Genocide continues to rage in Darfur

Posted on Thu, Jan. 12, 2006

Today -- International Genocide Prevention Day -- marks the 55th anniversary of the ratification of the U.N. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

What has the world learned? Did the Holocaust and the genocide in Rwanda teach us nothing?

Now we face a similar situation in Sudan. Government-backed militias, known as the janjaweed, have killed more than 400,000 people in the Darfur region, according to recent reports by the U.N.- and U.S.-based humanitarian organizations working there. At least 4 million people are hungry or starving, and another 1.2 million, including 400,000 to 500,000 children, have become refugees.

The U.S. government must take the lead to: end the violence; provide humanitarian assistance for those in need; create conditions that will allow those displaced to return home; and hold the perpetrators of the atrocities accountable.

President Bush and Congress have recognized the problem and labeled it ''genocide.'' However, there has been little action. An allocation of $50 million to the African Union peacekeepers was stripped from the budget.

Perhaps NATO should get involved; the U.N. seems paralyzed because of conflicting interests among Security Council members. Meanwhile, time goes on, and more people die.

Genocides don't just happen. They are allowed to happen when the world stands idly by.

CAROLYN SHAPIR, community relations chair, United Jewish Community of Broward County, Fort Lauderdale



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