sudanese government of suspects of crimes against humanity in the western region of Darfur and the government's seriousness to try whoever was involved in such crimes in the war-torn region.

Darfur: Mendez Slams Sudan Courts

From Reuters

Sudan's special court to try alleged war crimes in its Darfur region has not addressed major atrocities committed during a rebellion in the region, a senior U.N. official said on Monday.

Juan Mendez, the U.N. special adviser on the prevention of genocide, said during a visit to Sudan that many Darfur citizens did not trust the government because it has failed to punish the perpetrators of crimes.

"We...were disappointed to learn that the cases that are being considered by the special court for crimes committed in Darfur did not deal with the major crimes committed during the conflict," he told reporters in Khartoum.

Sudan, which has rejected any outside trials of Sudanese citizens, set up the court earlier this year saying it could be a substitute for the International Criminal Court (ICC) investigating alleged crimes against humanity in the conflict.

Darfur: 'Culture of Impunity'

From the BBC

A senior United Nations official has given a damning assessment of the Sudanese government's efforts to bring peace to Darfur.

Special UN advisor on preventing genocide Juan Mendez said Khartoum had done little to disarm militias or end the "culture of impunity" there.

He said Sudan's authorities remained in denial about the extent of the problem.

Mr Mendez was speaking after his second trip to Darfur, where the conflict has displace more than two million people.

[edit]

After visiting Darfur for the second time and hearing what Sudanese officials had to say he said problems were continuing.

"I perceived a significant disconnect between the account of the government - and the accounts of Darfuris who we met."

[edit]

In the early days of the Darfur crisis the Khartoum government armed Arab militia to fight the rebels.

Ever since the international community has regularly called on them to reign in the "Janjaweed" militias.

Mr Mendez says the plea is still falling on deaf ears.

"We don't see a serious good faith effort on the part of the government to disarm."

Eric Reeves: False Positive

Eric Reeves has a piece on how "the African Union is failing in Darfur" in the New Republic

In the Darfur region of Sudan, government-sponsored violence and intimidation continue to claim thousands of lives a month. Yet if you listened to world leaders, you would conclude that the African Union's deployment of troops to Darfur--intended to stop the genocide that is now in its third year--is a fully adequate response to the vast crisis. Kofi Annan recently reported to the U.N. Security Council that, "in some respects, the security situation in Darfur has improved over the past year. The presence of the A.U. Mission in the Sudan has been a major factor in this improvement." According to Jan Pronk, Annan's special representative to Sudan, "The A.U. force has helped to establish more stability. They have done an admirable job, highly professional, with much dedication." Praise has come from other corners as well. Back in May, French foreign minister Michel Barnier said, "I want to stress the wholly remarkable work the African Union is doing on the spot." And during her July trip to Africa, Condoleezza Rice had this to say about Darfur: "The African Union has the lead in this. We have tried to help and we will continue to try to help, but I think Africans believe this is a conflict ... best resolved on the ground by Africans."

All this praise for the African Union might sound like harmless encouragement. Unfortunately, it's not harmless at all. Perpetuating the myth that the A.U. mission to Darfur is succeeding is an easy way for the world's powers to pretend that Western intervention isn't needed. But continuing violence against defenseless civilians, including increased attacks on humanitarian operations, shows that A.U. forces are failing to protect the people of Darfur. And by continuing to insist that those troops are doing a good job, western leaders are failing the people of Darfur, too.

Media Blackout on Darfur

The latest from Nat Hentoff [in the piece, Hentoff praises the Sudan Tribune, which is indeed a vital source of information]

Fewer villages in Darfur are left to be destroyed,butthe killing -- and the use of rape as a weapon by the Sudan government's Janjaweed and soldiers -- continues. As U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan told the BBC on July 3: "We have learned nothing from Rwanda," an atrocity which we were told would never happen again.

Eric Reeves of Smith College in Massachusetts, the principal historian of the horrors in Darfur, wrote on Aug.11(www.sudanreeves.org) that the genocide there could become "much worse" as "the international community has abandoned these people to genocide by attrition." And on Sept. 8, Salih Booker, executive director of Washington-based AfricaAction, warned:"The death toll continues to mount." The Americanmedia, withfewexceptions,havealso largely abandoned Darfur.In"All EarsforTom Cruise, All Eyes on Brad Pitt" in the July 26 New York Times, columnist Nicholas Kristof, who has often reported from the killing fields, writes: "If only Michael Jackson's trial had been held in Darfur." Mr. Kristof noted that: "According to monitoring by the Tyndall Report, ABC News had a total of 18 minutes of the Darfur genocide in its nightly newscasts all last year and that turns out to be a credit to Peter Jennings.

"NBC had only 5 minutes of coverage all last year, and CBS only 3 minutes (except for '60 Minutes') about a minute of coverage for every 100,000 deaths. In contrast, Martha Stewart received 130 minutes of coverage by the three networks.

"Incredibly, more than two years into the genocide, NBC, aside from covering official trips, has still not bothered to send one of its own correspondents into Darfur for independent reporting." This appalling performance by broadcast and cable television is not surprising if you believe newspapers are invariably the source of in-depth coverage of vital stories.

Congo: Army Says it Will Forcibly Disarm Ugandan Rebels

From Reuters

The Democratic Republic of Congo's army said on Sunday it would forcibly disarm 400 Ugandan rebels who have crossed into the northeast of the country and are refusing to lay down their weapons.

A regional military commander, General Padiri Bulenda, told Reuters he would have to disarm the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels in order to prevent thousands of Ugandan soldiers from crossing the border into the Congo to hunt them down.

Bulenda said he visited the heavily armed rebels on Sunday. The Congo government initially denied any knowledge of the rebels' presence in its territory.

"There are 400 of these Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army rebels in Congo and they are armed to the teeth," Bulenda, commander of the 9th military region, told Reuters by telephone after returning from his reconnaissance mission.

"I am seeking permission to get two battalions (1,400 men) to disarm the rebels, and the U.N. has said they will provide us with air support."

He said the rebels had heavy machine guns and sophisticated communications equipment.

Darfur: Thousands Flee as Rebels Renew Attacks

From the Mail and Guardian

An upsurge in attacks by Darfur's main rebel force, including the capture of a key government-held town, is undermining the latest internationally sponsored talks on bringing peace to Sudan's western regions, according to senior United Nations officials.

Several thousand people, mainly women and children, have fled their villages and are walking towards camps for the displaced, adding to the 1,8-million who have been there since the conflict escalated two years ago.

The rise in violence by the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), the largest of the two rebel groups, comes after months of relative calm since African Union (AU) monitors fanned out across Darfur and the UN security council imposed a no-fly zone and sanctions on the Sudanese government.

The government has been blamed for most of the earlier violence and human rights abuses. Armed militias, known as Janjaweed and loosely linked to the government, were accused of mass murder and rape when Darfur hit the headlines last year, prompting the US to call the abuses genocide. At least 180 000 people died. But the latest violence, involving attacks on aid convoys and government officials as well as the theft of large numbers of camels -- the main source of wealth for local nomads -- comes from the rebel side.

Darfur: Forgotten Refugees Facing Years of Exile

A good piece from the Sunday Times

ABDARHAMAN GHAMIS left this desert refugee camp at Oure Kassoni, Chad, on a donkey a month ago. He crossed the border into Darfur, Sudan, and rode for six days towards Idda el Khair, where he had left his sheep before fleeing to Chad in 2004.

He found his livestock. And then the Janjaweed found him.

“The Arabs arrived in five cars early in the morning,” said Selake Ghamis, Abdarhaman’s cousin, among 30 mourners gathered for a memorial ceremony. “They shot him dead and took his animals.”

Darfur may have slipped down the West’s agenda, but the killing continues. Time and again faint hopes of permanent peace — the Government and rebels started a sixth round of talks in Abuja, Nigeria, this month — are quashed by a tragically predictable cycle of violence, accusation and denial.

Just one day after the talks started, the Sudan Liberation Army, the main rebel group that provoked the conflict in 2003, said that the Janjaweed — Arab herders armed by the Government to exact revenge on the civilian African population — had killed 30 people in North and West Darfur.

President Omar el Bashir’s Government, which has never admitted its role in the deaths of tens of thousands of Darfurians, blamed bandits.

The following day, an army spokesman said that rebels had killed an unknown number of soldiers and civilians in South Darfur. The African Union, which has 3,000 peacekeeping troops in the region, was unable to confirm either attack. Caught in the middle are the refugees. About 1.8 million people live in camps in Darfur, dependent on food aid. In Chad, a further 200,000 live in 12 refugee camps along the country’s eastern border.

Darfur: Sleepless in Sudan

The latest from Sleepless in Sudan

And Darfur descends further into lawlessness...my inbox is full of emails today about the latest instalment of the grim West Darfur soap opera that has been playing out over the past few weeks.

Official reports (including a recent USAID fact sheet) now confirm that a group of men responsible for many of banditry incidents against NGOs over the past weeks are beginning to force the local police into submission: following a shoot-out between the authorities and the bandits on September 19th (in which a few of the bandits were killed), it appears the buddies of the surviving ones - about 100 men - decided to march up to the police station in Geneina town and demand the release of some of their associates who were arrested as suspects.

After terrorising some of the traders in the market (a friend tells me they were forcing everyone to close their stalls and 'respect two days of mourning' for the dead criminals!), the men apparently frightened the local police chief into giving up the suspects.

So off they go to rob and shoot some more people, while the police are refusing to show their face in town and the new governor of West Darfur is off in Khartoum enjoying himself and celebrating his recent appointment to the post.

It's no wonder that even the UN's unfailingly optimistic Jan Pronk is beginning to notice that things in Darfur are, well, still falling apart.

Darfur: Rebel Group and Chad Agree to Cooperate

From Reuters

A rebel movement in Sudan's Darfur region and the government of neighbouring Chad have agreed to cooperate, removing an obstacle that has hindered progress at Darfur peace talks.

The Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) had for months accused Chad of being a "peace-spoiler" and complained about Chad's role as a mediator in the talks between the Sudanese government and Darfur rebels taking place in Nigeria.

The African Union (AU), which is mediating, said on Sunday a JEM delegation met Chad's President Idriss Deby in N'Djamena to dispel misunderstandings and the JEM had accepted Chad as a co-mediator in the peace process.

The AU said the two sides had agreed "to closely cooperate with the international community to find a speedy and durable solution to the humanitarian crisis facing the people of Darfur".

Uganda/Congo: UN Officials Meet LRA

From the BBC

The United Nations says it has held a meeting with a group of the Ugandan rebels, the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), for the first time.
A senior member of the Congolese army also met the Ugandan rebels, and called for them to disarm.

The LRA has been fighting a war with no clear agenda for the past 19 years.

The rebels normally operate in northern Uganda and southern Sudan, but last week some LRA rebels crossed into the Democratic Republic of Congo.

A UN official said at the meeting, in the north-east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, that the Ugandan rebels must disarm before their future status could be discussed.

Uganda: Time May Be Running Out for LRA Warlord

From Reuters

Somewhere in the rolling grasslands of southern Sudan, could time finally be running out for one of Africa's most sinister guerrilla leaders?

Joseph Kony has led Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels for almost two decades through a mixture of terror and mysticism, using shrewd tactics to evade capture.

However, with an international war crimes investigation poised to issue arrest warrants, and his deputy having fled to Congo according to the Ugandan army, the elusive guerrilla chief is under more pressure than ever.

Many Ugandans wonder how he has lasted so long.

Nineteen years of war have devastated the north and uprooted more than 1.6 million people, causing one of the world's worst and most neglected humanitarian crises.

More than 20,000 children have been kidnapped by the rebels and forced to become fighters, porters and sex slaves.

Thousands more trudge into the north's small towns every night rather than risk abduction by sleeping in their homes.

The Slow Collapse of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement for South Sudan

The latest from Eric Reeves

Despite the formation of a new Sudanese “Government of National Unity” in Khartoum, there is overwhelming evidence of bad faith on the part of the National Islamic Front (NIF) in creating what is only the semblance of a new political order. Not only does the NIF dominate the Presidency, including its advisory council, but continues to engage in a systematic policy of delaying implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), reneging on benchmark commitments, and engaging in threatening military behavior. Moreover, the NIF has created what is in effect a “shadow government” that will retain all real power. In short, there has been a silent “coup,” one in which the façade of shared governance masks the ruthless preservation of power by the NIF. And yet to all this, the international community---expediently wishing to preserve the semblance of a new national government rather than confront the urgent problems posed by NIF bad faith---has given a warm welcome, with only small reservations. Such ignorance, or disingenuousness, only encourages the NIF to believe that it can continue to consolidate its power in a new guise.

Darfur: Rebels Vow to Repulse Government Attack

From Reuters

A rebel group in Sudan's western Darfur region said on Saturday government forces were preparing to try to recapture a town but would be repulsed.

The Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) said on Tuesday it had captured the town of Sheiria, but military officials have vowed government forces would drive the rebels out.

"We have heard government forces are coming in our direction but we are ready for them," SLM spokesman Mahjoub Hussein told Reuters. "The SLM is on standby to repulse anything from the Sudanese government's army."

Darfur: Looks Are Deceiving

From VillageSoup

Nyala is a town of sandy streets with as many donkey-drawn carts as cars, of chipped plaster and wires dangling haphazardly, of open-air markets and outdoor grills where you can heap your plate with hunks of sheep or goat or beef, or even camel. By Darfur standards, Nyala is a metropolis. The 20-minute drive -- with its baobab trees and black-winged red finches, its patches of sorghum and herds of cattle foraging on tall grasses from the rainy season -- lulls you into a state of contentment. And then, before your eyes, looms Sector 7 of Kalma Camp, and you are jerked back to Darfur Reality.

As they say, “Looks are deceiving.” Every time I drive or walk in an IDP camp, kids call out affectionately: “Khawaje” -- white guy, or “OK, OK.” They wave and grin, as do the women on donkeys and the men lolling under the stick and grass awnings. I was reminded again today, talking to some of the IDPs after they had collected their food, why we are in such favor.

“Don’t ever leave us alone,” one young man told me. Even though the mass killings of a year ago have ceased, armed men on camel back freely roam the desert, still intimidating IDPs who leave the camps to collect firewood and animal fodder, or to tend crops. Those same smiling faces turn sour when there are government officials about. In fact, Kalma Camp is where a group of angry IDPs chased out the local gendarmes and burned their station to ashes. Looks are indeed deceiving.

Darfur: Senate Foreign Relations Hearing

The Senate Committee on Foreign Relations will be holding a hearing on September 28th entitled "Darfur Revisited: The International Response" [note: the room listed on the web is incorrect - the one listed below is the proper room]

TO: ALL MEMBERS
HEARING: DARFUR REVISITED: THE INTERNATIONAL RESPONSE
DATE: WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 2005
TIME: 9:30 a.m.
PLACE: SR-325

WITNESSES:

Panel I

The Honorable Robert B. Zoellick
Deputy Secretary
Department of State
Washington, DC

Panel II

General James L. Jones, Jr., USMC
Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR)
Supreme Headquarters, Allied Powers Europe
Mons, Belgium

Sudan: UN Extends Mission

From the UN News Center

Encouraging countries to deploy their peacekeeping troops in a timely manner to the strengthen peace agreements in the Sudan, the Security Council today extended the mandate of the United Nations Mission in that country (UNMIS) for six months, until March 2006.

In his latest report to the Council on Sudan, Secretary-General Kofi Annan recommended that the Security Council renew the mission's mandate for another 12 months, until September 2006.

In today’s resolution extending UNMIS, the Council expressed its intention to renew the mandate for further periods when it expires again in March.

Malawi: Children Die of Hunger

From Reuters

Twenty-nine children have starved to death at a Malawian health centre, an indication of the severity of a crop failure that has left millions short of food across southern Africa.

Aid workers have already reported deaths from starvation in a region where malnutrition and death from AIDS are common but the Malawian figures showed things were getting worse.

"We have lost 29 children to hunger-related illnesses and the situation is not getting any better," said Hanna Kausiwa, a community nurse at a rehabilitation unit run by the U.N. World Food Programme in Malawi's badly affected Nsanje district.

Other health officials confirmed the deaths. No national figures have been released by any country. Across southern Africa, aid workers say more than 10 million people will need food aid after the staple maize harvest failed. Many have already exhausted food stocks that should have lasted them until next May.

Genocide: Rwanda Maintains Pessimism About UN

From The New Times

The Rwandan government has said it is skeptical over a new UN agreement to protect civilians in war zones, saying the world body's past behavior still constituted a cause to worry."It is our experience that, while the United Nations is immaculate in its values and principles, it has all too often been found wanting in its actions,"...

... Foreign Minister Dr. Charles Murigande said September 18, adding: "there are probably no other member states in this August Assembly, apart from Rwanda, where the UN has consistently neglected to learn from its mistakes, resulting in massive loss of life and untold misery." Murigande, who was addressing the 60th General Assembly in New York, US, noted that the UN has ignored the problems in Rwanda for over four decades.

[edit]

"The United Nations has consistently failed to learn from mistakes; so many people died here in Rwanda during the 1994 Genocide and the agency just looked on as Hutu extremists exterminated Tutsis and moderate Hutus because they had underestimated the Interahamwe threat," Murigande said.

"Action, not words, would be the measure of our success or failure. How will the United Nations respond the next time to protect populations? Will there be lengthy academic or legal debates on what constitutes genocide or crimes against humanity while people die?" challenged Murigande.

[edit]

However, Murigande said, Rwanda "welcomes the endorsement of the Responsibility to Protect in the Summit Outcome document. The Responsibility to Protect includes a responsibility to prevent genocide, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing, as well as a responsibility to prevent incitement to commit these crimes."

Rwanda challenged the United Nations to shift from its past indecisive debates on whether to stop a certain human catastrophe to undertaking swift rescue operations for humanity.

Uganda: Congolese Flee

From New Vision

HEAVY gunfire on the DR Congo/ Uganda border at Bunagana forced thousands of Congolese to flee to Uganda on Tuesday.

A security source at the border said there was an exchange of fire between RDC Goma forces and the Congo government forces at Kyengerero, three kilometres from the border.

Goma forces reportedly laid an ambush to trap the government forces that were escorting the Goma-based new commander of the North Kivu forces, Col. Kasikira, on his way to visit the border.

The gunshots lasted an hour. By midday, over 1,000 Congolese women, men and children had flooded Bunagana trading centre in Uganda.

Uganda Says Top LRA Rebel Wants Asylum in Congo

From Reuters

The deputy leader of Uganda's rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) is asking for political asylum in Congo after fleeing into its remote northeastern jungles, Uganda's defence minister said on Friday.

Vincent Otti and about 50 fighters left their hideouts in southern Sudan's lawless mountains last week and crossed into the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) near Garamba National Park on Sunday.

"Otti's group has declared their presence in DRC and are requesting political asylum... I am waiting to hear the response," said Ugandan Defence Minister Amama Mbabazi.

Otti's group burned homes on the road between the Sudanese towns of Juba and Yei as it headed west last week, crossing the White Nile for the first time.

The cult-like LRA had never crossed the Nile before, supposedly because they feared losing the magical protection of their leader, the self-proclaimed prophet Joseph Kony.

"Congo is a new area for them, it is possible therefore that they are asking for political asylum in order to avoid any harassment, and maybe have some time to rest and reorganise," Mbabazi told a news conference.

"Or it could be a deception. Whatever it is, we will find out soon," he added. He gave no other details, but said Uganda had no plans to pursue the rebels into DRC.

Darfur: Dangers Make it Hard to Scrape a Living

From AlertNet

The Darfur crisis is far from over, says new research that warns of looming food shortages in the war-torn area of western Sudan and urges agencies to stockpile aid on the borders.

“Never before in the history of Darfur has there been such a combination of factors causing the failure of livelihood strategies and loss of assets,” says the new report by the Feinstein International Famine Center at Tufts University in Boston.

Traditional ways of earning a living that been disrupted by two years of conflict need to be revived if people are to get back on their feet, the report says. Attacks by government troops and Arab militia have forced about two million people, mostly black villagers, from their homes in western Sudan.

Reports continue of massacres, rape, torture and looting despite a nominal ceasefire, and the United Nations has described the situation as one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. Many villagers have lost their belongings, including crops, land and animals, while insecurity in the region makes it hard for people to trade, make phone calls or receive money from relatives elsewhere.

[edit]

The report says aid organisations should pay more attention to the feelings of communities and groups aligned with the government, as well as those who have been targeted by militias.

“If humanitarian aid fails to reach affected Arab groups, this will almost certainly inflame tensions, and could even contribute to harassment or reprisals against humanitarian workers,” says the report.

Read the report here (PDF).

Darfur: The Genocide Is Still Going On

From the Jewish Journal

Jews aren’t among those being killed, raped and displaced in the Darfur region of Sudan, but the situation there is nonetheless a Jewish disaster.

The slogan, “never again,” the redeeming lesson of the Holocaust, is turning into a farce in the African nation, as world leaders continue to find a dazzling array of excuses for inaction, including the obvious one: “It’s a complicated situation,” as cases of genocide always are.

Some Jewish organizations continue to speak out, but there are indications that the issue is fading, even as the killing continues. In the Jewish community, as elsewhere, the murkiness of the conflict and the lack of ready solutions have eroded activism.

One year ago, the Bush administration courageously labeled the treatment of Darfur villagers by Arab militias — sanctioned by the government in Khartoum — as “genocide.”

But apparently applying a label was enough for this country’s leaders; those tough words have been followed up by inaction and even moments of cooperation with the Sudanese government.

Uganda: Troops Deployed to Congo Border

From The Monitor

THE Ugandan army on yesterday moved and stationed more truckloads of its soldiers in West Nile areas bordering with the Sudan and Democratic Republic of Congo.

The move is to stave off possible aggression from the two countries.

Late last week, Uganda Peoples Defence Forces (UPDF) troops from the 51st battalion in Kitgum were rushed and deployed inside southern Sudan following intelligence clues that about 50 Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels under the command of Brig. Vincent Otti reportedly crossed via southern Sudan into the jungles of Zaramba forestland in north-eastern DR Congo.

Dozens of armoured vehicles and all-weather battle tanks, including buffaloes and mambas were also moved in from the army 4th division headquarters in Gulu to the frontier areas, which have since been put on war alert.

Hundreds of the soldiers, singing revolutionary songs and waving ecstatically, were transported to their new base aboard numberless semi-trailer lorries on Thursday.

Darfur: Rebels Denounce Unity Government

From AFP

The two main rebel groups in Sudan's war-torn western region of Darfur on Thursday denounced the country's unity government, saying it had failed to meet the minimum aspirations of Sudan's marginalised people.

"The (unity government) that was formed does not in the least way represent the marginalised Sudanese people," the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) said.

Sudan's first post-war national unity government was sworn in earlier in the day, eight months after a peace deal that ended Africa's longest-running conflict.

In line with the accord, the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) and its peace partner, former southern rebel group the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), got 80 percent of the ministerial posts.

The SLM argued in a statement faxed to AFP in Cairo that the line-up of the government had only "entrenched the dictatorship" of Beshir's NCP, which grabbed 52 percent of the posts and most key ministries.

The Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), the other rebel group in Darfur, said it was an attempt by "the minority to dominate the majority in the country."

It added: "This is not a true national unity government that expresses the will of the people of Sudan".

Genocide Intervention Fund Moves to DC

Via Passion of the Present we get this cool news

You can’t stop a genocide if you don’t know about it.

That is the unmistakably strong message that the BeAWitness.org video leaves after summarizing the media’s failures to cover the genocide in Sudan. Be A Witness is one of the campaigns that the Genocide Intervention Fund has joined in its efforts to raise awareness about the genocide currently taking place in Darfur.

But GIF has come a long way from raising genocide awareness from the depths of the Lang Center at Swarthmore College. This summer, GIF bought an office in Washington, DC, and just last week gained 501C3 status, making it an official non-profit organization.

“We moved to DC because since we are both about pressuring the government to fulfill its responsibility to protect, and raising awareness, we thought we were better able to do that by being close to where the government is in DC,” Mark Hanis ’05, one of the co-founders and the current president of GIF, said.

According to Hanis, the GIF staff in Washington will allot for nine positions, with four Swarthmore alums currently on board. Sam Bell ’05, Rajaa Shakir ’04, Ivan Boothe ’05 and Hanis will form the group’s executive staff until more individuals are hired.

Sudan Eyes Gains From Terror Talks

From the BBC

There can be few more surprising places in the world to see CIA officials openly discussing terrorism than here in Sudan, but the new geopolitical framework since 9/11 has made strange bedfellows.

Osama bin Laden was based in Khartoum for several years in the 1990s, and in 1998 the United States launched a cruise missile strike on what the US said was a chemical weapons facility, but which Sudan has always claimed was a pharmaceutical plant.

Although Sudan remains on the US banned list of states that sponsor terrorism, both American and British intelligence officials have come to sit with their counterparts from 12 African countries.

[edit]

Most of the conference has been held behind closed doors, but public speeches by Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir and his two vice-presidents show how much Sudan has to gain from hosting such an event.

Sudan is seeking international recognition for securing a comprehensive peace deal that ended Africa's longest civil war, in the south of the country.

That peace deal finally came into effect in January. But the continuing conflict in Darfur, in western Sudan, has proved harder to stop.

The violence in Darfur makes it politically impossible for the US to take Sudan off the list of states that sponsor terrorism for now. Only a year ago, the then US Secretary of State Colin Powell called the killings there genocide.

A tough UN resolution has demanded that the Khartoum government should do more to bring peace to Darfur, but speaking at the conference, Sudan's Vice-President Ali Osman Mohammed Taha said that the Darfur conflict was continuing only because of foreign interference.

[edit]

Hosting the conference is part of a sustained diplomatic push by Sudan to shake off its pariah status.

[edit]

The decision of the CIA to agree to come to Sudan shows the pragmatism of the intelligence community against the continuing political desire of America to punish Sudan for what has happened in Darfur.

Cameroon: Thousands Face Food Shortages

From Reuters

Nearly a quarter of a million people in northern Cameroon face the same kind of food shortages that have hit neighbouring Niger and aid workers will distribute emergency rations, a United Nations agency said on Thursday.

The $2 million operation will get under way for a month before the food harvest begins and will provide free food handouts, especially targeting pregnant women, single mothers, the sick and disabled, the U.N. World Food Programme said.

"For one month ... WFP is providing an emergency ration of cereals to 237,700 people in the far north province of Cameroon, the poorest part of the country," the WFP said in a statement. The French government was one of the main donors.

While the situation in northern Cameroon was not on the same scale as Niger, where several million people have faced food shortages, a WFP spokesman in Dakar, Senegal, said the causes of the scarcity were the same.

"They have very similar problems -- poor harvests and high food prices, forcing some people to eat wild fruits and leaves," Marcus Prior told Reuters.

Eritrea Warns of Renewed War with Ethiopia

From Reuters

Eritrea warned the United Nations on Wednesday that it might rekindle its border war with Ethiopia if the world body failed to resolve a lingering territorial dispute between the two neighbors.

"I wish to categorically inform the assembly that Eritrea is determined, and has the right, to defend and preserve its territorial integrity by any means possible," Berhane Abrehe, Eritrea's finance minister, told the 191-nation U.N. General Assembly.

"If the United Nations fails to reverse the occupation, it will be as equally responsible as Ethiopia is for any renewed armed conflict and its consequences," he said.

Pentagon Warns of Rising Terror Threat in Horn of Africa Region

From VOA

The head of U.S. troops in the Horn of Africa says terrorists and insurgents may begin leaving war zones in Afghanistan and Iraq and head for east Africa.

Major General Timothy Ghormley says officials are concerned that instability and weak governments in east Africa could draw international terrorist groups seeking to establish a base of operations.

Niger: World's Generosity Could Hurt Farmers

From the International Herald Tribune

The images from this impoverished West African country have been unrelentingly grim: hungry children with stick-thin arms and swollen bellies, mothers carrying babies hundreds of miles to look for food after a poor harvest and high prices put local staples out of reach. A few months ago, those images prompted a torrent of food aid from Western donors.

But now, after a season of good rains, Niger's farmers are producing a bumper crop of millet, the national staple. This should be a cause for rejoicing, yet in one of the twists that mark life in the world's poorest countries, the aid that was intended to save lives could ruin the harvest for many of Niger's farmers by driving down prices.

Darfur: Rebels Say Only War Will Lead to Fair Govt

From Reuters

A rebel faction, which recently captured a town in Darfur, denounced Sudan's new coalition government on Thursday as exclusionary, adding only war would bring fair rule.

"The national unity government has deliberately excluded large sections of Sudanese society and ignored the existence of the many marginalised in Sudan," said a statement signed by Mahjoub Hussein of the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA).

A January peace deal that ended a more than two-decade north-south civil war opened the way for the new government, which was announced on Tuesday. Some Southerners have said they were unhappy with the composition of the new cabinet.

"There is no possibility of any democratic transformation other than (through) armed struggle in Sudan," the SLA said.

Congo/Uganda: Kony Moving Towards DRC

From The Monitor

THE army said yesterday the Lords Resistance Army leader, Joseph Kony, is moving towards northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

This comes days after two of Kony's senior commanders, Abdema and Vincent Otti reportedly crossed to the Congolese side inhabited by different militia groups.

The Intelligence Coordinator northern region, Col Charles Otema, said yesterday Kony, in company of between 20 to 30 men, are crossing to the DRC.

"With the new arrangement with the Khartoum Kony knows very well that he cannot survive, so the general movements are toward the DRC," Otema said yesterday in a telephone interview from Gulu.

He is in a location we cannot disclose but he is on the run evading UPDF pursuit," he added. The UPDF commander Lt. General Aronda Nyakairima warned last week that the LRA's Vincent Otti has crossed to the Congolese side with 50 men.

Passion of the Present also caught this important piece of information buried in a Reuters article

[Garang's] death brought rioting between Arabs and Africans in several Sudanese cities, including Khartoum, and a resurgence of the activity by the brutal Lord Resistance Army (LRA), a Uganda outlaw group with camps in southern Sudan.

No one is sure what the purpose of the LRA is, which has recruited, brutalized, kidnapped and maimed several thousand children and is led by a self-proclaimed Christian mystic, named Joseph Kony.

The group was first armed by Sudan, and Pronk said there were unconfirmed reports factions in Sudan's military were still sending weapons to the LRA so "we are asking questions."

Sudan: President Swears in New Government of National Unity

From IRIN

Sudanese President Omar al Bashir swore in the cabinet of ministers of the new government of national unity in the Republican Palace in Khartoum, the capital, on Thursday.

The first Vice-President, Salva Kiir, and Second Vice-President Ali Osman Mohammed Taha were in attendance.

The ceremony followed the announcement of the formation of the new government by Bashir on Tuesday, after weeks of heated discussions over key cabinet posts and eight months after the January peace agreement that ended the country’s 21-year civil war.

"Dear citizens, I am glad to announce the special presidential decree forming the government of national unity," Bashir said during a special appearance on Sudanese television on Tuesday.

"This government represents good news. It is an expression of the Sudanese people's lively spirit to agree and continue bringing peace and strengthening national unity," he added.

Darfur: Parties Should Get Ultimatum

More from Pronk

U.N. members need to give the Sudanese government and rebels in Darfur an ultimatum to compel them to clinch a peace deal by the end of the year, the top U.N. official in Sudan said on Wednesday.

"The parties sometimes are talking, and a day after, they're shooting," said Jan Pronk, Secretary-General Kofi Annan's special envoy in Sudan, after briefing the 15-nation U.N. Security Council.

He said the council had to tell the rebels, the Khartoum government and their supporters in the region, "We don't accept any more the continuation of fighting and we want comprehensive peace agreement by the 31st of this year."

Otherwise they had to consider action that would cut off the financing of the fighters, Pronk told a news conference.

Violence in Sudan's western Darfur region has diminished over the past year, partly because militia have run out of targets after razing countless villages. But the region is still filled with bandits, government forces and rival rebel groups, and fighting picked up this month.

Pronk said that when the Darfur conflict began U.N. humanitarian officials agitated for the Security Council to take up the conflict, which it refused to do.

A "massive force" was needed then to guarantee security but instead several thousand African Union troops and monitors had to carry the burden. And now the council needed to plan for how to keep the peace in case a peace deal was signed.

"The longer a situation like this lasts, the more difficult it is to change it anymore," Pronk said.

Darfur: US Expresses Concern Over Escalation of Violence

From the Sudan Tribune

The United States expressed concern over an escalation of violence in Sudan’s western region of Darfur, saying African Union ceasefire monitors were critical in bringing the situation under control.

"There has been an uptick in violence, both rebel and government militia-associated. This is of concern to us," deputy State Department spokesman Adam Ereli told reporters.

[edit]

Ereli said that Roger Winter, the special representative of Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick, was in Khartoum Wednesday and would shortly visit the region "to deal with this and see if we can help to contain the violence and get the parties to act responsibly."

"The AU continues to be there in force and to be exercising a very important monitoring role. Those forces are growing, both in terms of number, as well as capabilities. And their mission, I think, is critical to this process," Erlei said.

Darfur: Administration Urged to Step up Efforts Against Genocide

From Family News in Focus

Hundreds of innocents are killed every day in the Darfur region of the Sudan as Arab Muslims seize the land and property of fellow Muslims. A group of U-S religious leaders met with the State Department and Congress to again draw attention to the crisis. The lawmakers, both conservatives and liberals, want the genocide to stop saying now is the time for civilization to step up. Those sentiments are echoed by Richard Cizik of the National Association of Evangelicals who adds reports of killing in the Sudan are not over-stated.

"These are people who are being mercilessly murdered by bloodthirsty killers and zealots and we cannot stand by and allow it to happen. The U.N. says six to ten thousand people are dying every month and it has to end."

Florida Democratic Congressman Robert Wexler says despite promises by the Sudanese to stop the violence, the situation is getting worse.

"Violence has erupted this week in violation of the negotiated ceasefire. In addition, rape continues to plague the region. And the African Union troops must make every effort to defend civilians from atrocities such as these."

The religious groups are lobbying Congress to heighten political pressure on the Sudan, and for foreign assistance, but their own efforts to stop the genocide are limited to providing money for food, clothing, and basic health needs.

Darfur: Violence on the Rise

You don't say?

From the AP

The top U.N. envoy for Sudan gave a sobering assessment of the shattered country, warning violence was on the rise in the Darfur region and criticizing nations that have not made good on their promises to supply peacekeepers and cash.

Jan Pronk said humanitarian programs have been underfunded by 50 percent for 2005. Though humanitarian and development programs have a budget of $1.9 billion this year, they have received only $950 million.

But the international community's chief fault was getting involved in Sudan too late, he said Wednesday.

"That is creating a situation which is getting out of hand, because the longer a situation like this is lasting, the more difficult it is to change it," Pronk said in an interview.

Pronk, of course, then proceeds to praise efforts to implement the North/South peace deal and the AU because it seems to be his job to do little more than offer optimistic views on the future of Sudan. So the fact that the situation in Sudan has deteriorated enough to overcome Pronk's rose-colored glasses is rather significant.

Darfur: "It Needed Humanitarian Intervention"

From UPI

The situation was so bad three non-governmental organizations have withdrawn their aid workers, the mission said. There were only the barest of details on the most recent developments.

The U.N. Security Council took up Sudan Thursday, when U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s Special Representative Jan Pronk briefed the session. He put the most recent troubles in perspective with the other problems besetting Sudan from the peace accord covering the south, delay in forming a Government of National Unity, recent trouble in the East of and, of course, Darfur.

[edit]

He said the war situation in Sudan was "everybody’s failure" and could have been avoided if the international community had acted quickly.

How could the present day situation have been avoided?

"I think there should have been intervention in 2003," Pronk said, adding that while the occurrence of genocide in the country was debatable, "There was mass slaughter of people.It needed humanitarian intervention."

Poor Timing?

Posting this seems a little ridiculous, considering all of the other posts today

Statement on President Congratulating Sudan on Opening New National Assembly and Appointing the Government of National Unity's Cabinet Members

Today, the President congratulated the leaders and people of the Republic of Sudan on the opening of their new National Assembly on August 31 and the appointment of the Government of National Unity's cabinet members on September 20.

These are important milestones in the continuing implementation of the historic Comprehensive Peace Agreement signed at the beginning of this year. All Sudanese can be proud of this significant progress, because it demonstrates the parties' continued commitment to a common vision of a unified, democratic, prosperous, and peaceful Sudan.

The United States remains firmly committed to the cause of peace in all of Sudan. We call on Sudan's National Assembly and its newly appointed leaders to maintain the momentum toward peace throughout the country, recognizing it as an inclusive process that encompasses the south, the east, and Darfur. Sudan must take those steps necessary to stop all forms of violence in Darfur, support humanitarian and African Union operations, and achieve a political settlement for Darfur through the peace talks in Abuja. Only then can Sudan truly begin to realize its great human and economic potential and demonstrate to its people and the international community that it is genuinely committed to charting a new course.

Darfur: Army Says Rebels Killed

From the AP

Sudanese soldiers inflicted "heavy casualties" in driving off rebels who overran a town in the troubled Darfur region, the military said Wednesday.

A United Nations official, George Somerwill, said the world body also heard from the region that Sudan Liberation Army fighters retreated late Tuesday from the area around Sheiria, a town of 33,000 people in southern Darfur.

Several hundred rebels captured the town Monday, violating a truce reached in December for Sudan's vast western region, where ethnic fighting that broke out in early 2003 has caused widespread hunger and emptied villages.

The army spokesman, Lt. Gen. Abass Abdul Rahaman Khalifa, said government soldiers defeated SLA fighters in a battle late Tuesday at Khazan Jadeed, about 6 miles east of Sheiria.

"The armed forces repulsed the attack of the aggressor forces, inflicted heavy casualties on them, and forced them to retreat and flee away," Khalifa told the official SUNA news agency.

He did not give any details how many rebels were killed or wounded, nor did he say whether there were any Sudanese military casualties.

Sudan: Top U.N. Envoy Says Violence On the Rise in Darfur, South

From the AP

The top U.N. envoy for Sudan gave an unusually sobering assessment of the shattered country on Wednesday, warning that violence was on the rise and nations were not making good on their promises of peacekeepers and cash.

Southern Sudan has seen repeated attacks by the Lord's Resistance Army, an Ugandan rebel group, while violence has spiked again in the Darfur region in the west, Jan Pronk said. Momentum from a north-south peace deal, signed in January, could stall because U.N. programs aren't getting the funding they need.

"I know how difficult it is nowadays, but this is essential because we have to meet the expectations beyond peace," said Pronk, who is U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's special representative for Sudan.

Pronk's description of the situation in Sudan comes almost two months after Sudanese Vice President John Garang, a former southern rebel leader, died in a helicopter crash on July 30. Officials have fretted that his death could lead to new instability.

Nonetheless, while reporting on sporadic violence, U.N. reports continue to be upbeat and say that moves toward peace in Sudan's two main trouble spots - Darfur and the 21-year civil war between the north and the south - are on track.

Pronk himself has repeatedly expressed his optimism that there could be a peace deal for Darfur by the end of the year. On Wednesday, he said the U.N. Security Council must make a clear demand that anything less is unacceptable, suggesting that his optimism may be shaking.

"Parties are sometimes talking, and a day after, they're shooting," he said. "That is not the way to do it."

Sudan : Southerners Unhappy With New Government

From the Sudan Tribune

Southern Sudanese said on Wednesday they were unhappy with the composition of the country’s new unity government and one observer described it as a humiliation for the former rebels brought into the cabinet.

Southern politicians said more key posts, particularly the critical Energy Ministry which was retained by Khartoum, should have been allocated to the former rebels of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM).

"The SPLM should not have given in on the issue of the Energy Ministry," said William Ezekiel, acting editor-in-chief of the Khartoum Monitor, a newspaper that concentrates on southern issues.

Referring to Salva Kiir, first vice-president in the new government and president of southern Sudan, Khartoum Monitor columnist Michael Koma, went further: "The best thing after this sheer humiliation is for Salva to step down from the presidency of the south."

Somalia: UN Keeping Close Eye on Growing Tensions

From Reuters

A top U.N. envoy said on Wednesday the world body was keeping a close eye on growing tensions in Somalia, where warlords opposed to the new president and prime minister are considering military action.

"We are following carefully what is going on in the territory and especially Mogadishu," Francois Fall, the U.N. special representative to Somalia, said at an event in Nairobi to mark international peace day.

The warlords, most of whom are also cabinet ministers in a government struggling to impose authority in the lawless Horn of Africa nation, have been meeting in Mogadishu this week to decide their response to the president's massing of troops.

Darfur: Fresh Fighting Threatens Talks

Gee ... ya think?

From Reuters

African Union mediators said on Wednesday renewed fighting in Sudan's Darfur region could mar peace talks in Nigeria and urged the government forces and rebels to exercise restraint.

The appeal came after a Sudanese military official vowed government forces would recapture a town seized on Tuesday by the Sudan Liberation Army/Movement (SLA/M), the larger of two rebel groups.

Fighting between the government and the rebels resumed during preparations for the sixth round of peace talks, which opened in Abuja on Sept. 15.

"We are appealing to both parties for restraint, because when things like this happen, they are going to affect the talks," AU mediator Sam Ibok told reporters in the Nigerian capital.

The Descent into Anarchy

One week ago, experts and observers warned that Darfur risked "sliding into a perpetual state of lawlessness." At a time when Khartoum and the Darfur rebels were preparing to meet in an attempt to move the essentially non-existent peace process forward, IRIN was reporting

Banditry and continuous attacks by armed groups on humanitarian workers, Arab nomads and villages in Darfur have increased significantly over the past weeks and threaten to destabilise the fragile ceasefire in the volatile western Sudanese region.

The "fragile ceasefire" has never really existed and fears of "perpetual" lawlessness are misplaced considering that Darfur has been essentially lawless for more than two years.

Last week, the World Food Program reported that "security levels deteriorated in Darfur during the reporting week." This week, the WFP reported that "despite precautionary security measures, attacks on commercial and humanitarian vehicles continue in Darfur."

And as the UN was expressing its concern "about the recurrent attacks carried out by armed men and gangs in Darfur states, which target civilians and commercial vehicles hired by relief organizations," Norwegian Church Aid was reporting that "relief convoy has been raided at gunpoint by bandits in Darfur for the second time in a short period. The security situation in Darfur shows signs of deterioration"

A growing problem is also that aid convoys are now being ambushed with increasing regularity by bandits on horses and camels. Norwegian Church Aid vehicles have been raided at gunpoint twice in a matter of weeks ... The field teams who travel most often through the western and southern parts of Darfur regularly encounter en route, and are often chased by, heavily armed men riding on horses and camels. Since the aid operation began just over a year ago, security has presented a great challenge for the agencies. Yet whereas assault, exchanges of fire and attacks on villages were previously politically motivated, much of the violence seems now to be criminal in nature.

And the violence continues.

Just yesterday, it was reported that 40 were killed in fighting after an attack on the rebel Sudan Liberation Movement/Army by "armed nomadic tribesmen" [aka "the Janjaweed"]. This was followed by another report that 80 government soldiers had been killed by the SLM when they captured the town of Sheiria in a surprise attack in retaliation for earlier government attacks on rebel-held territory.

The attack on Sheiria put at risk some 33,000 civilians who rely on humanitarian assistance after staff from three NGO's were withdrawn due to the fighting. And for good measure, the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) "reported that the security situation in the Kalma camp housing displaced persons has further deteriorated with a large number of security incidents, including some 60 reported attacks on women over the last week alone."

All of this took place while the sixth round of peace talks were being held in Nigeria.

It has now been more than a year since the United States declared the situation in Darfur a "genocide" - and the security situation on the ground is now even arguably worse. While government-orchestrated attacks on civilians have diminished, mainly because "there are not many villages left to burn down and destroy," the rampant insecurity in all likelihood still qualifies as part of Khartoum's genocidal campaign to "deliberately [inflict] on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part."

The genocide is not ending and the situation is not improving. The people of Darfur have, for all intents and purposes, been abandoned.

Darfur: Letter To President Bush

From Save Darfur

Dear President Bush,

We write on behalf of the Save Darfur Coalition, an alliance of 134 faith-based, humanitarian, and human rights organizations with over 130 million Americans united in horror and dismay at the genocidal campaign under way in Darfur, Sudan. In just over two years, the Sudanese Government and its paramilitary allies have killed more than 400,000 people, driven 2.5 million from their homes, and left 3.5 million without the food they need to sustain themselves.

There is a moral imperative to respond to these atrocities. An effective response must pursue four basic goals: protect innocent civilians; provide humanitarian aid to those in need; hold the perpetrators of violence accountable; and ensure that those forced from their homes can return in a safe, voluntary, and dignified manner.

These reasonable and necessary goals cannot be achieved without your leadership. In your recent speech to the United Nations, you said we “must actively respond to the other great challenges of our time.” Darfur is surely one of these “other great challenges.” Saving lives in Darfur is not only the humane thing to do, it also offers our nation an opportunity to build upon its proud legacy of aiding oppressed peoples.

Your words and the actions of your administration make it clear that you support—personally and strongly—ending the genocide in Darfur. The U.S. has led the world in humanitarian aid to Darfur, has led the United Nations to adopt measures holding the Sudanese Government accountable for international crimes, and has dispatched two secretaries of state to Sudan to press for change. For all your efforts, we thank you. But we must also ask you, the representative of the American people, to do more.

Specifically, we call upon you to take four urgent actions:

• Continue to speak out forcefully against the ongoing atrocities in Darfur. The world community must have no doubt that the U.S. is committed to ending this genocide.
• Press China and other leading nations to support international action to end the crisis. Remind them that short-term political and economic interests are less important than the preservation of hundreds of thousands of innocent lives.
• Employ our mission to the United Nations to urgently propose a Security Council resolution expanding the mandate of the African Union Mission in Sudan’s (AMIS) to include civilian protection with the guarantee that the United States and other nations will provide the AMIS with the financial and logistical support necessary to fulfill that mandate.
• Instruct the State Department to issue regular reports on the situation in Darfur and the effectiveness of our involvement there.

With each new chapter in the history of genocide, people of good will hope and pray that it will be the last. If we act with leadership and resolve in Sudan, history may recount how the American people helped script the hopeful, final chapter of this shameful tragedy.

Thank you,

David Rubenstein, Coordinator, Save Darfur Coalition
Ruth Messinger, President, American Jewish World Service
Reverend Dr. Bob Edgar, Executive Director, National Council of Churches
Reverend Richard Cizik, Vice President, National Association of Evangelicals
Rabbi David Saperstein, Executive Director, Religious Action Center
Reverend Bill Sinkford, Executive Director, Unitarian Universalists

Darfur: NATO Extends Airlift Mission

From Reuters

NATO has agreed to extend by a month a mission to airlift African troops joining peace efforts in Sudan's Darfur region and is studying other ways to help, an alliance official said.

NATO chiefs agreed on Wednesday to prolong until the end of October its first mission on the African continent and added it was considering an African Union (AU) request for help in training of African officers and in providing transport for future troop rotations.

"The AU came to NATO with a new request," said the official, who requested anonymity, adding the alliance would by the end of this week have airlifted a total of 3,500 African troops, including from Nigeria and Rwanda.

Darfur: Weekly Situation Report

From the WFP

HUMANITARIAN & SECURITY SITUATION

The security situation, and subsequent restrictions on UN movement, continue to affect humanitarian operations including WFP's food distributions and assessments in Darfur. Despite increased precautionary measures such as GoS police patrols and AU escorts, armed men continued to attack commercial and humanitarian vehicles in the region.

South Darfur

Two separate incidents of armed attacks on trucks were reported in Amar Jandid, approximately 10 km north of Menawashi, during the reporting week. Both incidents involved a large group of armed men who ambushed and looted commercial trucks traveling in the area. Some 87 bags of sorghum were stolen among personal belongings and money of the occupants.

There were several reports of both GoS and SLA buildup as well as clashes in locations around South Darfur. In Mershing, a UNDSS/WFP security mission recommended that food distribution activities be suspended for a few days while precautionary security measures are put in place. Meanwhile, there were also reports of SLA's established presence in Joghana, approximately 110 km south of Nyala. The UNDSS has advised agencies working in Joghana to ensure that the SLA is notified in advance of any movement in the area. The situation will be closely monitored by the UNDSS as fears of clashes with GoS present in Buram, some 30 km south of Joghana, are raising security concerns. In Jebel Marra, clashes between GoS and SLA were reported in Guldo during the week.

North Darfur

It was reported that the SLA attacked a GoS checkpoint in Abu Hamra village as well as several other villages close to Shangil Tobaya during the week (namely Um Lawat, Karja, Tebeldiya Wari and Arara). While the African Union (AU) is further investigating the situation, many residents allegedly fled Arara village from fear of GoS retaliation. A joint team of security officers from WFP, UNDSS and UNMIS traveled to Shangil Tobaya and Tabitt, where they met with AU, SLA and the Humanitarian Aid Commission (HAC) to discuss the situation. While the situation was reported to have stabilized, residents of the villages have re-located to IDP camps near Shangil Tobaya. The UNDSS is expected to submit a full report in the coming week.

Following the shooting incident that occurred in Tawila on 9 September 2005, a UNDSS security assessment mission re-visited the location and has declared the situation to be relatively stable. UN movement restrictions in Tawila were lifted but UN agencies have been advised to conduct all activities between 0900 and 1600 hours. All field missions were advised to contact the UNDSS prior to departure and to exercise extra caution at all times.

Cooperating Partner GAA suspended activities in Um Maharek village in Kutum locality following an outbreak of violence in which 15 people were killed.

West Darfur

On 15 September, two commercial trucks, being escorted by GoS police, were attacked and ambushed by armed men approximately 25 min south of Masteri. Four civilians and two GoS soldiers were reported to have been killed in this incident. An unescorted NGO vehicle was also stopped and looted near Habilah Kanari during the week. Armed men also shot at two vehicles belonging to UNHCR in the same area. It should be noted that the UN can only move on these roads (Geneina/Habilah/Mornie/Masteri roads, Sisi/Mornie road and areas around Jebel Moon) with a security escort.

Darfur: Religious, Humanitarian Group Leaders to Convene to Save Darfur

From the Christian Post

Leaders of religious groups and humanitarian aid agencies are convening in the nation’s capital today to help bring a stop to the ongoing genocide in Darfur, Sudan.

On the day marked as the National Day of Action, the Save Darfur Coalition’s National Leadership Assembly will address America's concern for the millions that have been suffering in Darfur for years.

Religious leaders such as the Rev. Richard Cizik, vice president of the National Association of Evangelicals, and Ruth Messinger, executive director of the American Jewish World Service, are meeting with elected officials, including U.S. Senator Sam Brownback (R-Kan.), to propose solutions to what many call the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

Simultaneously, Save Darfur Coalition members in over 50 local communities in 21 states are holding National Day of Action vigils to reinforce action on the part of President Bush and Congress against the violence and starvation in Darfur.

Participants will write postcards urging Bush to lead the world in protecting the civilians of Darfur and spreading awareness to inform their actions on behalf of the Sudanese people.

Nigeria: Militants Set Deadline, Threaten Violence

From Reuters

A Nigerian militant group from the oil-producing Niger Delta threatened on Wednesday to attack government and oil industry facilities if their leader, Mujahid Dokubo-Asari, was not released by 1300 GMT (0900 EDT).

Police said Asari had been arrested over "seditious and treasonable" comments, in which he called for the disintegration of Nigeria, and could face prosecution.

He routinely makes such calls.

Asari was arrested in the oil city of Port Harcourt and flown to the federal capital Abuja on Tuesday. His supporters had threatened to cause "grave mayhem" for the oil industry within 24 hours unless they heard from their leader.

"We are asking for his release. The deadline is 2 p.m. (0900 EDT). If we don't hear from him we will destroy government property and close down oil facilities," Dakuro Princewill, one of Asari's commanders, said by telephone from Port Harcourt after the police made their statement.

Uganda: Karamojong Warriors Fear Disarmament

From Reuters

There was nothing the men of Kosui could do when gun-toting Jie warriors drove off their cattle in the middle of the night.

Local chief Sipiriano Lokwi said they had already handed over their weapons to the Ugandan army -- a rare example of cooperation with attempts to disarm Karamoja, Uganda's most forgotten and destitute region.

Across mountainous Karamoja, gunmen haunt ambush sites dubbed "No Man's Land" and "Beirut," shoot-outs with the army are frequent and deadly, and cattle rustling repeatedly flares between local tribes and rivals in neighboring Kenya and Sudan.

Karamoja has the lowest health and education levels in the whole of the east African country, and rampant insecurity threatens all development efforts.

Cattle raids, involving hundreds of cows, have been part of life for generations in a region that is home mainly to semi-nomadic herders, but the attacks have become more deadly in recent years as warriors replaced spears with assault rifles.

There are so many firearms that away from Karamoja's main dirt roads and towns, small boys can be seen leaning on AK-47s in the shade, guarding herds of goats.

Locals hide their guns from troops and like all previous attempts, the latest drive to collect weapons looks set to fail.

Lokwi is bitter about his experience with disarmament.

With no way to protect their precious livestock, he says his men are now at the mercy of their marauding neighbors and tormented by hunger during increasingly common droughts.

Uganda: US Assures Cooperation Against Rebels

From Xinhua

US National Security Advisor Steve Hadley has assured Uganda of his country's cooperation in the planned joint operation between Uganda, Sudan and the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) against remnants of rebel LRA.

According to a press release issued from the Uganda State House on Wednesday, the US official made the remarks in Washington D.C. on Tuesday when holding talks with Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni who is currently visiting US.

On a group of Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels entering the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) through southern Sudan, Hadley said US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton will take up the matter of UN Observer Mission in Congo to improve UN presence and performance in the DRC.

Hadley told Museveni that Uganda is a very high priority area for the American government and the US will continue to assist Uganda to sustain her successes in economic and social reforms as well as benefiting from the US Millennium Account.

Somalia: 4,000km Trek For Asylum

How bad is Somalia if people are willing to walk 2,500 miles to Zimbabwe - From the AP

A group of Somali asylum seekers has arrived in Zimbabwe after a six-month trek over 4,000 kilometers (2,485 miles) from their Horn of Africa nation, a newspaper reported Wednesday.

The Herald said "at least" 26 Somalis, including two women, had surrendered to police in Harare on Monday after "trickling into the country" in smaller groups from Mozambique.

"It remains puzzling how the group found its way deep into the country and up to central Harare, undetected by security forces," said the Herald. Its reporter was permitted to interview the refugees who said they had surrendered to the Zimbabwean police because they were starving and exhausted after their journey, which was mainly on foot.

"There is hunger and war in our country and Zimbabwe is safe for us," the newspaper quoted a group leader as saying.

Congo/Uganda: Museveni to Demand for Rebel Kony Extradition

From The Monitor

President Yoweri Museveni, currently in the United States, has revealed that Uganda will demand for the immediate extradition of Joseph Kony and his Lords Resistance Army rebels who are reported to have crossed to DR Congo.

President Museveni disclosure yesterday when he met two former American ambassadors, Ms Nancy Powel and Mr Johnnie Carson who visited him at Mayfair Hotel in Washington DC.

A statement from State House quoted the president saying, "The issue of terrorism from Sudan is finished. We shall demand that the UN forces in Sudan take action. They should be extradited to Uganda or be handed over to the International Criminal Court," Museveni said in the statement dated September 20.

Dallaire Says World Still Ignoring African Bloodshed

From the Canadian Jewish Times

Retired general Romeo Dallaire suggests that little was learned from the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

Speaking at the opening event of the Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre’s annual Holocaust education series, he said that the world continues to ignore bloodshed in Africa because of race.

Dallaire, who pleaded – without success – for permission to take steps to stop the massacre while he was commander of the United Nations forces in Rwanda, said existing international laws and regulations are not being used to stop crimes against humanity in Africa. He pointed to killing of the black population in the Darfur province of Sudan over the past 15 months.

“We do have the legal tools, but not the political will nor the desire of the public,” said Dallaire, who was the keynote speaker.

“Why get involved? There’s no strategic or geographic interest, there’s nothing in it for us. Africa is overpopulated anyway… We take the destruction of human beings as some sort of trite exercise that is to be expected,” he said.

“Are some more human than others? Do we establish a priority among humanity, a pecking order?”

Darfur: More Work to Be Done

A letter to the editor in the Washington Post

The Post has been a strong voice in calling for an end to the genocide in Darfur; however, the Sept. 14 editorial "Genocide, One Year On" did a disservice to the cause of ending the violence.

While it is true that the Bush administration should be lauded for its courageous declaration of genocide a year ago, since then it has pulled back from its leadership in trying to stop the genocide. And as the administration's public commitment has waned, the violence has continued.

The editorial failed to note that U.N. officials estimate that more than 300,000 people have been killed in Darfur. Nor did the editorial discuss the recent increase in violence against humanitarian workers, which has led to some groups ceasing operations in the Sudanese region.

While it is true, as the editorial stated, that nearly 3.2 million people have been affected by the crisis, The Post did not note that the World Health Organization has declared that the same number (nearly half of the population of Darfur) is in need of food assistance.

Consistent pressure from the United States and the international community can make a significant difference in Darfur. But the situation there remains urgent. Much is left to be done.

Darfur: The Genocide We Never Discuss

From the Northern Star

Nearly the equivalent of everyone in Kane County has been murdered.

Are you paying attention now? The 404,119 Kane County residents reported in the 2000 Illinois census are alive and well. But Sudan, which housed three al-Qaida training camps starting in 1994, has supported Janjaweed militias that have killed 400,000 people in the Darfur region since 2003.

If all of Kane County’s residents were shot or raped to death, we’d care, but since it happened in Sudan, Africa, we don’t. Do we think them any less human?

In fact, how little we care is shown by the criminal lack of media coverage.

Darfur: Rebels Withdraw From Captured Town

From the AP

Rebels are reported to have withdrawn from a South Darfur town, which the Sudanese army was threatening to recapture, a U.N. spokesman said Wednesday.

The Sudan Liberation Army overran the town of Sheiria on Monday, violating the cease-fire in the western region of Sudan. The move provoked government protests and U.N. expressions of concern for the town's 33,000 inhabitants, who depend on international aid.

"We have heard from some sources that the SLA left the town," U.N. spokesman George Somerwill told The Associated Press in a phone call.

Somerwill declined to reveal the sources, but stressed that the African Union mission was responsible for the peace process in Darfur.

AU spokesman Noureddine Mezni refused to comment on whether the rebels had withdrawn from Sheiria, saying only that a statement would be issued later Wednesday.

Darfur: Fighting Threatens 33,000 People

Via Passion of the Present we get this from the UN News Center

Fresh fighting in Sudan's embattled Darfur region is threatening 33,000 civilians who were receiving humanitarian assistance from three international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) whose staff have been withdrawn, and the United Nations mission in the country today called on the combatants to show restraint.

The humanitarian impact is potentially serious in the town of Shareya, between North and South Darfur, where the fighting has occurred, the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) said on the eve of a briefing to the Security Council by Secretary-General Kofi Annan's Special Representative in the country, Jan Pronk.

The Mission also reported that the security situation in the Kalma camp housing displaced persons has further deteriorated with a large number of security incidents, including some 60 reported attacks on women over the last week alone.

Darfur: Rebels Kill 80

More on the rebel attack on the town of Sheiria - from Reuters

Rebels in the Darfur region of western Sudan said they captured the town of Sheiria from government forces in a surprise attack on Tuesday, killing more than 80 government soldiers.

A Sudanese military official said the rebels had launched a surprise attack on Sheiria, killing civilians and soldiers. He did not say the rebels had captured the town, about 70 km (45 miles) northeast of Nyala, the capital of South Darfur state.

A statement by the rebel Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM), signed by spokesman Mahjoub Hussein, said the rebels acted in response to government intrusions into rebel-held territory.

"After heavy fighting, the Sudan Liberation Army (SLM forces) was able this morning to defeat the enemy forces and occupy the town of Sheiria in South Darfur," said the statement, which was issued in London and received by fax.

"They left many victims among enemy forces and the initial count exceeds 80 government soldiers," it added.

Sudan: A Hand Toward Peace

An op-ed from John Eibner & Joe Madison in the National Review

If the flagging Sudan peace process is not reinvigorated, the promising Abuja Declaration will remain a dead letter, and the danger of expanded conflict will increase. The United States has the means to complete the work of peace. It can do so by investing substantial political and financial capital in the success of the African Union-sponsored negotiations. The conflict in Darfur requires at least the same level of U.S. commitment as was successfully devoted to ending the war in southern Sudan.

Senator John Danforth, with his direct access to the Oval Office and vast experience in public life, played a crucial role in bringing peace to southern Sudan. His retirement has produced a diplomatic vacuum. The appointment of a senior statesman as a successor would enhance the U.S.'s ability to influence the principal actors in the Darfur tragedy. If President Bush does not keep Sudan high on his agenda, he runs the risk of a costly foreign-policy failure — costly for the Sudanese victims of genocide, and costly for American power and prestige in a volatile region.

Sudan: New Power-Sharing Govt Named

From Reuters

Former rebels and Sudan's ruling party agreed on a new power-sharing government on Tuesday, said an official with the former rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM).

"It's been agreed," said the official who did not want to be named.

A Sudanese official in Nigeria, where talks on Sudan's Darfur conflict are taking place, had said earlier that the new government had been announced.

The formation of the unity government was due to have been completed by Aug. 9 but was delayed by the death of former SPLM leader John Garang in a helicopter crash on July 30.

The new government has been further delayed by a tussle between the SPLM and the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) over control of the energy ministry.

"There was agreement on the energy ministry today," the SPLM official told Reuters in Khartoum, adding that the SPLM and the NCP agreed to rotate control of the ministry every two years.

He did not say who would take control of the ministry first.

Somalia: Warlords Debate Fight Against Government

From Reuters

Warlords opposed to Somali government leaders based in Jowhar met on Tuesday to debate whether to attack or reconcile, underscoring the deep stalemate and potential for war in Somalia's latest attempt to find peace.

The warlords, most of whom are cabinet ministers in the government and favour Mogadishu as the capital, see the president's base in provincial Jowhar and his massing of fighters there as a sign of imminent attack.

Since it was formed in neighbouring Kenya in 2004, President Abdullahi Yusuf's interim government has been split over where it should be based while security is restored in the Horn of Africa nation, without effective central authority since 1991.

Warlords in control of Mogadishu, Juba, Lower Shabelle and Bay regions were debating at Tuesday's meeting whether they should convene in coming days in Ba'lad and simultaneously mass their militiamen and heavy weapons there, witnesses in the Somali capital told Reuters by telephone.

To move the militias to Ba'lad -- outside Mogadishu on the way to Jowhar where thousands of troops loyal to the government are based -- would likely be seen as a provocation.

Darfur: Faith-Based Groups to Urge Bush Administration, Congress to Make Stopping Genocide No. 1 Priority

A press release from Save Darfur

The Save Darfur Coalition, an alliance of 134 faith-based, humanitarian and human rights groups representing 130 million Americans, will hold a National Leadership Assembly to urge President Bush and Congress to make stopping the genocide by government-sponsored militias in Darfur, Sudan against civilians their No. 1 priority. The Save Darfur Coalition leaders will hold issue briefings for journalists, senior Bush administration officials and members of Congress to propose solutions to the world's worst humanitarian crisis. Simultaneously, Save Darfur Coalition members in over 50 local communities in 21 states will hold National Day of Action vigils and write postcards to President Bush urging him to lead the world in protecting the civilians of Darfur (see list of local events with local contact information.)

Event Details ---

Who:
U.S. Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS), member, Senate Appropriations Committee
U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL), member, House International Relations Committee
Rev. Richard Cizik, VP, Gov’t. Affairs, National Assoc. of Evangelicals, Wash., DC
Rev. Dr. Bob Edgar, General Sec., National Council of Churches, New York, NY
Rabbi David Saperstein, Dir., Religious Action Ctr. of Reform Judaism, Wash., DC
Rev. Bill Sinkford, President, Unitarian Universalists, Boston, MA
Ruth Messinger, Exec. Director, American Jewish World Service, New York, NY
Faisal Hussain Omar, Darfurian farmer/cattle trader whose brother and sister were burned alive and whose father was killed in militia attacks (via conference call)

Where: U.S. Capitol Building, Room HC-7, Washington, D.C.

When: Wednesday, Sept. 21, 12:15 p.m. EDT: issue briefing for journalists.

Darfur: Sudan Rebels Seize Town

From the BBC

Rebels in Sudan's war-torn Darfur region have captured a town, a United Nations spokesman says.

More than 500 fighters from the Sudan Liberation Army launched a surprise attack on Sheiria in South Darfur on Monday, military sources say.

The UN mission in Sudan has urged restraint on all sides, after an increase in fighting following last week's resumption of peace talks.

Over two million people have been made homeless by two years of violence.

Both the rebels and pro-government militia have launched attacks in the last few days, with casualties reported on all sides.

Responsibility to Protect: Why `Never again' Will Remain `Again and again'

From Gerald Caplan in the Toronto Star

Ironically, Rwanda matters more today than it ever has — certainly more than in its moment of greatest need. It has become the emblem of international and UN ignominy, humiliation, and failure.

As in "another Rwanda."

Everyone knows what that means — that we can't just stand by a second time while genocide is being unleashed. Thanks, among other things, to the stirring but politically vacuous Hollywood film Hotel Rwanda, plus Dallaire's own best-selling memoir (also called Shake Hands With the Devil), plus tonight's powerful documentary, the 1994 genocide has finally gained cachet.

All the more heartbreaking, then, that for almost two years another Rwanda has been happening in the Darfur region of western Sudan.

As was the case in Rwanda, there is disagreement among authorities as to whether Darfur constitutes a genocide under the terms of the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

But what we are learning from Darfur, which we never remotely imagined, is that even naming a genocide is an utterly inconsequential exercise in hot air.

Congo: Newly Arrested Army Dissidents Escape

From IRIN

The governor of Congo's South Kivu Province, Didas Kaningini, said on Monday that 48 dissident soldiers who were arrested recently as they returned from exile to the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) had escaped from a jail.

"They escaped on Saturday," Kaningini said on Monday. "They forced open the door of the prison in a military camp in Ruhambo."

The camp is some 120 km south of the province capital, Bukavu.

Kaningini said they escaped with weapons. They had been arrested on 13 September while crossing the border from Burundi, carrying weapons and communication equipment.

Darfur: Sudan Army Says Rebels Attack

From Reuters

Rebels in Sudan's western Darfur region killed civilians and Sudanese soldiers during a surprise attack on a town, a Sudanese military official said on Tuesday.

"Around 700 to 800 rebels launched a surprise attack on the town of Sheiria yesterday. The attack lasted an hour and they used artillery," said a senior official in the office of the armed forces spokesman.

"A number of civilians and soldiers died in the attack on the town," he told Reuters, adding it was not clear how many were killed.

Darfur: Norwegian Church Aid Convoys Raided Again

From Reuters AlertNet

A Norwegian Church Aid relief convoy has been raided at gunpoint by bandits in Darfur for the second time in a short period. The security situation in Darfur shows signs of deterioration.

The Darfur peace process is again underway in Abuja, and every time the negotiators have so far come to the table, the has been a marked increase in violence on the ground in Darfur. This round seems to be no exception. Breaches of the ceasefire have been reported, although Norwegian Church Aid has not been able to confirm these reports. A growing problem is also that aid convoys are now being ambushed with increasing regularity by bandits on horses and camels. Norwegian Church Aid vehicles have been raided at gunpoint twice in a matter of weeks.

“We are extremely thankful to know that our colleagues are safe and well. But the growing trend of ambush, both of clearly marked aid vehicles and hired trucks, is frightening. Hundreds of thousands of people rely entirely on the life-saving services we provide in Darfur. We provide these people with services that they actually have a right to receive – but we need relatively secure conditions to be able to deliver,” says Bjørg Mide, Director of the NCA/ACT/Caritas relief programme that operates in 35 different locations across Sudan’s western province.

The field teams who travel most often through the western and southern parts of Darfur regularly encounter en route, and are often chased by, heavily armed men riding on horses and camels. Since the aid operation began just over a year ago, security has presented a great challenge for the agencies. Yet whereas assault, exchanges of fire and attacks on villages were previously politically motivated, much of the violence seems now to be criminal in nature.

Hungry Niger Now Faces Malaria Threat

From AFP

The United Nations World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Tuesday it is sending 100 000 malaria treatments to Niger, concerned that malnutrition in the sub-Saharan country could worsen the child death rate from the disease.

"Even under ordinary conditions in Niger, 50% of all deaths among children are from malaria," the Geneva-based UN agency said in a statement, adding that 200 000 children are also at risk of malnutrition.

The disease is harder to diagnose in starving people because of complications caused by other symptoms.

"Without appropriate measures, the toll could rise even higher, because malnutrition makes children more likely to succumb to the disease," the WHO said, warning that 100 000 children face malaria as well as hunger.

Rwanda: Kagame Discusses Genocide

From the Hartford Courant

Rwanda is the most secure country in its region, Rwandan President Paul Kagame proclaimed to applause in the packed Student Union Theater at the University of Connecticut Tuesday.

The security Rwanda now embraces was only a dream to those who endured the 1994 genocide during which extremist Hutus, seeking to gain control of Rwanda and wipe out the Tutsis and moderate Hutus, slaughtered almost one million people, largely because of economic and cultural differences.

[edit]

Kagame discussed the many challenges and positive improvements experienced by Rwanda since the genocide ended, saying the country's developments are not as publicized as they should be.

"It is day-to-day work that does not grab the headlines but [the work] is crucial and we have made significant progress," he said.

Kagame said 60,000 genocide suspects have been tried for their involvement in the atrocities and Rwanda has restored a transitional government, established zero tolerance for corruption in its economic policies and convinced more than 20,000 Hutu soldiers to support the government.

Kagame, however, acknowledged that extremist Hutus still inhabit Rwanda and the terrible accounts of carnage a decade ago did not escape his address.

Responding to a question from the audience about sexual violence in Rwanda, Kagame told a story of a woman he had spoken to who was raped by an extremist during the genocide. The woman later became pregnant and gave birth to the rapist's child.

"Later on the lady said her child was the only immediate relative she had left because the rest of her family had been killed in the genocide," Kagame said.

Kagame said his main reason for speaking at UConn was to advocate dialogue and awareness.

"Let [the genocide] be discussed," he said to the audience, whom he referred to as his friends. "People must continue to ask questions and seek answers."

Rwanda: Gov't Seizes Newspaper

From Reuters

Rwanda has seized an edition of a privately owned newspaper and questioned its editor for publishing articles deemed harmful to the country, police said.

Police spokesman Theo Badege said Umuco's chief editor, Bonaventure Bizumuremyi, was being questioned "because we suspect some bad intention", but he had not been detained.

"We have confiscated the copies because they contain harmful stories that are based on rumours and sensationalism," he said late on Monday.

The Kinyarwanda-language Umuco is one of two privately owned independent weeklies in Rwanda, which has been criticised by the U.S. government for curbing press freedom.

Both Umuco and another weekly, Umuseso, have often run into trouble from the authorities for criticising the government.

Uganda: Army Abuses Probe Urged

From the BBC

The International Criminal Court in The Hague should investigate abuses in northern Uganda by soldiers as well as rebels, a human rights group has said.

For almost two decades, Lord's Resistance Army rebels have been terrorising people in northern Uganda.

But Human Rights Watch said the very people supposed to be protecting civilians have been carrying out widespread abuses against them.

Uganda's army said HRW was exaggerating the levels of abuse by soldiers.

The report by the New York based group says soldiers in Uganda's national army, known as the UPDF, have raped, beaten, illegally detained and killed civilians in camps.

Darfur: Major Clash Reportedly Kills More Than 40

An update from Reuters

A large retaliatory attack by armed nomadic tribesmen on the rebel Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SLM/A) on Monday left more than 40 people dead in the strife-torn western Sudanese region of Darfur, local sources said.

The attack was reportedly a response to a raid by the SLM/A on the village of Malam on 25 August, some 50 km from the South Darfur capital, Nyala, during which the rebels abducted children belonging to the Arab nomads living in the area.

According to the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), the rebels also stole more than 2,000 camels and killed three civilians and three government solders.

The SLM/A rebels claimed that they seized the camels after the animals invaded their farmland and the nomads refused to move them out.

"Following a week-long truce, the AU [African Union] was unable to convince the SLA to return the camels. A few evenings after the truce ended, a large group of nomads attacked an SLA stronghold in the Jebel Marra mountain area [in South Darfur state]," a source within the nomadic community said.

The fighting lasted four or five hours, he added, and 30 nomads were killed.

During the skirmish, approximately 10 to 15 rebels also were killed, according to a humanitarian source who was in the Jebel Marra when the attack occurred.

Sudan Affirms Commitment to Promote Human Rights

Via Passion of the Present we get this ridiculous article from the Sudan Tribune

Sudanese Foreign Minister, head of Sudan’s delegation to the UN’s World Summit, Mustafa Osman Ismail, affirmed that Sudan respects and asserts human rights according to its values and religious principles.

Addressing the UN’s General Assembly summit Friday, Ismail said Sudan follows with great concern the proposals to reform the human rights institutions, top of which is the proposal to set up a human right council, warning against policies of selectivity, double standard as well as exploiting human rights to achieve political gains.

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As for the issue of Darfur, the minister explained that efforts are being exerted to bring to an end the crisis in Darfur, pointing out to the efforts of the African Union in this connection, urging the international community to support these efforts toward peaceful solution of the crisis.

U.N. Reform: Reality Sets In

Boy - I didn't see that coming - from Reuters

China warned the West on Monday against any attempt to abuse a newly agreed international right to intervene to protect civilians threatened by genocide, war crimes or ethnic cleansing.

A United Nations summit last week approved the principle that the international community has a "responsibility to protect" civilians where governments are unable or unwilling to do so.

The aim was to prevent any repetition of the massacres in Rwanda, Bosnia and Kosovo in the 1990s.

But Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxiang insisted in a speech to the U.N. General Assembly that the authorization of the Security Council was required for any action to prevent a large-scale humanitarian crisis.

"We are against any willful intervention on the ground of rash conclusion that a nation is unable or unwilling to protect its own citizens," Li said.

China, a veto-bearing permanent member of the Security Council, has been the major power most reluctant to allow U.N. intervention to protect civilians in Sudan's Darfur region or censure of the human rights record of Zimbabwe. It also opposed the U.S.-led war in Iraq.

UN Reform: A Triumph for Decency

Via Mark Leon Goldberg we get this on the "Responsibility to Protect" - from AlterNet

The U.N. 60th Anniversary Summit has left these details of the "Responsibility to Protect," to be hammered out in the General Assembly, where "the spoilers" will doubtless have a field day. But they would find it difficult to beat these, since whether they have intended to or not, they have now accepted the general principle.

What will this mean for Darfur? Very little immediately, but if the city of Khartoum in Sudan continues to condone and facilitate mass murders there, next time the issue comes before the Security Council, the Sudanese regime's friends will not be able to invoke legal arguments to cover them. After all, they have signed onto the Declaration.

And for the next Rwanda, Cambodia, Kosovo or Darfur -- there is a clear warning to the perpetrators that their obligations as states under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights now outweigh their privileges of sovereignty.

Whether the prospect heartens or worries you, it is certainly what Annan and the 60th Anniversary will be remembered for.

Uganda/Congo: Top LRA Rebel Enters DRC

From Reuters

The deputy leader of Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels has entered Congo after striking out west for the first time from his hideouts in the mountains of southern Sudan, Uganda's army said on Monday.

During two decades of war, fighters from the cult-like group had never crossed over the White Nile, supposedly because they feared losing the magical protection of their leader, the self-proclaimed prophet Joseph Kony.

Uganda's army said Kony's deputy, Vincent Otti, and about 50 fighters forded the river last week before burning homes on the road between the Sudanese towns of Juba and Yei.

By Sunday night he had continued west, reaching the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo in the area of remote Garamba National Park, the army said.

"Otti is now in Congo. We believe he crossed sometime late yesterday," said army spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Shaban Bantariza.

The army could not say why Otti had gone to Congo, although it appeared to be for purposes of evading capture rather than opening any new front.

Darfur: Rebel Groups Say 30 Killed in New Attacks

From Reuters

Militias backed by the Sudanese government have killed 30 people in fresh attacks in Darfur, threatening new peace talks under way in Nigeria, rebel groups said on Monday.

The Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) said 17 people were killed in Korbia in northern Darfur on Saturday and 13 died in attacks on Jabamara in the west on Sunday.

SLA spokesman Abdulrahman Musa said fighting continued in Jabamara on Monday, adding that the rebel groups had lodged a complaint with the African Union (AU), the mediator in the talks which itself has 3,000 troops in Darfur.

"In the final analysis, we believe these (ceasefire) violations would not create a conducive environment to reach a settlement during this round of talks," Musa said at a joint news conference with the JEM.

A spokesman for the Sudanese government delegation at the talks said the two towns allegedly attacked were under AU control and it was up to the AU to confirm or deny violence.

"If they're talking about bandits then we don't control bandits," he added.

UN Reform: To Save the World From Hell

A piece by Samantha Power in Le Monde

Blaming the UN for the Rwandan genocide or for Iran’s nuclear weapons programme, as Richard Holbrooke, former US ambassador to the UN, says, “is like blaming Madison Square Garden when the New York Knicks (4) play badly”. The UN is a building. It is the behaviour and priorities of the states within it that need to be reformed. Take two notorious examples of the UN in crisis: peacekeeping and mismanagement. The most serious accusations against the UN have been that the massacres in Rwanda in 1994 and Srebrenica in 1995 happened in the presence of UN peacekeepers.

Annan, who then ran the department of peacekeeping operations in New York, was warned by Romeo Dallaire, his field general in Rwanda, of the imminent events. Annan, unforgivably, failed to pass the warning to the Security Council.

But who must bear the greatest responsibility for allowing the genocide? Annan, who predicted that the warning would cause member states either to do nothing or to flee Rwanda (a prediction borne out during the genocide, when western powers withdrew UN peacekeepers)? Or Bill Clinton who, fearing that US troops might get drawn in, demanded that the blue helmets be evacuated when the massacres were already happening? Or François Mitterrand, who had helped arm and train the murderers, and whose French soldiers parachuted in to rescue leading perpetrators during the last days of the killings?

Has anything changed? Western nations have heeded the lessons of the 1990s, but not by ensuring that peacekeeping is done well. Instead, they have avoided peacekeeping altogether. Armed forces from western nations who serve under the UN flag are now rare. The five main contributors of troops to the UN are Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Ethiopia and Ghana. The successful military operations of the past decade - the Nato intervention in Kosovo in 1999, the Australian rescue of the East Timorese in 1999, and the British mission in Sierra Leone in 2000, were carried out by coalitions of the willing.

Instead of strengthening collective structures to perform essential humanitarian and peacekeeping tasks, rich countries have decided to go it alone or stay home. The troops of poor countries are managing the hardest cases, such as Congo and Darfur.

Somalia: Political Crisis Pushes Country Closer to War

From Reuters

worsening political crisis threatens to plunge Somalia back into war and open a new era of humanitarian suffering, experts say.

Trust collapsed between the two opposing wings of its divided government many months ago, triggering a mainly rhetorical struggle for power as both sides squabbled over where in the failed state their administration should be based.

That development failed to stimulate a forceful international response, due to growing disarray among interested foreign powers over how to handle the Horn of Africa country.

But recent events have taken emotions inside President Abdullahi Yusuf's government to new levels of acrimony, and foreign powers will find it hard to remain aloof if warlords start settling their disputes through armed force, Somalis say.

Worried analysts point to movements of pro- and anti-Yusuf militias, a huge increase in arms imports, assassinations of high profile Somalis in Mogadishu, the failure of a disarmament project in the capital, and increased activity by militant Islamists seeking to exploit a deepening power vacuum.

Niger: Humanity Stripped to the Bones

From the Herald Sun

Her arms are like twigs, and she weighs little more than a baby.

She is one of 800,000 children in the west African nation of Niger who are in danger of starving to death.

She was photographed at a feeding centre run by the aid organisation Medecins Sans Frontieres.

Without the emergency supplies of enriched food provided by aid agencies, she would have starved.

Head of mission Johanne Sekkenes said more than 23,500 children under five had received treatment this year.

While 85 per cent of them survived, 10 per cent were admitted to MSF hospitals.

An appalling 5 per cent -- about 1200 tiny children -- died.

Genocide: Rwanda Questions New UN Pledge

From Reuters

Rwanda, the site of a 1994 genocide, hailed on Sunday a U.N. declaration that the international community must intervene in cases of genocide or ethnic cleansing but questioned whether the statement was just so many words.

"There are probably no other member states in this august body, apart from Rwanda where the U.N. has consistently neglected to learn from its mistakes, resulting in massive loss of life and untold misery," Rwandan Foreign Minister Charles Murigande told the 191-nation U.N. General Assembly.

"Action not words would be the measure of our success or failure," he said. "How will the United Nations respond the next time action to protect populations is required? Will there be lengthy academic or legal debates on what constitutes genocide or crimes against humanity while people die?"

Don't Let Darfur Repeat in Chad

From The Globe and Mail

As the conflict in Darfur, Sudan, continues to destroy the lives and livelihoods of millions of people, another crisis looms next door. Last month, while we were in Chad, its ailing President was in France seeking medical care for an unknown, reportedly serious illness. Chadians we spoke to were anxious that he might not return. The tension was palpable. The demise of the long-time Chadian ruler could trigger regional unrest and directly affect the 200,000 Sudanese refugees living in Chad.

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The future of those living near the Chad-Sudan border region rides not only on a resolution of the conflict in Darfur, but also on a stable Chad. A fragile balance in which the different groups can peacefully co-exist must be found soon. Chadian authorities, with the help of the international community, must address these problems or dire widespread consequences could result.

Canada has an opportunity to exercise a leadership role in this festering crisis. It can, for example, push for more international assistance to Chadians. For the Darfurians, the ideal solution would be for them to return to their homes, but as the security outlook in Sudan remains grim, there is little chance they will be going home any time soon - yet another reason to help assure a stable Chad.

The world failed to intervene effectively in Darfur, and hundreds of thousands have died. As disaster looms in Chad, will we fail again?

Darfur: Shaming the Present with the Past

From the Boston Globe

Standing before the six glass towers of the New England Holocaust Memorial, Elie Wiesel called it ''an event that brings shame to civilization."

The survivor of Nazi death camps at Buchenwald and Auschwitz was speaking, of course, about the systematic annihilation of 6 million Jews during World War II. But he also was speaking of the indifference of a world that too easily casts a jaundiced eye toward human suffering, in particular, he said, the massacre of some 300,000 people in the Darfur region of western Sudan.

''Rwanda, Darfur, Bosnia, and, of course, you wonder, what happened?" Wiesel said. ''Why are so many communities indifferent to so many people's pain and death? All of these could have been prevented. Believe me. You know it. Why weren't they?"

At a ceremony last night rededicating the Holocaust Memorial 10 years after it was built, speakers including Mayor Thomas M. Menino, Wiesel, and Rev. Gloria White-Hammond, co-pastor of the Bethel AME Church in Jamaica Plain, asked Americans to stop what they called another genocide unfolding in Darfur.

It was, they said, a way to honor the victims of the Nazis, who perished while world leaders dawdled. Speakers repeatedly invoked the phrase ''never again" -- often used to remember the lessons of the Holocaust -- in calling on political leaders and citizens to take action to end bloodshed in that region of Africa.

''Whenever a person says, 'I need help,' woe to those who refuse to help," said Wiesel, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 for his efforts against genocide worldwide.

A Wimp on Genocide

The latest from Nick Kristof

President Bush doesn't often find common cause with Cuba, Zimbabwe, Iran, Syria and Venezuela. But this month the Bush administration joined with those countries and others to eviscerate a forthright U.N. statement that nations have an obligation to respond to genocide.

It was our own Axis of Medieval, and it reflected the feckless response of President Bush to genocide in Darfur. It's not that he favors children being tossed onto bonfires or teenage girls being gang-raped and mutilated, but he can't bother himself to try very hard to stop these horrors, either.

It's been a year since Mr. Bush - ahead of other world leaders, and to his credit - acknowledged that genocide was unfolding in Darfur. But since then he has used that finding of genocide not to spur action but to substitute for it.

Mr. Bush's position in the U.N. negotiations got little attention. But in effect the United States successfully blocked language in the declaration saying that countries have an "obligation" to respond to genocide. In the end the declaration was diluted to say that "We are prepared to take collective action ... on a case by case basis" to prevent genocide.

That was still an immensely important statement. But it's embarrassing that in the 21st century, we can't even accept a vague obligation to fight genocide as we did in the Genocide Convention of 1948. If the Genocide Convention were proposed today, President Bush apparently would fight to kill it.

I can't understand why Mr. Bush is soft on genocide, particularly because his political base - the religious right - has been one of the groups leading the campaign against genocide in Darfur. As the National Association of Evangelicals noted in a reproachful statement about Darfur a few days ago, the Bush administration "has made minimal progress protecting millions of victims of the world's worst humanitarian crisis."

Incredibly, the Bush administration has even emerged as Sudan's little helper, threatening an antigenocide campaigner in an effort to keep him quiet. Brian Steidle, a former Marine captain, served in Darfur as a military adviser - and grew heartsick at seeing corpses of children who'd been bludgeoned to death.

In March, I wrote a column about Mr. Steidle and separately published photos that he had taken of men, women and children hacked to death. Other photos were too wrenching to publish: one showed a pupil at the Suleia Girls School; she appeared to have been burned alive, probably after being raped, and her charred arms were still in handcuffs.

Mr. Steidle is an American hero for blowing the whistle on the genocide. But, according to Mr. Steidle, the State Department has ordered him on three occasions to stop showing the photos, for fear of complicating our relations with Sudan. Mr. Steidle has also been told that he has been blacklisted from all U.S. government jobs.

The State Department should be publicizing photos of atrocities to galvanize the international community against the genocide - not conspiring with Sudan to cover them up.

I'm a broken record on Darfur because I can't get out of my head the people I've met there. On my very first visit, 18 months ago, I met families who were hiding in the desert from the militias and soldiers. But the only place to get water was at the occasional well - where soldiers would wait to shoot the men who showed up, and rape the women. So anguished families sent their youngest children, 6 or 7 years old, to the wells with donkeys to fetch water - because they were least likely to be killed or raped. The parents hated themselves for doing this, but they had no choice - they had been abandoned by the world.

That's the cost of our passivity. Perhaps it's unfair to focus so much on Mr. Bush, for there are no neat solutions and he has done more than most leaders. He at least dispatched Condi Rice to Darfur this summer - which is more interest in genocide than the TV anchors have shown.

One group, www.beawitness.org, prepared a television commercial scolding the networks for neglecting the genocide - and affiliates of NBC, CBS and ABC all refused to run it.

Still, the failures of others do not excuse Mr. Bush's own unwillingness to speak out, to impose a no-fly zone, to appoint a presidential envoy or to build an international coalition to pressure Sudan. So, Mr. Bush, let me ask you just one question: Since you portray yourself as a bold leader, since you pride yourself on your willingness to use blunt terms like "evil" - then why is it that you're so wimpish on genocide?

Darfur: The Impact of the AU

From Sleepless in Sudan

I've been asked a lot recently whether or not I think that the displaced people of Darfur are beginning to return to their villages now that some measures have been put into place to provide security for them. "But more African Union soldiers are in more places now - surely, that must have had some impact," friends and colleagues (particularly those sitting in comfortable corner offices in Brussels or Washington DC) ask impatiently.

In short, the answer is no.

Sudan/Uganda: LRA Denies Attacks in South Sudan

A press release from the Lord's Resistance Army

The Lord’s Resistance Army / Movement (LRA/M) would like to categorically deny the alleged reports that its forces was responsible for the attack on the recently opened Yei -Juba Road in Western Equatoria, in South Sudan which was carried on BBC World Service of 14th September, 2005. For those who know the terrain in question, it is technically and logistically impossible for the LRA/M to mount such an attack, as it was quite rightly reported as being the first time ever for such a crossing and an attack of this kind to take place.

Niger: Food Aid 'No Longer Needed'

From the BBC

Niger's prime minister says he agrees with UN plans to end large-scale food aid, which he described as an affront to the country's dignity.

"A large part of the country has already harvested its crops and is already eating them," Hama Amadou said.

The UN had announced it would only concentrate on those most in need once harvesting had started.

But the aid group MSF has warned that with almost a million people not yet fed, it is too soon to stop aid.

Medecins Sans Frontiere says that this could put many mothers and children in particular at risk.

This came from Reuters earlier in the week

Tens of thousands of children in Niger are not getting enough food and an increasing number are dying of malnutrition, the aid group Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) said on Tuesday.

A survey last month in the eastern region of Zinder showed "alarming conditions" and a worsening situation, with one in five children suffering from malnutrition, MSF said.

Mortality rates in the Zinder region for children under the age of five have risen to 5.3 deaths per 10,000 per day -- more than double the internationally recognized emergency threshold of two deaths per 10,000 per day, according to an MSF statement.

Sudan: New Government in Place Next Week

From Reuters

Sudan's new power-sharing government will be in place next week, the European Union's top aid official said on Friday after talks with Sudanese officials.

"There will be 30 ministers, 30 vice-ministers. The foreign minister was quite sure," EU Development Commissioner Louis Michel told Reuters after meeting Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman Ismail on the margins of a United Nations summit.

Sudanese officials earlier this week said a struggle over the energy ministry was delaying formation of a post-civil war government which was expected to be announced on Sept. 7.

A peace deal agreed in January gives the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) 52 percent of the government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) 28 percent. Other northern and southern political parties will share the remaining seats in government.

The government was originally scheduled to be in place by early August but was delayed after the newly appointed vice president, SPLM head John Garang, died in a helicopter crash.

Sudan: Donors Should Fulfil Their Pledges

From IRIN

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan called upon international partners and donors to seize the moment and honour their commitments to support Sudan’s fledgling peace process in his latest report to the UN Security Council published on Thursday.

Given the immense challenges facing the country, "I again urge all donors to convert the pledges already made without further delay, and to commit additional resources needed to meet the outstanding requirements for 2005," he said.

"Billions were pledged more than six months ago at the Oslo donor conference, and the four largest donors - the United States, the United Kingdom, the European Community and the Netherlands - still account for close to 80 percent of funding received to date," Annan added.

Of the US $1.96 billion needed for recovery and humanitarian assistance, outlined in the Workplan for the Sudan 2005, only 47.5 percent had been funded so far.

Thus far, aid programmes in Darfur had received 60 percent of funding, while southern Sudan had received 42 percent. Eastern Sudan and the transitional areas had received a mere 22 percent of the support they required.

Congo: 48 Combatants Arrested After Returning From Burundi Exile

From IRIN

The army of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) said it arrested 48 dissident soldiers, including 11 officers, on Tuesday in the east of the country near its borders with Rwanda and Burundi as they were returning from exile.

"The soldiers are linked to [a dissident former colonel] Jules Mutebusi," Col Baudouin Nakabaka, the commandant in southern South-Kivu's town of Kanyola, said on Thursday.

In June 2004, Mutebusi and his men, who are mainly Congolese Tutsis, attacked Bukavu, the provincial capital of South-Kivu. Nakabaka said that after the attack they fled across the border and had only now returned.

"They crossed the border near the village of Bwegera, 150 km south of Bukavu," he said.

He said each soldier had guns "They had 40 two-way army radios," he added.

The dissident soldiers were first arrested by the Forces démocratiques pour la libération du Rwanda (FDLR), a Rwandan Hutu rebel group based in eastern DRC, according to an official at the UN Mission in the DRC (MONUC) who wished to remain anonymous.

"The FDLR then handed them over to the army," the MONUC official said.

The government has issued an ultimatum for these and other illegal foreign troops to leave the country by 30 September or face serious consequences.

Sudan: Annan Recommends Renewing Mandate of UN Mission For a Year

From the U.N. News Center

Secretary-General Kofi Annan, underlining the daunting challenges faced by the United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS), has recommended that the Security Council renew the mission's mandate for another 12 months, until September 2006.

In his latest report to the Council on Sudan, Mr. Annan said the role of international partners and donors would never be more important than at the present time, given the challenges in the south and the wider need to address countrywide security sector reform and the resettling of returnees.

UNMIS has been engaged in active consultations on a status-of-forces agreement for the south, but despite earlier optimism and pledges of cooperation, consultations with a joint committee of the Government and the southern Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) have not yet led to an agreement.

While the discussions have addressed a number of important questions, those remaining to be resolved include the key issue of full and unrestricted freedom of movement for UNMIS, which is imperative for the fulfilment of its mandate and was previously agreed in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the Government and the SPLM/A, he said.

As of 5 September, 2,309 military personnel were deployed in the mission area, including 153 military staff officers, 145 military observers and 2,011 troops. The factors that have delayed deployment, however, include the rainy season and the inability of some contractors to meet their deadlines for the delivery of goods and services, including construction materials and the preparation of tented camps.

Meanwhile, the parties in Darfur region of western Sudan, especially the Sudanese Liberation Movement/Army (SLM/A) were to meet Government representatives for talks in Abuja, Nigeria, this week, but grave human rights violations have continued, along with threats to humanitarian operations and little progress at the political level.

"Divisions within the rebel movements, particularly SLM/A, are likely to be a challenge during the talks. I strongly urge SLM/A to resolve its internal differences and to attend the sixth round of talks prepared to negotiate and reach agreement on the relevant substantive issues," he added.

Meanwhile, the progress towards holding a face-to-face meeting between the Government in Khartoum and the rebels of the Eastern Front has been slow. UNMIS has been consulting with both parties, Mr. Annan said.

Darfur: UN Concerned About Recurrent Attacks in Darfur

From the Sudan Tribune

The UN has expressed concern about the recurrent attacks carried out by armed men and gangs in Darfur states, which target civilians and commercial vehicles hired by relief organizations.

During a news conference held at the headquarters of the official spokesperson of the special representative of the UN in Sudan, Radiah Achouri, she said the frequency of the attacks was growing.

Achouri spoke of a number of attacks which taken place in the past where civilians where killed in northern, southern and western Darfur.

She said that all conflicting parties in Darfur should be responsible so that security could be brought to all roads and passages where humanitarian goods and aid pass through.

Darfur: NMDR Demands Participation in Peace Talks

From PANA

The National Movement for Recovery and Development (NMRD), a splinter rebel group in Sudan’s western region of Darfur has called for the involvement of all warring groups in the African Union-mediated peace talks which resumed Thursday in Abuja, Nigeria.

MNRD is a splinter group from the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), which is taking part in the Abuja peace talks along with the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) and the Khartoum government.

"All the armed parties on the ground must be represented in Abuja and any exclusion is likely to call the negotiations into question," declared Hassan Khamis Djorou, MNRD co-ordinator.

"The Abuja talks are an ideal framework for the resolution of the conflict in Darfur but excluding us is an error that will heavily impact on the results," Djorou told a news conference in N’djamena, Chad.

First Things on "The Shame of Darfur"

Allen D. Hertzke has an excellent piece in the latest issue of First Things on Darfur. Here's an excerpt:

Given its special access to the White House and its grassroots muscle, the evangelical community remains uniquely situated to mobilize against what President Bush himself has described as “genocide in Darfur.” As one insider explained, “If evangelicals are not prioritizing it, then the administration will not prioritize it.” But the nation’s evangelicals should prioritize it. Even without sending American troops to the region, forceful and moral options remain. The administration can stop sending mixed messages, mount a determined effort to expand and empower African Union forces, add U.S. logistical support, secure more aid, and massively increase diplomatic and economic pressure.

And to make all this happen—to halt the rape and murder of Darfur—the vital element is action from the American religious community.

. . . .

The religious community must do its part by keeping the tragedy foremost on the political agenda, as it did for the southern war. Though the Bush Administration did not always follow the specific wishes of activists on southern Sudan, it placed a priority on peace because the issue had politically mobilized a critical mass of the American Christian community. A kind of stewardship obligation, especially for evangelicals, involves doing the same on Darfur. Fulfilling that obligation can transform a potential stain of neglect into another human-rights triumph for people of faith.

Read the entire piece.

Panel Passes Resolutions Calling Armenian Killings 'Genocide'

Not about Africa, but important nonetheless - from the AP

Over the strong objections of President George W. Bush's administration, a congressional panel Thursday endorsed two resolutions denouncing the deaths of Armenians early last century as genocide — a sensitive issue in relations with Turkey.

The House of Representatives' International Relations Committee voted 35-11 to approve a resolution calling on Turkey to acknowledge the culpability of its predecessor state, the Ottoman empire in the 1915-1923 killings.

A second resolution passed 40-7, calling for U.S. foreign policy to reflect an understanding of the Armenian genocide and for the president to recognize the deaths as genocide.

It is not clear if or when the resolutions will be brought before the full House of Representatives.

Armenians say that Ottoman Turks caused the deaths of 1.5 million in a planned genocide. Turkey said the toll is wildly inflated and Armenians were killed or displaced in civil unrest during the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. The Turks also fear that Armenia will use the genocide claims to make territorial demands against Turkey.

The State Department sent a letter to committee members saying the debate "could damage U.S.-Turkish relations and could undermine progress by Ankara and Yerevan as they begin quiet talks to address the issue and look to the future."

If you want to know more about the Armenian genocide, you should read "The Burning Tigris" by Peter Balakian.

UN Must Never Again Be Found Wanting on Genocide

Mark Turner is more optimistic about the "responsibility to protect" than I am and his views are worth reading

In coming years, as historians reflect upon what was achieved at this week’s United Nations summit in New York, one decision may stand out.

If all goes as planned, the world will vow on Friday “to take collective action, in a timely and decisive manner… should peaceful means be inadequate and national authorities manifestly fail to protect their populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity”.

This promise, part of a new doctrine called the responsibility to protect, reflects a profound shift in international law, whereby a growing sense of global responsibility for atrocities is increasingly encroaching upon the formerly sanctified concept of state sovereignty.

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That is not to say instant results are expected. Even the most ardent supporters of the responsibility to protect – an idea that emerged in the 90s – are under no illusions it will start saving lives immediately.

A study of recent atrocities, from Rwanda to the Balkans to Sudan, demonstrates how each situation was subject to the vagaries of great power relations.

In Darfur, for example, calls to intervene sooner were hampered by the west’s disarray following the Iraq war and its need for Khartoum’s co-operation against terrorism, as well Russian and Chinese commercial interests, not to mention African sensibilities.

In future, it is equally likely that the countries that could do something will continue to make decisions based on national interest and capacity.

Permanent members of the UN Security Council made it clear their national interests remained paramount. They strongly resisted demands by India that they suspend their veto over “responsibility to protect” decisions; and the US asserts that R2P, as it is sometimes known, amounts to moral pressure rather than legal obligation.

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Although the summit language fell short of the original scope of advocates who sought the right to apply the principle to a more general case of ‘widespread killing’. Simon Chesterman, an international legal expert at New York University, says its adoption was remarkable.

“It’s a lot more than I would have expected a couple of years back,” he said. “What’s really important is that previously [each] action [in response to atrocities] has been justified as unique, exceptional, one of a kind...What we’re seeing is a progressive redefinition of sovereignty in a way that would have been outrageous 60 years ago.”

Its success was due in no small part to the advocacy of Gareth Evans, a former Australian foreign minister who helped formulate the original idea, and more recently sold it to a high level UN panel on reform that shaped this week’s summit decisions.

Ed Cairns, a senior policy adviser for Oxfam, says its success now provides a powerful new tool for lobbyists. “I can remember the terrible times... in April and May 1994 (the Rwanda genocide)...banging on doors and just getting hand-wringing, semantics about whether it was genocide or not, when everybody knew what was happening,” he said.

“That would be more difficult now. But at the end of the day, will right to protect make a real difference when it comes to saving lives? The honest truth is none of us know,” said Mr Cairns. “It’ll be put to the test when the next crisis comes.

“It is at least possible that in 10 or 20 years we will look back on this week and think that while the summit as a whole was a bit of a damp squib, there was one thing that did come out of this. It’s more likely than not over the years it will save many lives.”

Genocide: Kagame Says Genocide Term Distracts, Stalls Action

From Reuters

Debate over whether a given conflict amounts to genocide distracts attention from peoples' suffering and stalls the international response to crises like Darfur, Rwandan President Paul Kagame said on Thursday.

Speaking to university students on the sidelines of a U.N. summit, Kagame said world leaders often seemed more fixated on what to call a conflict than on how to address it.

Diplomatic wrangling over whether ethnic violence in Rwanda in 1994 amounted to genocide kept the international community at bay while an estimated 800,000 people were slaughtered.

Kagame said similar debates had slowed response to conflict in the remote Darfur region of western Sudan.

"The issue again was, 'what is the name of what is happening?' in Darfur," he told the World Leaders Forum at Columbia University in New York.

"Call it what you want, but what is very obvious is that people on the ground are suffering."

"'Never again' really should be the concern of all of us, of everyone," he said.

Darfur: Rebel Split Clouds Talks

From the BBC

SLM officials told reporters that their arrival would be delayed because an internal meeting was scheduled for Sunday in Darfur to try to resolve their differences.

However, an spokesman for the African Union (AU) said representatives of "all the parties to the conflict" will arrive by Thursday and attend the opening session.

The BBC's Yusuf Sarki Mohamed in Abuja says he understands delegates from one SLM faction have arrived and the other is due shortly.

However, he says there is also another splinter group which sprang up last year which has not been invited.

They say they will not recognise anything agreed at the talks, our reporter says.

'Hotel Rwanda' Hero Urges Action

From the Grand Rapids Press

[Paul] Rusesabagina, who received robust standing ovations before and after his speech, told the crowds that the world still is failing the lesson they should have learned in Rwanda. Atrocities continue to happen in African nations, and the rest of the world continues to "close eyes, close ears and turn backs," he said.

Violence has displaced people in Darfur, the Congo, Uganda and Burmudi, leaving women and children poor, traumatized and without hope. Yet the horror hovers under the radar of the world's consciousness, he said.

That is why he has established the Hotel Rwanda Rusesabagina Foundation, a nonprofit organization that fights the horrors of genocide by providing education for orphans and medical and psychological care for women.

Twenty percent of the sales of his upcoming book, "An Ordinary Man," to be published by Viking Press in April, will go to the foundation.

Congo: Gov't Dismisses Claims of Army Desertion

From IRIN

Reports that troops are defecting in large numbers to join a dissident former general fermenting a rebellion in the northeast of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) were refuted by an army spokesman in Kinshasa as well as by a letter purportedly written by the ex-general, Laurent Nkunda.

A spokeswomen for the UN Mission in the DRC, MONUC, Jacqueline Chenard, said a letter arrived at the office in Goma, the provincial capital of North-Kivu that was signed by Nkunda which stated, "We don't plan to revive war in the country except in a situation of self defence."

Chenard said the letter, dated 8 September, was also addressed to government authorities in the province. However, she said MONUC could not confirm the authenticity of the letter whose total contents she would not reveal.

Sudan: Food Situation Remains Precarious in the South

From IRIN

The food-security situation in south Sudan - particularly Northern Bahr El Ghazal - remains fragile, as malnutrition rates during an already bad hunger season seem to be further deteriorating and the prospects for the next harvest look bleak, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) warned.

"Although we don't have the definite figures yet, anecdotal evidence suggests that the numbers [of children admitted to supplementary feeding centres] continued to grow in August," said Simon Crittle, WFP spokesman for southern Sudan, on Thursday.

"Ideally, numbers level off towards the end of the hunger season in August/September, but this year they seem to be going up," he added.

Statistics provided by NGOs working in Northern Bahr El Ghazal showed that during the month of July more than 8,500 children at feeding centres were malnourished, with 1,100 diagnosed as severely malnourished.

Niger: Cuts to Aid 'Risks Lives'

From the BBC

United Nations' plans to end general food aid distributions in Niger in a few weeks could be a disaster, warns medical NGO Medecins Sans Frontieres.
The UN's World Food Programme said that once the harvest begins next month, it will redirect food to concentrate on those most in need.

The UN argues this will allow high food prices, caused by shortages, to fall.

But MSF warns that with almost 1m people not yet fed, next month is too soon to end wide-scale distributions.

It says that this could put many mothers and children in particular at risk.

Uganda: Superstition and Hunger

From Reuters

Aid workers say more than half a million people are dependent on food aid and droughts are becoming more regular, now striking every other year. Eighteen percent of children under five years of age are malnourished.

The humanitarian workers say the crisis in Karamoja needs just as much global attention as better known disasters like the hunger and violence in Sudan's Darfur and the insurgency in northern Uganda by Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels.

"Karamoja's malnutrition and mortality indicators put it about where Darfur was on those terms a year ago," said Ken Davies, Uganda director for the World Food Programme (WFP).

"Darfur has since improved because of massive world attention. That is exactly the same attention Karamoja needs. We can't keep going to the international community every other year for drought relief funds."

Congo: Renewed Violence Pushes Civilians To Seek Refugee

Via MONUC

Around 800 families from Circa Boga and Tchabi, in the north-eastern Ituri region, in the Democtratic Republic of Congo, abandoned their homes due to renewed violence at the end of August, seeking refuge in Eringeti, in Beni, in the North Kivu province.

The news was referred this morning by Radio Okapi of the MONUC (United Nations Mission in the DR-Congo), quoting figures released by the local Red Cross. The civilians are for the most part women, children and elderly people that arrived in small groups fleeing some attacks carried out by unspecified "armed groups" east of Bunia, capital of Ituri.

The displaced are currently receiving humanitarian assistance by some organisations present in the region, but are in urgent need of food, medicine and clothing. According to African press sources, already in August a medical centre and Anglican parish were robbed in the Boga area by suspected militiamen of the MRC (Congolese Revolutionary Movement), a rebel group formed recently in nearby Uganda that claims to be combating in favour of the populations of Ituri and North Kivu.

Confo: Force Modeling Shift in Peacekeeping

From Forward

When the bulky white United Nations trucks rumble into this dusty, hardscrabble town on the border with Rwanda, cars, motorcycles and bicycles move aside. Passersby gently wave at the peacekeepers — Pakistani soldiers with U.N. blue helmets — on board.

It is a stark change from several months ago, when there were no Pakistanis and certainly no warm greetings for U.N. peacekeepers. Until recently, for the dirt-poor people of the war-plagued Kivu region and the Ituri province further north, peacekeepers were a vivid symbol of international futility: Not only did they fail to protect residents from military combatants, but they also were accused of sexually abusing local underage girls.

The U.N. mission in the Congo — the largest in the world — was in deep trouble. This is a potent illustration of the ills crippling the world body, which critics regularly paint as inefficient, weak kneed and corrupt. But then late last year, the U.N. Security Council agreed to bolster the mandate of the U.N. mission in the Congo and enforce strict guidelines to crack down on sex abusers. Three Pakistani brigades were dispatched to North and South Kivu and to Ituri under the orders of a new two-star Dutch general. The fresh troops, which number about 4,700 in North Kivu, started taking on and disarming militias and providing better protection to the civilian population, gradually earning the trust of the local Congolese — even though the situation remains volatile and U.N. troops are overstretched.

The change in Eastern Congo is part of a shift in recent years toward more robust and comprehensive U.N. peacekeeping. The development has been endorsed not only by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and key U.N. members, but also by the Bush administration, by leading Republicans and, most recently, by a bipartisan Congressional task force chaired by Republican stalwart Newt Gingrich and former Democratic senate leader George Mitchell.

Sudan: Where's the Peace Dividend?

From Reuters

A burst of torrential rains, which transforms dirt tracks into impassable swampy marshland, further isolates the clusters of small villages that constitute much of the south, a region half the size of western Europe.

The lack of infrastructure used to compel Garang to fly all over the south to inform the people personally of the peace deal, which gives southerners the right to vote on independence after a six-year transition period.

Akuem is still waiting for Garang's successor, Salva Kiir.

"The replacement should come and tell us what he knows. We don't know anything," said William Deng, 26, who mistakenly believes the right to secession will be determined by the president and vice-president of Sudan.

Under the January peace accord, southern Sudanese can hold a referendum on their future in six years. But as they battle disease, hunger and low levels of education, many here wonder if that will be long enough to allow the south to stand on its own.

"We are not free, we are still in a bad situation," said David Garang, who works as a driver for a medical charity, one of the few locals to earn a regular salary. Garang is a common name in southern Sudan.

"Some of us are still drinking from the river, there are no water pumps, no food. We don't have schools, we have no hospitals other than this one," he said.

Darfur: New Round of Peace Talks

From the AP

Sudan’s government and rebels from its western Darfur region were to gather in the Nigerian capital Thursday for a new round of peace talks aimed at ending a crisis that has displaced millions, the African Union said.

The rebels, though, are fighting among themselves, further undermining a difficult peace process. Five previous rounds of A.U.-brokered peace talks have been inconclusive and ceasefires have been repeatedly violated.

Darfur: Evil Then, Evil Now

An op-ed in the Boston Globe

Despite this admonition, all over the world we find the evil of racial hatred. Nowhere is this crisis greater than in the southwest region of the Sudan, called Darfur. For over two years, militias known as the Janjaweed, in collaboration with the government of Sudan, have been waging a campaign of murder, rape, starvation, and displacement against African tribal farmers.

More than 2 million people have been forced to leave their homes and more than 300,000 people have been killed. The displaced people live, surrounded by danger, in refugee camps where many do not have enough food, water, or medical care to survive. The United States called this genocide but neither our government nor the United Nations has taken enough action to protect the people of Darfur.

Speaking of the crisis in Sudan, Wiesel has said, ''How can a citizen of a free country not pay attention? How can anyone, anywhere not feel outraged? How can a person, whether religious or secular, not be moved by compassion? And above all, how can anyone who remembers remain silent?

''It happened in Cambodia, then in former Yugoslavia, and in Rwanda, now in Sudan. Asia, Europe, Africa: Three continents have become prisons, killing fields, and cemeteries for countless innocent, defenseless populations. Will the plague be allowed to spread?"

How do we commemorate the 10th anniversary of our Holocaust memorial? We bring people of all cultures together at the memorial this Sunday for a ceremony of rededication. Together we remember the story of Europe's vibrant Jewish life and culture. And we ask all people to honor the memory of 6 million Jews by raising their voices loudly to demand attention to the men and the women and the children of Darfur whose precious lives are in great danger.

If we do not raise our voices, this genocide will continue. We must demand that our government, other nations, and the United Nations take whatever action is necessary to end the abuse and murder of the people of Darfur.

What is the meaning of the New England Holocaust Memorial? It is to remind us that what happened to the Jews of Europe 60 years ago must not happen in the Sudan today. Never again.

Sudan: Khartoum Says West is Ignoring New Crisis in East

Try and wrap your head around this

Sudan’s foreign minister said Wednesday that the West is ignoring a new crisis in the eastern part of the country, and that he expects no action until it becomes a full-blown conflict with people dying and refugees fleeing.

In an exclusive interview with The Associated Press, Minister Mustafa Osman Ismail also charged European Union sanctions were one of the catalysts that caused the crisis in Darfur, where at least 180,000 people have died in the conflict and ensuing chaos - many from hunger and disease. An estimated 2.74 million survivors are affected, more than 60% of them women and children, according to the U.N. Children’s Fund.

Speaking on the periphery of the U.N. World Summit, Ismail also complained that the U.S. is slow in acting on promises to lift sweeping economic sanctions and in coming forth with aid.

"They promised once we signed the peace agreement (to end the war in southern Sudan), that sanctions would be lifted and aid would come, and we signed it," Ismail said. "Now they say the situation in Darfur has to be resolved (first)."

Darfur: NMRD Abandons Ceasefire

From Reuters

A Darfur rebel group excluded from upcoming peace talks in Nigeria said on Wednesday it had abandoned a ceasefire agreed with Khartoum and would resume operations in the western Sudanese region.

The National Movement for Reform and Development (NMRD) signed a ceasefire with Khartoum in December last year and agreed to a security deal in April.

The group split last year from one of the two main Darfur rebel groups, which are due to start talks with the Sudanese government in Abuja on Thursday.

"The ceasefire is over," NMRD Political Secretary Khalil Abdallah told Reuters by telephone from Darfur.

"We will resume our operations on the ground because we are not a part of the negotiations," he said, adding that the government had failed to implement the ceasefire signed with the group.

"We are representative of the people of Darfur. Without us, there is no serious chance for peace," he said.

A Meaningless Pledge

Some are hailing the inclusion of language regarding a "responsibility to protect" in the draft declaration on UN reform to be discussed during the three-day summit being held in New York.

The "Responsibility to Protect" is, according to the seminal report on the topic

[T]he idea that sovereign states have a responsibility to protect their own citizens from avoidable catastrophe, but that when they are unwilling or unable to do so, that responsibility must be borne by the broader community of states.

The report, and the idea, were generated by the international community's ignominious failure to intervene in situations such as the 1994 Rwandan genocide. The thinking was that it was necessary to shift the debate away from a "right to intervene," which carries serious implications for the cherished idea of national sovereignty, and toward a "responsibility to protect" those people in danger.

After much debate, compromise and rewriting, the final text included in the draft declaration came out looking like this

The international community, through the United Nations, also has the responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other peaceful means, in accordance with Chapter VI and VIII of the Charter, to help protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. In this context, we are prepared to take collective action, in a timely and decisive manner, through the Security Council, in accordance with the UN Charter, including Chapter VII, on a case by case basis and in cooperation with relevant regional organizations as appropriate, should peaceful means be inadequate and national authorities manifestly failing to protect their populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. We stress the need for the General Assembly to continue consideration of the responsibility to protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity and its implications, bearing in mind the principles of the Charter of the United Nations and international law. We also intend to commit ourselves, as necessary and appropriate, to help states build capacity to protect their populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity and to assist those which are under stress before crises and conflicts break out.

Nowhere has the Security Council or the UN member states actually pledged to do anything. This section carries no legal obligations; rather, it merely reiterates that the UN has a responsibility "to help protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity," which is something they already an obligation to prevent under the Genocide Convention.

Note also that it doesn't say that the UN has a "responsibility to protect" but rather a "responsibility ... to help protect" those at risk. That is a big difference.

As such, it is a little difficult to share Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin's excitement

But a Canadian-inspired initiative highlighting the world's responsibility to protect threatened people and prevent genocides is a clear move forward, Martin said.

The doctrine "essentially says that if Rwanda occurred today that the United Nations would act," he said, referring to the genocide that took an estimated 800,000 lives in the African country in the mid-1990s.

Considering that there is "another Rwanda" currently taking place in Darfur, why are we to expect that suddenly the UN is going to take seriously its "responsibility to protect"? Has the UN failed to act thus far solely because it lacked this one resolution? The UN has resisted acting on Darfur for two years and there is absolutely no reason to believe that this recognition of a theoretical "responsibility to protect" will have any impact on the legal or political concerns that have thus far prevented action.

If the UN and its members truly believed in the "responsibility to protect," they would be protecting the people of Darfur, not writing resolutions vaguely promising to act when Darfur-like situations arise in the future.

Congo: Deal with the FDLR Threat Now

From the International Crisis Group

The world must address once and for all the grave security threats posed by the Forces Démocratiques de la Libération du Rwanda (FDLR) in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo.

On 16 September, leaders from Congo and Rwanda, as well as the African Union, the EU, the UN and the U.S., will meet in New York to discuss issues of regional cooperation in Central Africa. They must focus their attention on the FDLR, the insurgent force which includes remnants of the perpetrators of Rwanda's 1994 genocide and today terrorises the civilian population in eastern Congo, undermines the process of transition there, creates concern in Kigali, and hinders chances of development throughout the region.

In letters to regional and international leaders (full text below), Crisis Group President Gareth Evans urges they use this important meeting to agree on a dual track approach to the FDLR, offering members -- apart from those clearly guilty of the most serious crimes -- real incentives for repatriation to Rwanda while simultaneously threatening military action against those that refuse.

"While peaceful efforts to bring about the disarmament and repatriation of the FDLR are crucial, the time has come to increase the military pressure against them", says Evans. "The FDLR members must understand that if they refuse to disarm and go home to Rwanda, they will face military action".

As the Congo enters its third year of the transition, the process remains fragile, and the Congolese people continue to pay a heavy price. An estimated 1000 men, women, and children are still dying each day from the consequences of the turmoil. Only with strong international engagement can the transition to peace and stability be achieved.

"Bold action is needed to address this threat and, above all, to protect the civilian population", says Evans.

Darfur: SLM to Skip Talks

From AFP

The main rebel group in western Sudan's war-torn Darfur region has said it will not attend key peace talks with the Khartoum government due to open in Nigeria on Thursday.

"Our position remains the same: We will not attend political negotiations on Thursday with the Sudanese government until we hold our general conference on September 25-27," said a statement from the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) on Wednesday.

The group said it would still send a high-level delegation to the Nigerian capital Abuja "to inform the African Union and international mediators of our decision".

Sudan/Uganda: LRA Attacks Inside Sudan

From the BBC

Ugandan rebels have crossed the White Nile river for the first time and attacked an area on a major road near the capital of southern Sudan, Juba.

More than 40 Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) fighters burnt houses on the Yei to Juba highway in broad daylight.

Since riots following the death of south Sudan's leader John Garang, this road has been Juba's main supply route.

The BBC's Alfred Taban says authorities were surprised by Tuesday's attack and there is great tension in Juba.

The LRA insurgency in northern Uganda has been marked by the massacre of civilians and the abduction of tens of thousands of children.

Darfur: Delegates Set for Last Peace Push

From AFP

Sudanese government and rebel delegates are expected in the Nigerian capital Abuja on Thursday for what African leaders hope will be a final round of peace talks that will bring an end to slaughter and starvation in the war-torn Darfur region.

Previous sessions of the African Union-sponsored conference have made limited progress, with both sides accusing the other of breaking ceasefire promises, and preparations for this new round have been marred by threats from one rebel group to pull out.

But African Union (AU) officials are publicly confident that delegates will indeed make their way back to the negotiating table and that an agreement on power-sharing and the demobilisation of warring militias can finally be worked out, 30 months after fighting broke out.

Aid Workers Lament Rise of 'Development Pornography'

To me, these concerns seem utterly ridiculous, but what do I know?

Starving black babies pleading silently for help.

Twenty years ago, such images thrust Ethiopia’s deadly famine into the global spotlight, helping to raise billions of dollars in aid. But the pictures also sparked soul-searching among aid agencies who felt they reinforced debasing stereotypes of Africa and robbed the subjects of their dignity.

That soul-searching led to the development of voluntary standards on the use of images in charity fundraising and appeals, but now some experts say fierce competition for donations in a ballooning NGO sector has led to an alarming resurgence in shock tactics that critics call “development pornography”.

“It’s got worse in the last 10 years,” said Nikki van der Gaag, a freelance writer and editor. “There’s a whole new generation of people working in NGOs who’ve never had this debate before.”

Critics say Western newspapers have been full of undignified images of women and children alongside articles and appeals related to Niger’s 2005 food crisis.

Congo: Forgotten War Rumbles On

Passion of the Present links to this Reuters piece

Outside the charred remains of a village, just off a dusty track, a skull has been skewered onto the end of a stick in the ground.

Adorned with a white bandana and a slice of pawpaw, it strikes an absurd note. But the display has a deadly serious significance in a remote corner of Congo where a forgotten war is rumbling.

Mukana is one of a string of villages in the north and centre of the southern Katanga province to have been attacked by the Mai Mai -- local militiamen who were armed by the government to fight Rwandan-backed rebels during Congo's five-year war.

"The villagers fled when the Mai Mai attacked," a local resident said. "But when they came back, they found one in the village, chopped his head off and put it on the stick to scare the others away."

Since Congo's war officially ended two years ago, the Mai Mai in Katanga have been left to their own devices and are attacking civilians across the province.

The militiamen, many of whom believe they become invincible when they are blessed with water and special herbs, have looted villages, torched thousands of homes and destroyed crops.

The government is busy wooing mining investors in the copper and cobalt-rich south of Katanga, while its presence in the dusty, barren north is limited to ageing civil servants and soldiers who often harass rather than protect civilians.

Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), the only aid agency in the area, is looking after 15,000 displaced persons but countless more remain hiding in the bush.

Humanitarian workers complain that unlike other parts of Democratic Republic of Congo where the United Nations and numerous aid agencies are trying to end violence and help those displaced, the crisis in Katanga seems largely forgotten.

"It's not very sexy -- it's not as attractive as a region where you have a lot of foreign troops and blue helmets (U.N. peacekeeping soldiers)," Rony Brauman, director of research at the MSF Foundation, told Reuters.

Darfur: Genocide, One Year On

A Washington Post editorial

ONE YEAR AGO, then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell declared that the violence in the Darfur region of Sudan justified the term "genocide." That was the first time since the adoption of the U.N. Genocide Convention in 1948 that a government had accused a sitting counterpart of this worst of all humanitarian crimes, and Mr. Powell chose his words carefully. His language was based on a survey of Darfurian refugees commissioned by the State Department: Of 1,136 civilians interviewed, a third had heard racial epithets while being attacked, suggesting that the mass killings and evictions in Darfur constituted genocide. The survey also found that three in four refugees had seen government insignia on the uniforms of their attackers, leaving no doubt as to the guilt of Sudan's government.

Since that finding, the United States has led an international effort to end the genocide. The effort has not been as quick or decisive as the genocide finding warranted: The Bush administration's attempt to pressure Sudan's government with U.N. sanctions was feckless, and it made no effort to deploy a robust NATO peacekeeping force. But, little by little, American diplomacy has made headway. For now, the horror has abated.

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But the progress is incomplete and reversible. Fully 3.2 million people have been affected by the war, half of Darfur's population. Many of these subsist in crowded camps for displaced people, where they depend on Western charity. Although humanitarian access has improved since last year, it remains imperfect. In the Kalma camp, which is home to something like 160,000 displaced people, the government has refused to extend a Norwegian group's authority to coordinate the distribution of relief supplies and has imposed an economic blockade. Meanwhile low-level violence continues. Although the government has authorized the deployment of 7,700 A.U. troops, only 5,800 are in place so far -- a failure both of the African governments that had promised troops and of the Western governments that promised to support them logistically.

The progress over the past year demonstrates that the United States and its allies do have the power to save lives by the tens of thousands. It also suggests that, if the Bush administration had pushed harder and earlier, it could have saved many more people. This lesson must be remembered over the coming weeks and months. Outsiders need to persist in their efforts to broker peace negotiations between Sudan's government and Darfur's rebels; they must complete the deployment of the African Union force and continue to pressure the government for humanitarian access. The past year demonstrates that, if the United States and its allies pursue these goals with determination, they can get what they want. But if they lose interest in Darfur, violence may resume and humanitarian access may dry up. With so much of the population already displaced and weakened, Darfur's death rate could easily return to the horrific levels of a year ago.

Darfur: WFP Weekly Situation Report

From the World Food Programme

Security levels deteriorated in Darfur during the reporting week. Rampant fighting and attacks on trucks are raising serious concerns on the safety of humanitarian staff in Darfur.

South Darfur: Repeated attacks on trucks in Menawashi were reported during the week. On 8 September, nine WFP trucks were attacked in Menawashi while transporting food from El Fasher to Nyala. Armed men forced the trucks off the road into the bushes where an estimated 50 armed men were hiding. The drivers were ordered to remove the tarpaulins from the trucks and load them, together with other personal belongings, onto camels, before being released. This report follows two previous incidents of armed banditry against commercial trucks in the same location on 5 September during which one passenger was killed and a driver seriously wounded. There was another attack on two commercial trucks transporting WFP food on 10 September. Approximately eight bags of food together with the tarpaulins of the trucks and personal belongings of the drivers were stolen.

The sequence of events in Menawashi, as well as targeted insecurity in Ishma, Um Zeifa and Labado areas, prompted the UN Department of Safety and Security (UNDSS) to meet with the National Security. Meetings were also held with "Janjaweed" leaders in Menawashi as well as Khor Abeche, Neitega, Mershing and Al Malam to address the issue of repeated attacks on UN agencies and relief supplies in these areas. In the meantime, UNDSS has declared the road between Menawashi and El Fasher in North Darfur closed to UN movement, pending security assessments.

Meanwhile, continued attacks and looting in Ishma, Labado and Muhajariya has led to one contracted transporter's withdrawal of trucks from operating in these areas.

Clashes between rebel groups were reported in Kunja, approximately 120 km northwest of Nyala. UNICEF and Samaritan Purse relocated their staff from nearby Feina.

West Darfur: Following escalating insecurity in West Darfur, particularly the increasing trend of attacks against humanitarian workers, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator (HC) visited Geneina on 5 September. The HC met with GoS authorities, UN agencies and the African Union (AU) to discuss the deteriorating security situation in West Darfur.

Fears of potential clashes near Jebel Moon between nomads and a Chadian rebel group have raised security concerns. It was reported that the rebel group attacked nomads in an area southeast of Sileah, killing several people and looting a large amount of livestock. The UNDSS reported that the nomads are mobilizing to retaliate. The rebel group has been observed to be spreading across central West Darfur near Masteri, Beida, Goker, Mornie and Sanidadi.

All roads between Geneina, Habilah, Mornie and Masteri continue to be declared unsafe for movement without AU and/or GoS security escorts. In addition, a portion of the road between Sisi and Mornie and areas close to Jebel Moon between Sileah and Aru Sharow have also been declared unsafe to free UN movement due to insecurity.

North Darfur: On 9 September, fighting broke out in the Tawila market, killing three people and wounding 19 others. International NGOs, Relief International, Save the Children Sweden and Oxfam, evacuated their staff to El Fasher town and some IDPs were reported to have fled the camp. UNDSS is closely monitoring the situation. ICRC has made a request through OCHA to the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) to deploy an emergency surgical team into Tawila following reports of some 30 people who are in need of urgent medical attention. The GoS has reported that the situation is now under control and that agencies can return to the area.

Darfur Risks Descending Into Anarchy

From IRIN

Darfur risks sliding into a perpetual state of lawlessness even as the Sudanese government and the main rebel groups in the war-torn region discuss the possibility of peacefully resolving the conflict there, observers have warned.

Banditry and continuous attacks by armed groups on humanitarian workers, Arab nomads and villages in Darfur have increased significantly over the past weeks and threaten to destabilise the fragile ceasefire in the volatile western Sudanese region.

"The month of September, so far, has not been a good month. There has been quite an increase in both the number and the scale of attacks," Radhia Achouri, spokeswoman for the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS), said on Tuesday.

"Overall, there have been at least 10 serious attacks on humanitarian workers in the past 30 days - for the purpose of looting - particularly in West Darfur," Achouri added. "The situation in South Darfur is not better."

"These type of occurrences are happening all the time and all over," Ambassador Baba Gana Kingibe, head of the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), said on 6 September, expressing his worry about the widespread nature and frequency of recent attacks.

UN Reform: Final Language on the Responsibility to Protect

From the final draft outcome document that will be submitted tomorrow

Responsibility to protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity

138. Each individual State has the responsibility to protect its populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. This responsibility entails the prevention of such crimes, including their incitement, through appropriate and necessary means. We accept that responsibility and will act in accordance with it. The international community should, as appropriate, encourage and help States to exercise this responsibility and should support the United Nations to establish an early warning capability.

139. The international community, through the United Nations, also has the responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other peaceful means, in accordance with Chapter VI and VIII of the Charter, to help protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. In this context, we are prepared to take collective action, in a timely and decisive manner, through the Security Council, in accordance with the UN Charter, including Chapter VII, on a case by case basis and in cooperation with relevant regional organizations as appropriate, should peaceful means be inadequate and national authorities manifestly failing to protect their populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. We stress the need for the General Assembly to continue consideration of the responsibility to protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity and its implications, bearing in mind the principles of the Charter of the United Nations and international law. We also intend to commit ourselves, as necessary and appropriate, to help states build capacity to protect their populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity and to assist those which are under stress before crises and
conflicts break out.

140. We fully support the mission of the UN Special Advisor for the Prevention of Genocide.

If this sounds rather vague and meaningless to you, that is because it is. I'll have more to say about this in a future post.

Kenya: Appeal for $32.5 Million to Feed the Vulnerable

From Reuters

Kenya appealed for $32.5 million from donors on Tuesday to feed more than a million people left starving by drought.

Kenya has experienced consecutive seasons of poor rains in the last few years and last year President Mwai Kibaki declared the drought situation a national disaster and appealed for food donations from the international community.

Njenga Karume, Kenya's minister in charge of special programmes, said that although the food security situation had improved in some areas since Kibaki raised the alarm, in drier parts it had not changed.

"An estimated 1.2 million people, including 200,000 school children in 17 (arid and semi-arid) districts remain extremely vulnerable. They cannot meet their basic needs and continue to require external assistance," Karume said.

Africa's Peace Seekers

The Christian Science Monitor is running a series entitled "Africa's Peace Seekers" that profiles three individuals and their attempts to end various African Conflicts:

Lazaro Sumbeiywo in Sudan

Betty Bigombe in Uganda

Petronille Vaweka in the Democratic Republic of Congo

UN Reform: Genocide Survivors Urge World Leaders to Protect Civilians From Massacres

From the AP (here is the Oxfam press release, courtesy of Passion of the Present)

Pregnant and with three small children in tow, Grace Mukagabiro ran for her life after her husband was beheaded and their house burned down.

On Tuesday, the Rwandan survivor of the attack on her Tutsi village joined former Irish President Mary Robinson and other activists begging the United Nations summit of more than 160 world leaders to endorse a U.N. measure that would protect civilians from mass killings.

"I survived the Rwandan genocide. Almost a million others did not," the 42-year-old mother of four said, a decade after the massacres led by the Hutu government. She still lives in Kigali, Rwanda, working as program coordinator for the global aid agency Oxfam.

Mukagabiro spoke at an Oxfam-sponsored news conference in the Church Center opposite the United Nations headquarters, where the summit was to begin Wednesday.

Then the group walked several blocks to Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, where a mock graveyard was erected, with 100 white tombstones that read, "NEVER AGAIN?"

U.N. member nations are trying to reach consensus on a document enabling the world body to tackle major issues of the 21st century. It would reaffirm nations' obligation to protect their people from genocide _ a crime under the U.N. convention first adopted in 1948.

But the document has been significantly watered down from earlier drafts, which might have given the international community the firm responsibility to protect victims by overriding the sovereignty of local governments and taking direct action.

"That would mean nations wouldn't have to ask the question again, as they did in Sudan, 'Is this genocide?"' said Robinson, a lawyer and former U.N. high commissioner for human rights who chairs the Council of Women World Leaders, a Washington-based nonprofit.