Sudanese president charged with genocide - CNN.com

Sudanese president charged with genocide - CNN.com:

"(CNN) -- The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has filed genocide charges against Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir for a five-year campaign of violence in Darfur.
About 1,000 Sudanese rallied in Khartoum Sunday against the possible charges.

They include masterminding attempts to wipe out African tribes in the war-torn region with a campaign of murder, rape and deportation.

ICC Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo presented his evidence against al-Bashir to the judges at the Hague in the Netherlands on Monday. ..."

The International Criminal Court is not under the authority of the United Nations, but they do accept referrals, as in this case. This is a hopeful sign that the international community is taking the Darfur situation seriously enough, but the ICC apparently lacks the authority to execute an arrest warrant (once one is actually issued), relying on the accused's country of residence to handle arrest and extradition.

So unless the UN decides to do what it was designed to do, and impose an end to the genocide in Sudan, this action may have little more than a symbolic effect.

PC(USA) - Presbyterian News Service - Bare essentials

PC(USA) - Presbyterian News Service - Bare essentials:

"RUMBEK, Sudan — Sudan appears to be a country in waiting.

Waiting for a crucial census that will clarify for the first time since 1993 the population figures in the north and the semi-autonomous south Sudan.

Waiting for elections in 2009.

Waiting for a critical referendum in 2011 that will allow the people of the 10 states of South Sudan to vote on the question of self-determination from the Khartoum-based north.

But, after a 21-year civil war that crippled much of the nation’s infrastructure, and an increasingly shaky peace agreement signed in 2005, Sudanese people, especially those in the south, are also waiting for more basic, essential things: water, healthcare, roads, schools."

It has been a while since I blogged about the problems in Sudan, but this Presbyterian News Service article snapped me out of my lethargy.

People who are in Sudan, or have closer knowledge of the region than I, are saying that the people are slowly shifting from a culture of violence to one of peace. But without education their development will be slow -- there is a very low literacy rate due to the inability of schools and other necessary services to operate. Many of the trades and skills have been seriously diminished by the lack of schools, not to mention the significant death toll of the past 20 years.

The US Embassy in Khartoum has an informational page on the situation in Darfur, and mentions the Darfur Peace Agreement of May 2006, which seems to clear the way for increased humanitarian aid. Wikipedia also has an article on the peace agreement, but it appears to be a verbatim copy of the US State Department information that I linked in the previous sentence.

The question is who and how. The United Nations has not had a stellar record in Sudan, but they can rectify that with effective peacekeeping and aid programs. Christian groups might be able to help, but considering the fact that Sudan is predominantly Muslim, such groups need to be particularly sensitive.

Sudan is still waiting.

Khartoum Expels U.N. Envoy Who Has Been Outspoken on Darfur Atrocities - New York Times

Khartoum Expels U.N. Envoy Who Has Been Outspoken on Darfur Atrocities - New York Times:

UNITED NATIONS, Oct. 22 — Sudan’s government on Sunday ordered the chief United Nations envoy to leave, saying he was an enemy of the country and its armed forces.

Jan Pronk, the United Nations envoy to Sudan, has been asked to leave the country by Wednesday. He is returning to New York immediately.

Secretary General Kofi Annan said that he was reviewing the letter from the Khartoum government and had asked the envoy, Jan Pronk, to return to New York for “consultations.”

The Sudanese order said Mr. Pronk had to leave by Wednesday. United Nations officials confirmed he would depart before then and said he would need the permission of the Sudanese government to return.

Mr. Pronk, a blunt-spoken former Dutch cabinet minister, has been outspoken in reporting on the killings, rapes and other atrocities in Darfur, the region in the western part of the country where at least 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million have been driven from their homes.

This is a chilling turn of events in the Sudan. I wish I could see a clear way to seeing this situation resolve, but I expect it will get a lot worse before it starts getting better.

Technorati tags: sudan, darfur

Groups Plan Rally on Mall To Protest Darfur Violence

Groups Plan Rally on Mall To Protest Darfur Violence:

"An unusually broad coalition of 164 humanitarian and religious groups, including Amnesty International and the National Association of Evangelicals, is planning a huge rally Sunday on the Mall to call for intervention to end the violence in Sudan's Darfur region...."

The problems in Darfur cry out for action, and it seems that the UN and its member nations need some nudging to get them off their collective backsides and doing something effective.

When such disparate groups set aside their historic mistrust of each other and unite around a common purpose, things may begin to happen.

The people of Darfur really can't wait.

Technorati tags: religion, darfur, peacekeepers

Now or never in Darfur

Eric Reeves, an english professor at Smith College, has written a provocative article in The New Republic Online (registration required):

Now or never in Darfur:

"What will happen after humanitarian organizations leave Darfur? The question grows more relevant daily. For much of 2004, humanitarian groups ramped up their operations in Darfur. These efforts temporarily blocked the genocidal aims of the Sudanese government from coming to full fruition. Throughout 2003 and 2004, government-backed militias terrorized Darfur's African tribal populations, evicting them from their villages and cutting them off from their livelihoods. Many ended up in refugee camps, where only the efforts of humanitarian groups have allowed them to stay alive. Sudan's leaders would like nothing more than to see these groups leave the country, so that disease and malnutrition can finish the work the militias started three years ago...."

With all the crises that develop worldwide, it is easy to get overwhelmed by it all. Apathy has killed people in every time and every place. How many Jews might have been spared had the Allies not ignored or scoffed at news filtering out of the Third Reich during the 1930s? How much suffering could have been alleviated in the former Yugoslavia had the world been willing to act earlier? More recently in Africa, the world saw a horrible genocide in Rwanda and did little to stop it. Now in the Darfur region of Sudan, the events unfolding bring a sense of familiarity.

The UN removed "nonessential" staff last month, as did some humanitarian organizations, due to attacks on aid workers. The janjaweed militias are becomong bolder in their attacks, and many organizations feel they cannot act in safety. The Sudanese staff will remain behind, but without the eyes and ears of the international community in Sudan, they may be in danger.

The resources that aid workers count on are dwindling, due to what Eric Reeves calls "donor fatigue". The future of the Darfur region may well depend on Christians not succumbing to fatigue or despair.

Religious groups cite ‘moral duty’ to stop Darfur genocide

Religious groups cite ‘moral duty’ to stop Darfur genocide:

"(RNS) Religious groups on Sept. 21 stepped up pressure on the Bush administration and Congress to help end the genocide in Sudan’s Darfur region, saying the United States has a “moral duty” to intervene.

The “Save Darfur Coalition,” an alliance of 134 religious and humanitarian groups, said Washington must provide increased aid to African Union troops who are on the ground in Darfur and impose economic sanctions on the Sudanese government in Khartoum. Leaders met with Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick and members of Congress and delivered a letter to President Bush as part of the “National Day of Action for the People of Sudan.”..."

This religion News Service release echos recent calls for Christians to become engaged in speaking on behalf of the victims of genocide in Darfur.

Pressure exerted by the Bush Administration brought a halt to genocidal acts in one region of Sudan, but now the Sudanese government is turning its attention to Darfur, and we cannot fail to speak up with our collective voices.

The Daniel of Religious Rights - Christianity Today Magazine

The Daniel of Religious Rights - Christianity Today Magazine:

"In the Longworth House office building on Capitol Hill, on an unusually warm April afternoon, Nina Shea is moving to the drumbeat of a southern Sudanese Shilluk tribal dance. The typically reserved, influential director of the Center for Religious Freedom (CRF) at Freedom House is with a broad coalition of clergy, congressional representatives, human-rights activists, and Sudanese war survivors. They are celebrating the January signing of Sudan's comprehensive North-South peace agreement.

Shea and the coalition she helped assemble have been pushing for agreement for more than a decade. The 22-year genocidal jihad waged by the ruling National Islamic Front against Sudan's predominantly Christian and animist South has ended. But Shea and others say they will not rest until peace is restored to Darfur, where a second genocide rages on...."

I posted a few days ago on an article on The Shame of Darfur, an article from First Things, that contrasted the quickness of Evangelicals to address Christian persecution with the relative lack of response to persecution of other religions. The current Christianity Today article shows that Christians ARE engaged in the issue of Darfur, if not to the extent that they should be.

Nina Shea's story is an interesting one. Her faith journey took her from a Catholic upbringing, to falling away from the Church, and back to a strong faith. Her activism on behalf of human rights began in high school and has continued to the present day. She worked for a while for the International League for Human Rights and traveled in Central America where she investigated human rights violations in El Salvador and Nicaragua. During what she called her "secular years", she encountered a double standard when she was pressured to suppress a report on Sandanista human rights violations. During this time of disillusionment with the Left, she grew spiritually, began to see the importance of the Church in areas of oppression, and grew to realize that the Church was being persecuted and that few people seemed to care.

A favorite Biblical passage for her is the story of Daniel in the lion's den -- where God sends an angel to close the mouths of the lions. That story and the parable of the Good Samaritan drives her to service to others, extending the love of Jesus to those in need regardless of whether they are Christians or not.

First Things October 2005: The Shame of Darfur

First Things October 2005: The Shame of Darfur:

The Shame of Darfur
Allen D. Hertzke

Copyright (c) 2005 First Things 156 (October 2005): 16-22.

"In April 2005, a striking celebration occurred in Washington to mark the signing of a peace accord between rebel groups of southern Sudan and the Islamist regime in Khartoum, ending Africa’s longest and bloodiest civil war. In a packed room in the Longworth House Office Building, Sudanese exiles mingled with the American officials and religious leaders whose efforts helped halt Sudan’s two-decade genocidal war against its non-Muslim population.

The event marked a triumph for both the Bush administration and the faith-based human-rights movement that has burst on the American foreign-policy scene in recent years. But the triumph was muted, for the Sudanese government in Khartoum has now turned its attention from the southern part of the country to the western, undertaking massive ethnic cleansing in the region known as Darfur. And so far, neither America’s religious community nor its government has acted with the same vigor in addressing the crisis.

Indeed, the administration’s mixed signals, alternately condemning and lauding the regime, have done little to rein in the Janjaweed marauders who keep the Darfur people from leaving fetid camps to plant crops and rebuild their shattered villages. And one reason the administration has not acted more forcefully is that the potent Christian groups involved in foreign affairs—those who anchored the religious coalition that compelled results in southern Sudan with unity and toughness—have been fragmented in their response to Darfur. This fact tarnishes the achievement in the south, and the stain will fall most heavily on the evangelical world. Born-again Christians in America, it will be said, care more about the deaths of their fellow believers in the south than about the deaths of Muslims in the west...."

-- Posted by permission

Have we Christians been so concerned about the persecuted Church in the world that we fail to see persecution of other faiths? Allen Hertzke makes a compelling case that this is indeed so, and I must agree.

We cannot afford to hide behind the attitude that "this is not my battle to fight." We may not be able to individually respond to all cases of persecution around the world, but where we are made aware of such persecution we need to react collectively in some fashion and our combined voices may be the best way to respond.

The same framework that allows evangelicals to speak so forcefully on behalf of persecuted Christians can be brought to bear on any persecution. Hertzke notes that evangelicals enjoy significant access to the current administration, and it has been efectively used to help bring about positive change in some areas.

A "tectonic shift" in the population patterns of Christians has resulted in ever increasing numbers of Christians in the Third World. The areas in which the church is growing the fastest are also areas of warfare, violence, poverty, and persecution -- something that many Christians in developed nations have difficulty relating to.

The effectiveness of the Church's witness in the world can be greatly enhanced when the ministry of compassion reaches all those who are persecuted, not just Christians.