As world focuses elsewhere, a systematic slaughter unfolds in Sudan

[InkAddict]

http://www.canada.com/news/world/story.html?id=cf24653f-92fb-4563-a4b1-5f2fc3e976da

As the world's attention was turned to crises in the Middle East, a slaughter has raged for 17 months in Sudan's Darfur region. Arab gunmen on horses and camels, backed by bombers and helicopter gunships, have razed hundreds of black African villages, killed tens of thousands and driven more than one million from their homes.

"They say they don't want to see black skin on this land again," said Issa Bushara, whose brother and cousin were gunned down in front of their horrified families during an attack by the Janjaweed militia...


Where is our media on this? What's being done by anyone? Can anything be done at all? Might someone at the NAACP ask *about this? No oil here?

[Catt03]

1. It's been in the media ; both print and television

Better question is...where are our politicians on this.

They have to turn away because we cannot afford to help; no troops, no money, no friends.

[Baltimoreboy]

2. Should we invade?

If the answer is yes, how is that different from Iraq?

[NMDemDist2]

3. that sums it up , things are FUBAR

[opihimoimoi]

4. If Bush is the Man he sez he is...he would want to git those Bad Leaders

who been doing all this killin and slaughterin.... give them FREEDOM and all that shit....

But, since there is no OIL there...of serious consequence that is.... Sudan WHO?? Where??

[amber dog democrat]

8. bingo. No oil = no help

but considering how little benefit Iraq receives from the invasion and occupation I don't see how much help we are going to be... but too bad there is no oil.

[opihimoimoi]

10. The make believe John Wayne Bush is revealed as he goes golfing

He is not going to spoil his beautiful mind on the Sudan and their problemas..".. its only 4.7 million poor people living out there where there is no food."

[amber dog democrat]

15. yeah but watch him drive this ball onto the green

that takes lots of concentration... we can't be thinking about starvin furriners with a driver in hand. We might slice!

[reorg]

12. 2 billion barrels

...

War resumed in 1983 and intensified in the late 1990s when a 1,000-mile pipeline was constructed to connect Sudan's southern oilfields with Port Sudan in the north. With assistance from foreign oil companies, the Khartoum government carried out a scorched-earth policy, destroying all African villages near the pipeline.

The result was a famine in 1998--which was made much worse by the government's policy of blocking aid to the south. By last year, over 2 million people in the south had died, and over 4 million were refugees.

But Western governments now prefer a more stable environment to gain access to Sudan's oil reserves, currently estimated at over 2 billion barrels. This is why they have pressured the central government into peace negotiations with the SPLA.

Talks are continuing in Kenya, and the two sides are close to an agreement that would give the south a more equitable sharing of Sudan's oil revenues, political autonomy and an eventual referendum on independence. The rebel groups in Darfur would like to negotiate a similar agreement, but instead, the Khartoum government has conducted its massive campaign of ethnic cleansing.

The U.S. government has imposed sanctions on Sudan since the mid-1990s and classifies the country as a "sponsor of terrorism." But Washington has quietly been mending fences with the regime--because of Sudan’s oil resources

...

http://www.socialistworker.org/2004-2/503/503_08_Sudan.shtml

[section321]

5. Its happening again. Just like Rwanda. No one wants to step up

No country is willing to step up and say "enough!"

[hightime]

6. JUST BREAKING......the U.N. is writing a report!!

That should help.

[notbush]

7. Where's the U.N. ??????

Hell, the U.N. can't break up a fist fight.
Cambodia,Sudan,Rwanda........Yeah like the U.N. really gives a shit.

[Violet_Crumble]

9. What do you expect the UN to do?????

If the UN does anything, it'll only be because the US has chosen not to stop them doing anything...

Cambodia? Not a good one to bring up. The US strongly supported that murderous regime and made sure it took up Cambodia's seat at the UN...

Rwanda? Read this and then ask why the US didn't just not do anything, but at times actively worked to discourage intervention to try to stop the genocide. http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2001/09/power.htm

Violet...

[reorg]

11. No oil? Who told you that

there is no oil? From what I read this ongoing civil war for 20 plus years is mostly about oil, as most "ethnic" wars are actually about resources.

For a map of the oil wells in Sudan and their (current) owners I found this map:

http://www.hrw.org/reports/2003/sudan1103/2.htm


Other African oil countries close to the crisis region: Chad, Cameroon (pipeline), and Nigeria of course. So invading for "humanitarian" causes may have strategical benefits, like, e. g. one or two military bases?

[reorg]

13. Oil Underlies Darfur Tragedy

Oil Underlies Darfur Tragedy

Zaman - Turkey
Cumali Onal - Cairo
July 7, 2004

The fighting in Sudan's Darfur region, which is being reported in the world press as 'ethnic cleansing' and a 'humanitarian crisis', reportedly stems from attempts to gain control over the oil resources in the region, claim Arab sources.
These Arab sources find it interesting that such skirmishes occurred when a peace agreement that would have brought an end to 21 years of north-south conflict was about to be signed. The sources point out that oil fields have recently been discovered in Darfur.

So far at least 10,000 people have lost their lives as a result of the fighting between Arab residents and locals in Darfur, while over a million have fled their homes.

The Sudanese government claims that there is a serious humanitarian crisis in the region. However, the Khartoum administration adds that some countries and groups, primarily Western humanitarian aid foundations and media institutions, are playing up the incidents in an attempt to make Sudan appear unstable and in need of foreign intervention.

...

http://www.sudan.net/news/posted/8991.html


www.zaman.com

[reorg]

14. Oil driving US’ move on Sudan

Oil driving US’ move on Sudan

The East African Standard
By Kibisu Kabatesi
July 11, 2004

Darfur, the international community unanimously agrees, is "the worst humanitarian crisis of our time".

(...)

However, the US involvement is not a newfound whim of philanthropy by Washington. There is a deliberate strategic national interest: access to oil. Since the Clinton administration, the US has been angling to diversify its oil supplies away from the turbulent Middle East region.

(...)

The war against terror, whose by-product has been increased terrorist threats on US access to Arab oil, has spurred the urgency for alternative sources for the black gold. Oil producers in sub-Saharan Africa are now sought after as allies and Libya now exports oil to the US. The original "you are either with us or against us" mantra in the war against terror has petered as the economic reality of access to oil has hit home.

The US has increased policing of the West Africa’s oil producing region. The US carrier USS Harry Truman has been deployed on Africa’s Atlantic coast under an exercise dubbed "Summer Pulse 04". The US passes off the exercise as part of the war against terror, but the reason is the oilfields off the west coast of Africa, described as the fastest growing source of oil over the past 10 years.

(...)

In June 2002, the BBC quoted oil industry sources confident of deep-water discoveries that would boost the production on the Atlantic rim for old players like Nigeria, Angola, Gabon, Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, and newcomers like Sao Tome.

Sudan falls into this orbit not for its current production levels but for its potential to supplement the Gulf of Guinea oil belt. With peace imminent in southern Sudan, Darfur can only be an inconvenience to a possible link line from Chad to the previously "blood oil" in Southern Sudan.

http://www.eastandard.net/headlines/news10070402.htm
http://www.sudan.net/news/posted/9020.html

[Bo]

16. No more repeats,,,please

[reorg]

17. what exactly is your problem?