Global Policy Forum

World Pressure Doing Little to Halt Killings, Experts Say

By Laurie Goering

International pressure remains insufficient to halt the death and displacement of black Africans in the Darfur region of Sudan, despite growing evidence that the government continues to back the Arab militias it has promised to disarm, African political analysts and human-rights experts charged Tuesday.

High-level visits to the troubled region this month by Secretary of State Colin Powell and by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and the release of new documents implicating Khartoum in what the United Nations calls "ethnic cleansing" have failed to stem the crisis in Sudan's rebellious west, said John Prendergast, a special adviser on Africa to the Washington-based International Crisis Group. "The net impact of all the visits and all the pressure has been minimal. Right now the level of pressure that is being applied to the government of Sudan is insufficient to change its calculations about how to deal with Darfur," Prendergast said.

A decade after more than 800,000 died in Rwanda's genocide, international bodies that swore such carnage would never happen again are finding their promises tough to keep.

The UN Security Council is split on passing a resolution condemning the estimated 10,000 to 30,000 deaths in Darfur and creating sanctions against government officials accused of involvement. Some members want to give Sudan's government more time to follow through on promises to act against the Janjaweed militias; others believe sanctions against the militias, which have carried out a campaign of rape, murder and forced

displacement, are sufficient. International pressure remains insufficient to halt the death and displacement of black Africans in the Darfur region of Sudan, despite growing evidence that the government continues to back the Arab militias it has promised to disarm, African political analysts and human-rights experts charged Tuesday.

High-level visits to the troubled region this month by Secretary of State Colin Powell and by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and the release of new documents implicating Khartoum in what the United Nations calls "ethnic cleansing" have failed to stem the crisis in Sudan's rebellious west, said John Prendergast, a special adviser on Africa to the Washington-based International Crisis Group. "The net impact of all the visits and all the pressure has been minimal. Right now the level of pressure that is being applied to the government of Sudan is insufficient to change its calculations about how to deal with Darfur," Prendergast said.

A decade after more than 800,000 died in Rwanda's genocide, international bodies that swore such carnage would never happen again are finding their promises tough to keep.

The UN Security Council is split on passing a resolution condemning the estimated 10,000 to 30,000 deaths in Darfur and creating sanctions against government officials accused of involvement. Some members want to give Sudan's government more time to follow through on promises to act against the Janjaweed militias; others believe sanctions against the militias, which have carried out a campaign of rape, murder and forced displacement, are sufficient.

Cease-fire Monitors Offered

The African Union, which has promised greater self-policing on the continent, has offered to send 60 cease-fire monitors to Darfur. The union also is considering deploying 200 to 300 troops to the region but only to protect the monitors.

While the U.S. has responded relatively quickly to what the UN has called the world's worst humanitarian crisis, aid from other nations has been slow to reach the conflict-torn region. Only about 30 percent of the needed relief infrastructure is now in place, workers say. Refugees from Darfur, meanwhile, continue to stream into neighboring Chad. About 175,000 have crossed the border, according to human-rights organizations, and about 1.2 million are displaced in Sudan.

While more people died in Rwanda than in Darfur so far, the Sudan crisis "is perhaps more indefensible because of the amount of time that has gone by without a response," Prendergast said. "In Rwanda we had 90 days to respond, and it was a country most people couldn't find on a map. In Sudan we've had 16 months to respond, and it's a country that has been the focus of very intense U.S. concern the last three years."

The crisis in Darfur, analysts say, is part of a 15-year effort by the government in Khartoum to put down potential political challenges and get rid of rebels demanding greater regional autonomy and power sharing.

Sudan's government has denied involvement in the attacks, calling the burning of villages, the killings and the rapes the work of renegade militias. Khartoum has promised to step up policing of the region and begin disarming the militias. A Sudanese court Monday sentenced 10 Janjaweed fighters to 6 years in prison and to the amputation of one leg and one arm.

But documents released Monday by Human Rights Watch suggest that while the government has publicly called for peace, it has quietly continued recruiting and arming militiamen and other "loyalists." The Arabic-language documents, obtained by the international rights group, include a government order in February calling for "security units" in Darfur to tolerate the activities of the militiamen and a plan for Arab resettlement of areas where black farmers were driven out.

Sudan experts say Janjaweed militiamen also are being incorporated into new police and military units in Darfur, which means "we have them providing protection for the same civilians they just displaced and committed atrocities against," said Georgette Gagnon, deputy director for the Africa division of Human Rights Watch.

"The Khartoum government is trying to have it both ways, maintaining a facade of cooperation with the international community but in fact doing relatively little to rein in the ongoing atrocities in Darfur," said Kenneth Roth, executive director of the human-rights group.

Campaign of Rape Alleged

Amnesty International, in a report released this week, also charges Arab militiamen with carrying out an organized campaign of rape against women and girls as young as 8 in an effort to create social stigma in the Muslim communities and drive Darfur residents from their homes. Victims and witnesses said some women's legs were broken to prevent their escape from attackers.

What may be needed to change minds in Khartoum and end the violence, analysts say, is stepped-up international pressure, starting with targeted sanctions not only against implicated Sudanese officials but also against the companies they own, most of which do business overseas. If the UN fails to pass such measures, the United States could do so on its own, Prendergast said.

If sanctions don't work, the threat of an embargo on Sudanese oil sales might bring change, analysts say. A third measure would involve creating a commission of inquiry on war crimes charges in Sudan and laying the groundwork for prosecution of regime officials. "That would wake the government up and make them feel there is a cost to their actions," Prendergast said. "At this point there is no cost. There are a lot of speeches and threatening noises, but the government has seen there's no action."

As efforts to pass an effective UN Security Council resolution face hurdles, simply getting more international observers and aid workers in Darfur would be helpful, Gagnon said. But action must come quickly, she said. Already, villages forcibly emptied of black residents are being resettled by Arabs.

"That's an indication of the consolidation of ethnic cleansing," she said. "The longer the Security Council doesn't act, the more likely it is the ethnic cleansing will not be reversed."

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