Darfur Crisis the 'next Rwanda', UN Warns by NYT / International Crisis Group / Reuters.. 12:53pm 20th May, 2005   Labado, Sudan, June 7, 2005    "Uncover Your Eyes", by Nicholas Kristof. (New York Times)    Last fall President Bush declared the slaughter here in Darfur to be genocide, and then looked away. One reason for his paralysis is apparently the fear that Darfur may be another black hole of murder and mutilation, a hopeless quagmire to suck in well-meaning Americans - another Somalia or Iraq. It's not.    We're again making the same mistake we've made in past genocides: as in the slaughter of Armenians, Jews, Cambodians, Rwandans and Bosnians, we see no perfect solutions, so we end up doing very little. Because we could not change Nazi policies, we did not bother to bomb rail lines leading to death camps; today, because we have little leverage over Sudan, we do not impose a no-fly zone to stop the strafing of civilians or even bother to speak out forcefully.    Yet this town of Labado underscores that Darfur is not hopeless, that even the very modest actions that the international community has taken so far have saved vast numbers of lives.    A desert town that used to hold about 25,000 people, Labado was attacked in December by the Sudanese military and the militia known as the janjaweed. For several days, the army burned huts, looted shops, killed men and raped women.    For months, Labao was completely deserted and appeared destined to become a ghost town. But then African Union forces, soldiers from across Africa who have been dispatched to stop the slaughter, set up a small security outpost of 50 troops here. Almost immediately, refugees began returning to Labado, followed by international aid groups.    Today there are perhaps 5,000 people living in the town again, building new thatch roofs over their scorched mud huts. The revival of Labado underscores how little it takes to make a huge difference on the ground. If Western governments help the African Union establish security, if we lean hard on both the government and the rebels to reach a peace agreement, then by the end of this year Darfur might see peace breaking out.    For now, Labado is only an oasis, and when the people here step out of the town they risk being murdered or raped by the janjaweed militia.    Refugees fleeing to Kalma from a village called Saleya described how nine boys were seized by the janjaweed, stripped naked and tied up, their noses and ears cut off and their eyes gouged out. They were then shot dead and left near a public well. Nearby villagers got the message and fled.    Aid workers report that in another village, the janjaweed recently castrated a 10-year-old boy, apparently to terrorize local people and drive them away. The boy survived and is being treated.    Yet along with atrocities, there are hopeful signs. While Mr. Bush should do more, he has forthrightly called the killings genocide and heaped aid on Darfur, probably saving hundreds of thousands of lives.    Indeed, aid shipments have brought malnutrition rates in much of Darfur below those of other places in Sudan, partly because donor governments have "borrowed" aid from other regions. So children are going hungry in southern and eastern Sudan as a consequence of Darfur.    If Mr. Bush led a determined effort to save Darfur, there would be real hope for peace here - plus, the international image of the U.S. would improve. And a new Zogby poll commissioned by the International Crisis Group found that Americans by margins of six to one favor bolder action in Darfur, such as a no-fly zone.    But Mr. Bush is covering his eyes. Last year administration figures like Colin Powell and John Danforth led the response to Darfur, but now neither Condoleezza Rice nor the White House seems much interested.    Darfur will never be a Somalia or Iraq, because nobody is talking about sending in American combat troops. But simply an ounce of top-level attention to Darfur would go a long way to save lives.    In 1999, Madeleine Albright traveled to Sierra Leone and met child amputees there, wrenching the hearts of American television viewers and making that crisis a priority in a way that eventually helped resolve it. Ms. Rice could do the same for Darfur if she would only bother to go.    Mr. Bush values a frozen embryo. But he hasn't mustered much compassion for an entire population of terrorized widows and orphans. And he is cementing in place the very hopelessness he dreads, by continuing to avert his eyes from the first genocide of the 21st century.    May 29, 2005. (AFP)    United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan has urged immediate action to end the Darfur crisis in Sudan after hearing accounts of destruction and abuse during a visit which he described as "heart-wrenching".    On the second day of his tour of Sudan, Mr Annan was confronted with the devastation caused by more than two years of fighting between ethnic minority rebels and government forces.    He kicked off his trip to the western Sudanese region with a visit to Kalma, Darfur's largest camp for displaced people, where he listened to tribal leaders' accounts of human rights violations.    Mr Annan then went to Labado, a town largely destroyed in the fighting last year and where thousands of returned residents greeted him with desperate calls for relief and protection.    "Heart-wrenching," Mr Annan told reporters in Khartoum upon returning from his whirlwind tour of Darfur. "Obviously, everybody says it's better than it was last year but this is not a situation that can be acceptable for long," he said.    "We do not want to see a situation where they [the displaced] are in camps for years and years and years ... So it is very urgent that we take the right steps and ensure we get them back to their villages."    Kalma camp is bursting with an estimated 110,000 people, only a fraction of the more than 2 million who were displaced by more than two years of civil war and famine. Suleiman Abu Bakr, speaking on behalf of the camp's tribal leaders, told Mr Annan that 56 people had been killed in the camp since March and 580 women sexually assaulted in recent months.    He blamed the attacks on Sudanese police and the infamous Janjaweed, the pro-government Arab militias which the Government has used as proxies in its scorched-earth campaign to crush the Darfur rebellion.    The head of the Sudan Liberation Movement, the main Darfur rebel group, told AFP that two civilians were killed in Kalma just before Mr Annan's visit on Friday and another two in Zamzam camp in North Darfur. "The situation is going to worsen for the displaced when the rainy season starts," Abdelwahed Mohammed Ahmed Nur said.    "We want the United Nations and the international community to take decisive action because there is a risk that four million people will die if nothing is done."    The region is facing chronic food shortages because farmers have not been able to sow crops ahead of the rainy season amid ongoing violence in the western region.    Mr Annan also got a taste of the task facing the Sudanese authorities and the international community if and when displaced Darfurians return to their homes after an elusive peace deal.    In the town of Labado, which has seen the recent return of about half of the 60,000 families who fled when government forces staged a massive anti-rebellion raid in December 2004, people are still fearing for their security and lack the bare minimum to survive.    As aid agencies still complain of limited access to the needy and insufficient international funding, the African Union peace mission in the region was also seeking to boost its security operation.    In Labado, Mr Annan met the AU's Nigerian commander, General Festus Okonkwo, who demanded more men and equipment. The pan-African body announced on Friday, after Mr Annan warned that the world was running "a race against time" to solve the Darfur crisis, that it had received $382 million in donations.    The AU wants more than $602 million in cash, military equipment and logistical support to boost its current 2,700-strong truce monitoring operation to more than 7,700 by September.    The UN chief welcomed the AU donations but stressed that additional resources were needed to cover Darfur's relief effort and the reconstruction of Sudan's pacified south.    "We should not allow the peace agreement to get into trouble for a lack of money," Mr Annan said.    Before flying south, where an estimated 1.5 million people were killed in 21 years of civil war, Mr Annan is due to meet Sudanese Vice President Ali Osman Taha and exert more pressure for a rapid solution to the Darfur crisis.    Mr Annan said on Friday he was hopeful that negotiations between rebels and Khartoum, set to resume in Nigeria's capital on June 10, would yield a peace deal. "I hope when they get there this time, they are going to stay there and negotiate in a sustained manner until they get an agreement," he said.    May 25, 2005. (ABC News)    "NATO backs first African mission", by ABC News correspondent Zoe Daniel.    The North Atlantic Treaty Alliance (NATO) has agreed to provide air support, training and logistical help to African Union peacekeepers in Sudan's troubled region of Darfur.    NATO has agreed to provide the support in principle, ahead of an international meeting on the issue in Ethiopia later this week. The alliance says it will help the African Union, which is expanding the number of troops in Darfur to 7,700 immediately and is considering a force of 12,000 by the end of the year.    The agreement will be discussed further on Thursday, when UN secretary-general Kofi Annan will meet EU and NATO leaders. If the agreement is officially approved, it will be the first time NATO has had a mission in Africa. However, NATO troops would be involved in a support role only. The European Union has agreed to provide similar help.    25 May 2005 (IRIN News)    SUDAN: African Union calls for increased support to Darfur mission.    Africa’s peacekeeping mission in war-torn Darfur risks failure unless it receives increased support, the African Union (AU) warned on Wednesday.    Speaking on the eve of a major fundraising conference for the peacekeeping mission, AU Peace Commissioner Said Djinnit told reporters Darfur was a critical test of international commitment and Africa’s resolve to end wars on the continent.    "We strongly believe that now is the time for peace in Darfur," he said at the AU headquarters in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, where he laid out a US $723 million rescue package.    "It is the time for the AU, it is the time for the parties and it is time for the international community to secure peace in Darfur," he added. "We strongly believe the AU needs support because alone we cannot do it."    Djinnit said the 53-nation bloc required financial, military and logistical backing. "It is not easy for us because we have limited means and resources - financial and human," he noted. "We are struggling to live up to the challenge; we know it is formidable."    NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer was expected to attend the conference on Thursday with EU Foreign and Security Policy Chief Javier Solana and UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan.    Currently, NATO is working closely with the EU and UN to prepare the mission and has said it would not impose itself on the AU. Britain has offered trucks and France transport planes as EU nations seek to help the African peacekeepers end one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.    EU defence ministers meeting on Monday also offered help with command planning, surveillance and housing for the peacekeeping mission in Darfur.    At least 180,000 people are believed to have died and about two million others have fled their homes in Darfur to escape the conflict between rebels on one side and pro-government militia on the other.    Although the cash-strapped AU needs help, Djinnit insisted that troops on the ground would be exclusively African.    The mission, whose current strength is around 2,200, will begin expanding its troop numbers to 7,700 in July, which will cost the international community $463 million. Djinnit said the peacekeeping force could top 12,300 troops and police in 2006. Nigeria, Rwanda, Kenya, South Africa, Gambia and Senegal have all said they have troops ready.    A "shopping list" of military hardware that includes helicopters, 116 armoured personnel carriers, passenger and cargo aircraft as well as trucks for African troops operating in Darfur will be presented at the summit on Thursday.    Djinnit said the AU’s presence would not be long-term. It would hand over authority to the UN once a political solution had been found. He said the focus now needed to be placed on the peace talks between the rebels and government.    "It is not the ambition or the means for the AU to engage in a long- term, long-standing peacekeeping, which other institutions like the UN are better placed to do," he said. "Our ambition is to make sure that there is a political settlement and that the process is in the hands of the Sudanese."    The Darfur conflict erupted in February 2003 after rebels took up arms, complaining of discrimination by Sudan's Arab-dominated government. The government responded by backing armed militias to counter the rebellion, but the militias have been accused of committing widespread atrocities against civilians.    May 20, 2005. (Reuters)    UN member states need to exert more political pressure to resolve the crisis in Sudan's Darfur region, which has the potential to become the next Rwanda, a top UN official says.    Mark Malloch Brown, chief of staff to UN secretary-general Kofi Annan, has told lawmakers what was happening in Darfur reflected a lack of willingness of the international community to get involved.    "Darfur is the litmus test. It has the potential to be the Rwanda on our watch," he told a House of Representatives International Relations Committee hearing on reforming the United Nations.    Malloch Brown said talk about reforming the United Nations would amount to nothing if Darfur became another Rwanda, referring to the 1994 genocide in the central African country that resulted in the deaths of some 800,000 people.    The United Nations and its member states were strongly criticised for not doing enough to prevent the genocide in Rwanda and aid groups and others fear a repeat in Sudan.    The Darfur conflict broke out two years ago when rebels took up arms against the government, complaining of discrimination. Khartoum is accused of retaliating by arming militias who burned villages and killed and raped civilians.    At least 300,000 people have died from violence, hunger and disease and 2 million have been driven out of their homes.    "Everyone wants to stop Darfur happening, but no one wants to put their troops in harm's way," Mr Malloch Brown said. He complained the number of African Union troops sent to Sudan was too small, but said Sudan had made it clear there would be trouble if forces came from outside of Africa.    24 May 2005    Letter from Gareth Evans, President, International Crisis Goup to parties taking part in the AU Mission in Sudan (AMIS) in Addis Ababa on 26 May 2005.    I write in the context of the forthcoming high-level conference on the AU Mission in Sudan (AMIS) in Addis Ababa on 26 May 2005 to urge your support for much stronger  intervention by the international community to stop the ongoing killing in Darfur.    Despite repeated pledges to stop the violence, the Sudanese government has utterly failed to do so.  Political negotiations have stalled and, despite the presence of AU troops on the ground and the UN Security Council's important action in relation to accountability and sanctions, the civilian population of Darfur continues to grievously suffer.    This is a highly complex situation, and there are multiple elements in the necessary international action plan -- as spelled out by Crisis Group in its Policy Briefing, A New Sudan Action Plan, of 26 April 2005.  But two issues in particular require, urgently, a bold new approach:  the mandate of the international troop presence, and its size and capacity.     Protection Force Mandate    The current mandate of AMIS, as authorised by the AU Peace and Security Council, focuses on monitoring and verification, leaving to the Sudanese government the basic responsibility -- which it has utterly failed to discharge -- for protection of civilians and humanitarian workers. AMIS's own protection role, so highly qualified as to be almost meaningless, is only to 'protect civilians whom it encounters under imminent threat and in the immediate vicinity, within resources and capability'. The force's mandate must be strengthened to both enable and encourage it to undertake all necessary measures, including proactive action, to protect civilians in Darfur. Without a stronger mandate, the ability of AMIS -- or any other international force -- to provide protection will remain extremely limited, regardless of the force size.    The Sudanese government may well be reluctant to accept any change of mandate. But its periodic arguments that it is not in full control of the Janjaweed militias, and above all the continuation of serious violence which it has repeatedly pledged to stop, must now become the basis for international insistence that this happen. That insistence should be backed by a decision to commence planning for the deployment, should this become necessary, of a fully-mandated protection force in a non-permissive environment.    Protection Force Size    The current security and humanitarian situation in Darfur requires a much greater presence than the 2,341 Phase I military personnel now on the ground, or the 7,731 (including 1,560 civilian police) authorised by the AU and targeted for arrival in September.  Crisis Group's own estimate -- developed after consultation with military experts in the AU, UN and elsewhere -- is that a minimum presence of 12,000-15,000 personnel is needed now to undertake the tasks of protecting villages against further attack or destruction; protecting IDPs against forced repatriation and intimidation; protecting women from systematic rape outside the IDP camps; providing security for humanitarian operations; and neutralising the Janjaweed militias. The minimum need, as we see it, is for a battalion group (infantry plus support elements) to be deployed in each of the eight sectors, with a battalion as force reserve, 700-1,000 military observers, 1,500-2,000 civilian police, and 1,000 headquarters and other staff.    It has become apparent that the AU, with the best will in the world, will be unable without substantial further international support, to deploy an effective force of anything like this size in anything like the necessary time-frame -- around 60 days. It has only just achieved the Phase I military component (with a shortfall still on the civilian police side) and at the present rate of progress is likely to find difficulty in meeting its September target for the remaining authorised deployment. There appear to be only two available options for achieving the force size urgently needed.     Option I: More African Personnel, with Strong International Support.  While the preferred position here would clearly be for a single African lead country to provide most of the required additional personnel, African states currently have 18,600 assigned to UN peace operations, with more expected to contribute to UNMIS, IGASOM and other planned operations elsewhere, and a lead deployment of several thousand African troops is not likely to be immediately available from any one country on the continent, and almost certainly not from sub-Saharan Africa. North Africa offers possibilities worth exploring, but Morocco -- one such country with strong military capability -- is not a member of the AU, should this be thought relevant, and the experience with Egyptian forces already in Darfur indicates that there are deep sensitivities on the IDP side associated with the substantial presence of any Arab force, in particular from Egypt, which would need to be taken into consideration.    An aggregation of smaller numbers of troop contributors sufficient to meet the required total might be possible -- the AU itself  has foreshadowed a possible increase in AMIS to 12,300 to assist those displaced to return home for the 2006 planting season.  But there will be obvious difficulties in deploying, on an urgent basis, sufficient numbers of trained troops with the necessary interoperability.    All this suggests that the only way the necessary numbers could be found and effectively deployed from within Africa would be for the AU to accept and request a far higher degree of international involvement than has so far been contemplated, in particular in the following areas:    * Force generation and deployment: donors must be prepared to underwrite the costs of the expanded force and the delivery of troops to Darfur, and be operationally engaged in their deployment: this will require strategic lift from countries of origin and ground transportation within theatre.    * Force preparation: because of the scope and complexity of the challenges, troops deploying to Darfur will require the highest possible degree of preparation, standardisation and interoperability. The AU will need support in rapidly developing a standard force preparation package for all contingents, both military and civilian police (CIVPOL). This can be achieved through the use of existing peacekeeping training facilities on the continent, 'fly away' training teams from AU, EU and NATO member states and in-theatre instruction.    * Capacity: in order to meet the demands posed by rapid expansion of AMIS, the AU's partners must be prepared to provide staff and advisers at all levels of the mission. Primary focus should be on the Force HQ in El Fasher, which requires a 24 hour Joint Operations Centre with requisite intelligence, communications and command tools. A Joint Logistics Coordination Centre is also necessary to sustain the force and enhance its operational flexibility.    * Mobility: an expanded and more assertive AMIS presence will require greatly enhanced mobility in order to fulfil its mission. The existing fleet of helicopters need to be upgraded or replaced to accommodate armament, forward-looking infra-red (FLIR), tactical communications equipment and night operations capability. Current restrictions on night flying must be lifted and difficulties with fuel distribution resolved. At the same time, there is a need for additional fixed wing transport aircraft for in-theatre movement of troops, and more suitable ground transportation.    * No-Fly Zone: an effective enforcement mechanism must be established in support of UNSC Resolution 1591, which prohibits offensive military flights within Darfur. A decisive first step would be for the UNSC and AU to insist that the GOS remove all fixed and rotary wing military aircraft from Darfur and refrain from subsequently re-entering the airspace. In addition, concrete measures to enforce compliance with the no-fly zone, including direct monitoring of airports and control of air space should be considered.    Under this option, it would be possible to preserve the principle (which would clearly be helpful in achieving consensus within the AU) that only African personnel would interface with Sudanese -- including  IDPs, militia, government troops and rebels in on-the-ground operational situations. Non-African personnel, although necessarily present in-theatre in significant numbers (as communications and logistics specialists, aircrew, staff officers and the like)   would be confined  -- with the possible exception of helicopter pilots flying tactical missions -- to various supporting roles.    Option II: A Multinational Bridging Force.  If the first option proves unachievable within the time-frame envisaged, as is quite likely, then a further option must be seriously contemplated if the international community is to meet its responsibility to protect the people of Darfur, however difficult or unpalatable this may appear at first sight to various parties.    NATO would appear to be the best equipped organisation to provide -- and lead -- the additional troops required in the necessary numbers and with the necessary short lead-time. It has ample planning, command and control and logistic support and sufficiently interoperable troop resources at its disposal; with Turkey as a member, it could potentially draw on a large pool of well-trained Muslim but non-Arab forces, who may be thought particularly appropriate in a Darfur context; and has already taken one step in this direction by agreeing to meet an AU request to provide some training support.     There are no obvious alternative troop suppliers. Although individual non-African countries like the UK, France and Germany may have the necessary capacity, it is unlikely that any of them would, with their present commitments elsewhere, wish to take on an operation of this size individually, either under their own flag or as an EU-flagged 'lead nation' (as with the French-led Operation Artemis in the DRC in 2003).  The EU has a developing multinational force capability, but its recently announced Battle Groups are not likely to be fully operational until 2007, and it is difficult to envisage the 'Berlin Plus' arrangements, involving a European-badged operation with NATO support,  producing an agreed solution in the time available    Such a NATO operation should be viewed as essentially a 'bridging' force, designed to tackle Darfur's most urgent protection needs. The imperative need is to get additional capable forces on the ground now. Having NATO supplement AMIS would provide the best means in the short term to fulfil the operational requirements of civilian protection in Darfur, filling the gap until such time as the AU is fully staffed and mission capable.    Khartoum is likely to be even more strongly opposed to any proposal for a multinational force not confined to Africans than it will be to the strengthening of the force mandate. But the international community cannot let Khartoum dictate its fulfilment of its responsibility to protect those at risk.  It has already accepted non-African forces in southern Sudan and the Nuba Mountains, after the exertion of international pressure. Ideally, the government of Khartoum would acquiesce in the face of a unified call -- in which the AU will need to join -- for its cooperation.  If it does not, and the killing continues, the international community will have no alternative but to consider the deployment of such a protection force without its consent, even though a much larger force than that here proposed would clearly be necessary in a non-permissive environment.    The bold options here proposed are no more than the minimum necessary to stabilise a very difficult and dangerous current situation.  Further decisions will be required for action to ensure the return of the over 2 million refugees and internally displaced, or if the situation deteriorates further.     Protecting civilians in Darfur represents a significant challenge for the international community and the AU in particular. While Khartoum seeks to persuade the international community that the situation is gradually stabilising, its actions ensure that the problems in Darfur will persist, discrediting the notion that it is willing to assume the responsibility for protecting its own people.    No single actor will be able to resolve the crisis in Darfur alone. Only a partnership of diverse military, civilian and humanitarian  actors -- including the  AU, EU, NATO, UN, and NGOs -- will succeed in providing an adequate degree of protection for the civilian population and laying the foundation for a secure environment and a stable peace.    I urge the participants at the 26 May conference to take up this challenge and do their part to protect those at risk in Darfur. Visit the related web page
	Next (more recent) news item
	Next (older) news item