Who will stop Darfur killings?

SWEET LAND OF LIBERTY NAT HENTOFF NEWSPAPER ENTERPRISE ASSOCIATION

In the closing days of last year, President Bush sent a message to Sudan’s commander in chief, Gen. Omar Hassan al-Bashir, that if he did not accept the United Nations plan to end the genocide in Darfur by Jan. 1, there would be consequences. Bush’s special envoy to Sudan, Andrew Natsios, said that if al-Bashir continued to stonewall, the Bush administration would implement “Plan B.” However, “Plan B” is classified, so we don’t know the details.
U.N. Security Council Resolution 1706 called for a U.N. force of 20,000 to supplement the African Union’s brave but inadequate force of 7,000 in Darfur. By Jan. 1, al-Bashir had not accepted the plan or Bush’s ultimatum. On Jan. 9, The Associated Press reported: “The U.N., the AU and international aid groups say Khartoum (Sudan’s government) is massively arming the Janjaweed (Gen. al-Bashir’s killers and rapists), and the paramilitary has recently carried out several deadly raids against civilians with the regular army’s support.”

YOUR MONEY OR YOUR CHILD

Every world leader knows of the massive crimes committed by the Janjaweed in Darfur and now in neighboring Chad. Before he left Sudan recently, Jan Egeland, U.N. coordinator for humanitarian affairs, told National Public Radio (Dec. 1), “I saw a mother who sat with her child at a hospital. There was a bullet wound through the child’s neck. An armed Janjaweed militiaman said, ‘I will shoot your child unless you give me money.’ They had no money, so he shot the child.” Read more >>>