Max Boot, in the L.A. Times, tries to shout loud enough about Darfur so somebody will actually do something. The U.N. Security Council finally passed a resolution freezing the assets of war crimes suspects, banning them from travel, and referring them to the International Criminal Court. That's a start, but it has no teeth. "Who will deliver the bad guys to court? . . . [W]ho will bring peace to Darfur?"
At the moment, there are just 2,000 lightly armed peacekeepers from the African Union covering all of Darfur, a region the size of France. And they have no authority to stop rape, pillage or murder . . . So who will stop the killing? That question should trouble any tender soul who has ever mindlessly muttered, "Never again." . . .
The only way to save Darfur is to dispatch a large and capable military expedition. But Security Council members France, China and Russia have blocked a U.N. decision on armed intervention because they covet trade ties with Sudan.
That still leaves the possibility of civilized states acting independently of the U.N., as they did in Kosovo. But the only nation with a serious military capacity, the United States, is overstretched in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The European Union should step into the breach. . . . But it has chosen to spend its euros on extravagant handouts for its own citizens rather than on the kind of armed forces that might bring a ray of hope to the "heart of darkness."
Boot concludes with a scathing slap at the West's antiwar legions:
Remember how exercised everyone around the world was about the crimes committed at Abu Ghraib? Infinitely worse deeds are being done in Darfur every day. Where's the outrage? Where are the street rallies that might spur Western governments into action? Aside from a handful of journalists and human rights activists, the only Westerners who have shown any sustained interest in the Sudan are evangelical Christians, who've been exercised primarily about the fate of their coreligionists in the south. The silence of the "antiwar" masses speaks volumes about their priorities: They don't object to war crimes as long as they're not committed by Americans.
I think the media bear some responsibility, too. The crimes and tragedies we get exercised about are the ones we don't just hear about, but see on our TV screens. Deplore it or not, it's a fact of modern life. It may be difficult and dangerous to capture the suffering of Darfur on video, but there are ways. Interviews with victims, for instance. This story in the New York Times brought one aspect of the story alive: the uncertain fate of the light-skinned babies who are born to black women raped by Arab Janjaweed militia. Just as in Bosnia (except that in Darfur much of it is committed by Muslims against Muslims), systematic violence against women as a way of demoralizing and destroying a people is a huge part of what's going on in Darfur, as witness this Times article (archived) from last October:
ABSTRACT - Violence against women of Darfur, Sudan, continues even with eyes of world on western Sudan; women are insulted, beaten and raped as they try to eke out living far from home in miserable camps of displaced across Darfur; they are also threatened, robbed and beaten with whips; they are most vulnerable when they trek out to do women's work--fetch firewood; fear and distrust in local law enforcement authorities runs so deep that crimes are rarely reported to officials; when they are, victims and human rights observers say, little is done . . .
Our world is poised on an uncomfortable cusp where it has a weak will, and therefore no way, to intervene forcefully in any instance of mass rape and slaughter. And yet, collectively, we no longer have the excuse that we don't know. It's particularly awkward that America and Europe did find a way in Bosnia and Kosovo, countries geographically and racially closer to our majority hearts. Boot is right: this has to change.
- amba
UPDATE: The numbers, from a press release by former Minnesota Senator Rudy Boschwitz, who's in Geneva as the Ambassador and Head of the U.S. Delegation to the 61st Session of the UN Commission on Human Rights: "The number of deaths in the Darfur region may now be as high as 300,000, and the number of dispossessed is at 2,000,000, and the violence, particularly against women, incalculable." UNCHR's tepid inaction exemplifies the lack of will discussed above:
The resolution against the Sudan was put off till Monday. It may well then be moved from Item #9 to Item #19, which means it will become a weakened consensus resolution that will be most unsatisfying to the American delegation. We will surely say so and do everything possible to keep a strong resolution in Agenda Item # 9. If it fails, as it well might, the CHR will have condemned itself.
Hat tip: Prairie Editor.
UPDATE II: The new, expanded New York Times Op-Ed section in the April 17 Week in Review is largely devoted to genocide, past and present, with three anniversary essays by survivors of the Cambodian killing fields (the Khmer Rouge took over on April 17 -- a new Ruination Day?), and a column by Nicholas Kristof (himself of Armenian descent) about Darfur. From that column, I learned that there as a television channel that is extensively covering the genocide in Sudan. It is -- are you ready for this? -- mtvU. And at this link on their website is one of the most thorough and helpful link-lists of ways to get informed and involved.
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