For a real peace: Ending the genocide!

Bosnia and Ruanda warn us: overcome indifference!

400,000 dead – 2.5 million expelled – 3.5 million threatened with starvation

"If we do not react, two million people will have to remain cooped up in refugee camps. They will continue to suffer from hunger and epidemics and remain victims of rape and murder. Their lives are in our hands!

60 years ago, after the holocaust, the world swore: NEVER AGAIN! After the genocide in Ruanda in 1994 it repeated this oath. We can no longer wait till these promises are fulfilled!”

 

This call for saving the black African Muslim civilian population in the West Sudanese province of Darfur was started by the American Jewish World Service and signed by 69 Jewish organisations and institutions from 47 federal states of the USA. The demand is made here for the units of the African union in Darfur to be given decisive support and to be enlarged to an international peace-keeping force. This should have the mandate of actively putting an end to the genocide.

 

In spite of the peace treaty of 5th May 2005 the atrocities in Darfur have increased and international aid agencies wanting to bring food and medicine to the expelled people are being massively prevented from carrying out their work by the Sudanese government.

 

While a great deal of space is being given to the working through and condemning the holocaust in Germany, the present genocide is often being treated as taboo, denied or simply ignored. So the Society for Threatened Peoples (GfbV) intends to present all governments with the warning of the largest Jewish organisations of North America. It must be a duty to do everything to end the genocide and crimes against humanity. For this reason too we beg of you to support our campaign for the threatened people of Darfur.

 

"He who murders one person has at the same time killed the whole of humanity. He who saves a life saves the whole of humanity.”

THE KORAN, Sure 5.32

 

 

Genocide in Darfur

Civilians are being bombed

 

A few days before this broadsheet of the Society for Threatened Peoples (GfbV) went to the printers at the end of April 2006 the BBC showed a horrifying documentary film. Distressed refugees ran in tears with their children towards the TV team through the hot savannah of Darfur. They pointed excitedly behind them, where smoke was rising. Their village of Jughana had been attacked in the early morning by the Sudanese air force, said a survivor excitedly. Now they were afraid that the Janjaweed militia would come. Soldiers from the peace-keeping force of the African Union (AU), who were accompanying the journalists, noted the reports of the refugees, gave them water. But although the survivors said that they had had to leave the sick and elderly behind and although more and more exhausted refugees came in, the AU soldiers did not drive into the destroyed village. For it was getting dark and a Sudanese military aircraft circled threateningly above their heads.

 

More than 2.5 million persons expelled

 

The AU does not have the mandate of actively protecting civilians from harm. More than half the black African population of the Darfur region is seeking refuge. More than 2.5 million people have been driven out of their villages by the so-called Janjaweed, the Arabian mounted militia. The refugees in the camps are full of fear. Almost all of the camps are controlled by the militia. Women and children, who have to fetch water or wood for cooking from outside the camp, are often raped. Men are beaten up or murdered. Vehicles of the international aid agencies are attacked and plundered by the Janjaweed, while the aid workers are threatened.

 

More mass dying in sight

 

It is a blow in the face for the surviving victims that the Janjaweed are to be integrated into the police force instead of being punished for their war crimes. This was laid down in the peace treaty of 5th May, which was signed by only the smallest of the three black African resistance groups. It was also laid down that the Janjaweed should be disarmed by the Sudanese army. It was however precisely this army which previously gave out weapons to the militia and energetically supported them in their attacks on defenceless villages.

 

Darfur is today further removed from peace than ever before. The International Red Cross considers the situation too dangerous to be able to provide any assistance there. For the UN emergency aid coordinator, Jan Egeland, the situation at the end of April was as bad as at the beginning of the war. If in fact all the aid workers had to leave this could cost up to 100,000 lives per month. Egeland was not allowed to enter Darfur for several months. In mid-June the head of government, al Bashir, announced loudly that he would not permit an international military intervention in his country. At the end of June the UN aid agencies were forbidden from working in the crisis area, and shortly afterwards the ban was lifted. This cat and mouse game is part of the tactics of the regime, preventing the rescue operations of the UN peace-keeping force as long as possible. But the UN must refuse to be turned away. Khartoum must at long last be put under real pressure to accept a peace-keeping force.

 

The genocide

 

Since 2003 the Sudanese military government under Omar al Bashir has steadily aided and abetted the Arab mounted militia in expelling the black African population of Darfur. Over half the villages are reported to be now in ruins. Army units take part in massacres and individual killings. The secret service has a special brief in the framework of these ethnic cleansing operations. It takes measures against political leaders and intellectuals. The army arms the militia, equips them with uniforms and provides them with supplies. The regional state authorities support their mobilisation and recruitment.

 

Because the army, secret service and authorities actively support or facilitate the crimes against the civilian population, Khartoum is responsible for the massacres of the rural population, for murders aimed at particular people, for the systematic rape of thousands of women and children, for the torture, for the mass expulsion and provoked mass exodus of at least two million people, for the persecution of the refugee treks, for the destruction of harvests and fruit-trees, for the poisoning of water-holes, for the planned stealing of cattle and land and the repeated blockade of humanitarian aid for those expelled and finally for the constant violations of human rights against the people living in the refugee camps.

 

Humanitarian aid is being purposely prevented

 

Six months after the beginning of the war international news reports spoke of 30,000 victims. In August 2004 the Society for Threatened Peoples gave the figure of 120,000 dead in its documentation "Genocide in Darfur”, which was made up of reports from international aid agencies and human rights organisations, from journalists, other eye-witnesses and victims. Two members of the organisation "Doctors without Frontiers” were arrested because they had published a report on rape. A GfbV investigation commission also interviewed eye-witnesses of war crimes in the refugee camps in Chad. Today, almost two years later, the number of victims is estimated at 300,000 or even 400,000. In the first months of the year 2006 another 200,000 people are reported to have been expelled. Through the blocking of humanitarian aid and the crimes against people in the camps the number of victims is again rapidly rising. Because its work permit was not extended the Norwegian Refugee Council had to withdraw its employees from the Kalmi camp and leave to their fate100,000 refugees who had sought protection there.

 

It is genocide!

 

The Arab dominated, Islamic-fundamentalist regime of General al Bashir is responsible for the crimes of genocide against the black African Muslim majority of Darfur. Khartoum is systematically violating Article II of the UN Convention for the Prevention and Punishing of Genocide, according to which genocide is one of the following acts: a) killing members of the group b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group c) intentional imposition of living conditions on the group which will lead to the complete or partial destruction of the body.

 

In the opinion of most countries it is "only” crimes against humanity which are being committed. But even for such cases heads of state throughout the world bound the international community at their millennium summit in September 2005 to secure the protection of the civilian population. But the world has so far not carried out its obligation in Darfur. It has always let itself be held at arm’s length by Khartoum.

 

The allies of the regime

China and Russia have for months blocked sanctions against those responsible for the genocide. Finally in April penal measures were imposed on only four actors, among them two representatives of the resistance in Darfur. Originally according to the decision of UN experts 17 persons who were mainly responsible should have been punished with sanctions. However most of them go about undisturbed and their crimes have gone unpunished. So they can continue their campaign of destruction.

 

64% of all Sudan’s exports go to China. The main export is mineral oil. PetroChina is a participant in Great Nile Petroleum to the extent of 40%. The company has invested two thousand million US dollars in the Sudanese oil industry since 1997. China has there some 30,000 military advisers, employees and aid workers. China has also delivered to the Sudan 34 fighter aircraft, among them being seven SHENGYANG F-7 supersonic fighters. Thanks to the oil exports Sudan’s military budget rose between 2001 and 2003 from 581 to 700 million US$. Russia delivered to Sudan between 2001 and 2003 armaments, above all fighters and combat helicopters, to a value of 549 700 million US$. In the summer of 2004 the Sudanese air force received twelve MiG-29’s.

Satellite pictures of the US space agency NASA of that time already showed that of 576 villages in Darfur 300 lay completely ruined and 80 hamlets had been largely destroyed.

 

The Arab League (AL) is strictly against any UN intervention without the agreement of General al Bashir. He as the chief criminal is to retain the right to decide over the fate of his victims. The AL has donated to date a total amount of 200,000 US$ for the peace-keeping force of the African Union, which represents the cost for one day. At the AL summit in April 2006 it announced support of 150 million dollars for October. Baba Gana Kingibe, the head of the AU mission in Sudan said of this decision: "That is medicine after the death of the patient.” A coalition of 16 Arab human rights organisations from eight Arab states appealed in April 2006 to the leaders of the AL to condemn the violations of human rights and to force the Sudanese government to end its attacks on civilians in Darfur.

 

Criminals and victims

 

Since the founding of the state in 1956 the parliamentary and dictatorial governments of the Sudan have been recruited mainly from its Arab-speaking population. The policies of suppressing the black African population in the southern and western regions have a tradition going back to this time. The Islamist-fundamentalist regime of General Omar al Bashir is responsible for the genocide against two million mainly Christian South Sudanese. His campaigns against the partly Muslim, partly Christian population of the Nuba mountains produced the from 1987 until January 2002 about half a million victims. The genocide against the Muslim black African majority in Darfur (80% of the total population) began following the revolt of two resistance movements of the Fur, Zaghawa, Masalit and smaller ethnic groups at the end of 2002. They had risen against grinding poverty and exploitation. The majority of the Arab population of Darfur, making up 20% of the population, wants to have no part in al Bashir’s war of destruction.

 

 

Darfur – Voices against Indifference

"Sudan is today the world centre for human pain and suffering.

The so-called civilised world has known this for a long time and preferred to look the other way. Now there is no excuse for passivity and indifference. Those who try to break down the walls of apathy deserve the support and solidarity of everyone.”

Nobel prize-winner Elie Wiesel on 14th July 2004 at the American Jewish World Service

 

"After the holocaust we as a Jewish community said: Never again! The world said: Never again! Sadly we have seen that after the holocaust a number of genocides have been carried out. How many millions must die before the world takes notice of it?

Alan Respler, Director of the Jewish Community Relations Council in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, USA

 

"General al Bashir is a master politician. He conveys human warmth, congeniality and gives a very serious impression. He denies all responsibility for all the murder and rape. The culturalö and political elite of Sudan, among them elderly gentlemen with degrees from Europe and the USA, are educated, nice people, who however could find no fault with their government. I understand now how privileges and denials go together, in the same way as it happened in Germany.”

Rabbi Mordechai Liebling, Vice-president of the Jewish Fund

for Justice

"It is dreadful for these people in the villages to be hunted like wild animals, to see their children being pulled out of their arms and thrown into burning huts. Bit isn’t it also dreadful that our indifference demoralises us?”

Nicholas Kristof, columnist of the New York Times, 14.03.2006

 

"We do not have enough to keep the people in Darfur alive. We cannot change their totally inhuman situation in the camps sufficiently, where they can live without being attacked every day.”

Jan Egeland, Coordinator for the UN emergency aid

"We have only begun half-measures and these half-measures were not sufficient to protect the people.”

Juan Mendez, Kofi Annan’s delegate for the prevention of genocide

 

"There is a sense of urgency that there are people dying...that needs to be stopped.”

Jean-Marie Guehenno, UN Peacekeeping Operations

 

SUPPORT THE CONTINUATION OF OUR HUMAN RIGHTS WORK FOR SAVING DARFUR!

Save Darfur – End the genocide!

 

WE DEMAND:

• the sending of a UN peace-keeping force with the mandate of actively protecting the civilian population

• the whole of Darfur should be a no-fly zone for the Sudanese air-force

• the disarmament of the Janjaweed militia by international troops

• the exclusion of the Janjweed militia from the police force

• the handing over of the war criminals to the International Court of Justice at The Hague

• sanctions against all politicians responsible for war crimes

• sufficient means for humanitarian aid and free entry for all aid and human rights organisations to and in Darfur

• regional self-government for Darfur

 

What we have done so far

 

In the winter of 2003 already we warned with articles in the press, in interviews, in talks with politicians and at the UN Human Rights Commission of a mass dying in the civilian population in the West Sudanese region. Several thousand people joined our eMail protest against the continued massacre.

 

At the beginning of August 2004 we published our 100-page report "Genocide in Darfur” (No. 34), for which we included reports by international aid agencies and human rights organisations, by journalists, other eye-witnesses and victims. In the same month the GfbV sent an investigation mission to the Chad to interview eye-witnesses in the refugee camps (GfbV Report No. 37, Genocide in Darfur: Sudanese refugees report”). The International Court of Justice at The Hague called for these reports. The memorandum "Genocide with German weapons in Darfur?” appeared in September, and at the end of the year we devoted the main article of our magazine "Threatened peoples - pogrom” (No. 228, 6/2004) to this genocide.

 

We will mention here only a few of the human rights campaigns we carried out for the people of Darfur. "It is genocide” – Under this title we set up a symbolic graveyard on 9th August 2004 in front of the Neue Wache in Berlin. More than 40 daily papers reported on this and many TV teams filmed the event. With a further vigil we called for really effective sanctions by the EU against Sudan on 31st August 2004 in front of the office of the European Commission in Berlin. On 29th July 2005 we protested in front of the Russian embassy in Berlin against the delivery of twelve jet fighters to Sudan. The work of the GfbV for the oppressed people in Darfur was accompanied by a mass of press releases and also lobbying with letters, faxes and personal talks with politicians.

 

This is what we shall be doing in the next few months – please join in!

On our internet campaign platform www.gfbv.de/rettetdarfur we provide week by week new information on the genocide in Darfur, we report up-to-date information on violations of human rights and call out to new campaigns. Please join in! In our Darfur eMail Newsletter also we give information on the latest developments and GfbV initiatives. You can order it at darfur@gfbv.de. Please pass it on to your friends.

 

If you don’t have access to the internet: order our free-of-charge campaign packet Save Darfur!

 

We shall ask all interested groups, institutions, organisations and famous people in the German-speaking area to join our campaign and to sign a joint appeal to governments, parties and the media.

 

Please help us to bring the media to report more often on the suffering of the people in Darfur and send your letters to your regional newspapers and to radio and TV stations.

 

As long as China and Russia block all effective measures from the outside and work closely with the criminal regime in Sudan there is no prospect of peace. For this reason we are planning human rights campaigns for the G7 summit meeting in St Petersburg this year.

 

We are also planning a Darfur day with human rights experts, with well-known Christian, Moslem and Jewish and victims.

 

We shall be organising for events a lecture with a power-point presentation on the genocide in Darfur and preparing a list of speakers.

 

We shall press for the probable war criminals to be brought before the International Court of Justice at The Hague.

 

We shall write to the 16 German firms which took part in the 23rd International Fair in Khartoum in February 2006. A number of North American firms withdrew from the oil sector in Sudan as a result of public pressure.

 

THE PEOPLE IN DARFUR NEED OUR HELP!

 

>> Please join in our campaign. <<

>> Order our free-of-charge campaign packet. <<

Please send a Mail to: verwaltung@gfbv.de