A bloodied Sudanese woman, restrained by an armored man, screams in horror and panic, while people around her run in frenzy, many beaten or shot. A young man, no more than 28 years of age, kneels in silence, a few meters away from the screaming woman, with tears of fear pouring down his face. He is shot several times in the face and chest. The woman cries in anguish, as she holds her dead 3 year-old daughter in her arms. She has just witnessed the slaying of her husband.
Tens of thousands of civilians have been murdered and thousands of women raped in Sudan’s western region of Darfur by Sudanese government soldiers and members of the government-supported militia, the Janjaweed. About 2.5 million civilians have been driven from their homes, their villages torched and their property stolen by the Sudanese military and the Janjaweed. Some of the victims have escaped to the neighboring country of Chad, but most are trapped inside Darfur. Thousands die each month from the effects of inadequate food, water, health care, and shelter. It is believed that anywhere from 100,000 to 400,000 civilians have died in Darfur.
The ethnic and racial basis of the violence has been acknowledged by the U.S. Department of State, the United Nations, independent human rights organizations, and international journalists. The Sudanese government has primarily targeted the civilian population of the Fur, Zaghawa, and Masaalit ethnic groups, as it fuels ethnic and racial violence by using the Janjaweed militia as proxies against Darfur insurgents, who launched a rebellion in early 2003. The Janjaweed are nomadic Arab tribes that have long been at odds with Darfur's settled African farmers. As one of the principal actors in the Darfur conflict, the Janjaweed have successfully pitted the nomadic Arab-identifying Muslim Sudanese against the sedentary non-Arab Muslim Sudanese population of the region, in a battle over resource and land allocation. Hundreds of thousands of helpless civilians, a large portion of the original population, now live in camps for internally displaced persons, also referred to as IDP camps, or in refugee camps across the border in Chad. The Janjaweed presence threatens to attack any IDP movement outside of the camps, making venturing outside extremely difficult, and return of the displaced population to their homes impossible. Rape is reported to be widespread and commonplace and a near certainty for women caught outside the camps. Men who leave the camps are often beaten and tortured, often killed. Even within camps, the Janjaweed continue to commit killings, rapes, beatings, and theft.
Inhumane acts cause havoc and devastation, as villages are torn apart in Darfur. The situation on the ground has worsened considerably over the past few months, with renewed violence, attacks, and aerial bombings by the government of Sudan's military. Thousands of girls and women have been raped and subjected to forms of sexual violence in Darfur, abuses amounting to war crimes and crimes against humanity. Enslavement of women, though less usual than rape, is also a threat. Numerous women who had fled the IDP camps in Darfur reported that the Janjaweed took women to serve in their households and to be used at will.
Despite international outrage over the human rights crisis in Darfur, not a single person responsible for war crimes or crimes against humanity has been brought to justice. In violation of international humanitarian law principles, attacks by the Sudanese government make little or no distinction between combatants and civilians. Attacks, such as the aerial bombardment of innocent civilians, demonstrate disproportionate and indiscriminate use of force, and often intentionally targeted civilians. Though several humanitarian organizations had attempted to take action within Darfur, the increased fighting and danger has resulted in the total withdrawal of humanitarian aid in some areas. Many fear that if the fighting spreads, the entire Darfur aid operation would have to be terminated.
Unfortunately, the Sudanese police, as agents of the state, are unable or unwilling to take action in response to reports of crimes by the Janjaweed in and around the IDP camps. Even where individual attackers have been identified, only ineffective and superficial steps have been taken to bring to justice those responsible. Police officers are reported as protesting that they have no power to take on the Janjaweed, and that orders from above prevent them from taking effective action. However, refugees and IDPs have told Amnesty International that members of the Janjaweed had been incorporated into the police force in some cases, and that police officers were sometimes implicated in Janjaweed crimes.
In eastern Chad, directly across the border from West Darfur, cross-border attacks have been taking place since late 2005, in which the Janjaweed have targeted, killed, and forcibly displaced civilians on the basis of their ethnic origin. The attackers have carried out mass killings of civilians, looted the wealth of whole communities, and forced thousands to flee the border region. The massive displacement of people has depopulated a vast strip of eastern Chad along the border with Sudan. While many people have moved away from the border to urban areas, others have been unable or unwilling to move far from their homes and are still under immediate threat of attack. Since Chadian armed opposition groups based in West Darfur and supported by Sudan have become more active, Chad has been increasingly involved in the Darfur conflict. The Chadian authorities have taken no steps to protect civilians. Rather, their unwillingness or incapacity to deploy troops in response to the killing and displacement of Chadian civilians has contributed to the continuation of the Janjaweed attacks. There is also the risk of conflict spreading within Chad and potentially into the Central African Republic.
The situation in Darfur is intensifying by day. The conflict has led to some of the worst human rights abuses imaginable, including organized and widespread killing, rape, abduction, and displacement. Sudanese government-sponsored actions include the inflaming of the ethnic conflict, the impediment of international humanitarian access to areas within Darfur, resulting in deadly conditions of life for displaced civilians, the bombings of civilians with aircraft, and the murdering and raping of civilians. Many humanitarian efforts have had to be terminated because of such dangers, and actions taken on behalf of the United Nations and other international organizations have only failed. Human rights violations and war crimes continue in Darfur without effective opposition by the international community. The crisis in Darfur is one the international community needs to address. Governments and organizations must communicate and take action to stop the situation, as this issue cannot remain so insignificant and unacknowledged by the world.
Additional Links: USHMM.org, SaveDarfur.org, Amnesty International
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