Once You've Started, You Just Can't Stop...

USA Today reports that President Bashir is now kicking out every aid group in Sudan within the next year.

I guess once you start, it's difficult to stop. I worry that this is a slippery slippery slope. And with the entire world caught up in debates over financial stimulus measures, Bashir has a free pass to do what he would like.

This cannot continue. What am I going to do about it? Write a letter, send an email and make a phone call.

What are you going to do about it?

Let me know in the Comments section so that other people can do it too.

Continue reading this article...

Notes From an Aid Worker

Dear xxxx,

As you may have heard in the news, one the implications of an arrest warrant against the president of Sudan has seen Save the Children US (SCUS) along with 12 other major NGO's getting expelled by a presidential decree earlier today.

Yesterday (WED 4th) evening, as the rally in the city centre was wrapping up, I was aware of Save the Children UK office was being raided by government officials, however, today about 10 am it came as a shock, when armed police and plain clothes security elements with senior ministry of humanitarian affairs officials came to our office and presented a letter accusing the agency of spying and started the takeover process to seize everything from our files to our computers and all vehicles, HF Radios, SAT phones in all 22 sub offices across the country. In one instance, approx 1700 people SCUS employs in Sudan are jobless. Our program delivery has stopped, essential lives saving interventions of the agency have stopped and the livelihoods of thousands of employees have been affected.

We have been accused of spying and providing the ICC with information against the state. As one security official from the humanitarian ministry put it to me (while he was reaching over me and my desk trying to snatch the mouse to shut my machine off), that I should be glad as most of us are not being arrested with crimes accounting to treason against Sudan... we are just being told to leave the country.

What saddens me is the resulting impact of the general populations and IDPS in the camps. Just with SC US programs in Darfur, approximately 400,000 people in 5 major camps and surrounding villages received food through daily distributions, 200 health clinics overlooked treatment of thousands of patients daily, and 400,000 ppl had access to clean water. The list is endless, South kordofan and Nuba have seen major developments in terms of Save programs in water, sanitation, livelihoods, health, nutrition, education, women and child protection. We are just one agency, collectively, the 13 NGOs meant the whole Sudan though these agencies was receiving millions of dollars in rehabilitation and development funds in the post conflict transition phase. Where will all these people turn for help to? Did the ICC even think about what the backlash was going to be? They have made it worse for the very people they are looking to help.

xxxxx (my brave sister working with SCUS as well) on the phone from Darfur where the whole team awaits flights to evacuate, during our conversation stopped talking and asked me to listen to the announcement being made on loud speakers by armed men on horses roaming the streets of Geneina town (janjaweed) warning all the people, as to anyone seen celebrating this warrant issue will be publicly humiliated and killed. I hope she and the others can make it back by Sunday so we all can breathe easy again.

We have been given a few days to leave the country, our country director is working very hard to buy us time to wind up and keep the process smooth, but as it seems we all will be out of Sudan with the coming week if not earlier. So far all staff is being sent to Addis Ababa.

I thought of giving you an update, as i'm sure you would be closely monitoring the situation.

All the best
xxxx
Apologies for the scattered ideas and thoughts in this message, the last two days have been very tough Continue reading this article...

Video Blog on the ICC

Continue reading this article...

We Can't Let This Happen

So the ICC made it's announcement...and now the fallout.

Apparently, 10 humanitarian groups have already been asked to leave, including Mercy Corps, International Rescue Committee, Oxfam, and Doctors Without Borders. These groups are responsible for millions of lives in Darfur.

Additionally, the Justice and Equality Movement has just announced that it is pulling out of peace talks with the government. This is unacceptable.

I've said before that the ICC announcement will be what we do with it. Now it has happened and it is up to us to ensure that it is a positive development rather than a negative. So get calling or writing and tell the government that it is unacceptable that Sudan is kicking out aid groups, that it is unacceptable that the peace process doesn't continue, that it is unacceptable that the violence continues.

PS. Go sign the IRC petition to let them back in. Continue reading this article...

Q & A on ICC and Darfur

Nicholas Kristof has a Q & A on the ICC arrest warrants over at the New York Times website that are worth taking a look at. Continue reading this article...

Halifax West High School Shout Out

Way to go Halifax West High School!

They have an article about their efforts in the Chronicle Herald. Continue reading this article...

No, Wait, It's On Its Way...

While the International Criminal Court has not actually announced yet that it is going to issue an arrest warrant against Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, it is expected any day now. This announcement is both a big opportunity and a big danger for the people of Sudan depending on how we, and the rest of the world, use it.

The chief danger lies in the possibility that President al-Bashir will find himself backed into a corner with no reason to work for peace. In this case, he may try to kick out humanitarian aid workers who are saving millions of lives in Darfur, increase attacks on his enemies, the rebel groups, and kick out the joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping mission (UNAMID). Additionally, such a response would endanger the Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the North and South that President al-Bashir signed in 2005. The resumption of war between the North and South would be a devastating increase of violence and suffering for the Sudanese people. Also, President al-Bashir might be tempted to cancel the elections that are meant to happen later this year.

The opportunities, however, are also numerous. If the international community supports the decision of the ICC and offers real protection to the civilians, this could be the first real substantial pressure on the government of Sudan for a meaningful peace process. Similarly, this sort of pressure may also persuade the President of Sudan to actually implement the peace agreements he makes, something that he has rarely done up to this point.

Although it's extremely unlikely right now, it is also possible that the President of Sudan will actually be arrested. In this case, the best we can hope for is a scenario like that which has befallen Charles Taylor, the former leader of Liberia who is now on trial in The Hague.

Needless to say, the most important thing is that the international community ensures that the response to this arrest warrant is one that moves the country in the direction of peace rather than more war. This is an opportunity and a dangerous situation. It is partly up to Canada to determine which way it unfolds.
Continue reading this article...

Breaking the Ice - Rebels to Sit Down with Khartoum?

The past few weeks have seen some devastating violence in South Darfur around a city called Muhajeriya. Some 30,000 people fled their homes as the largest Darfur rebel group, the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), battled with government soldiers and members of another rebel group called the Sudanese Liberation Movement - Minnawi. To cut a complicated story short, the rebel group JEM took a town from a rival rebel group which was allied with the government and then endured a series of government bombings and retaliations which killed dozens of civilians. Some of you may have seen the recent post about Canada's condemnation of this violence.

Now it seems like the violence has halted momentarily with the rebels withdrawing from the town and the government allowing UN officials and aid agencies access. Even more promising, the JEM rebels have announced that they may start preliminary peace talks this week in Qatar.

There are many reasons to be skeptical about these talks, but also many reasons to be optimistic. The last time JEM spoke with the government, they refused to sign onto the peace agreement with the government and took up arms again claiming that the agreement did not adequately address their concerns. Since then, however, they have shown very little interest in meeting with government officials. For that reason, this is a very positive turn-around. Also, JEM is the most powerful rebel group in Darfur at the moment and may be able to act as a leader in negotiations, especially if other groups see JEM as getting a good deal or worry about losing out if an agreement goes through.

From the government's perspective, officials are trying to do everything in their power to deflect the arrest warrant that may be released against Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir in the next week or so by the International Criminal Court (ICC). This may be pushing them to play nice. It is yet to be seen, however, how far they are really willing to go to divert the possible arrest warrant. Similarly, the whole process could be thrown into disarray if the arrest warrant is indeed announced and the President decides there is no longer any reason to try to play by the rules.

Canada and the international community can once again influence the process and reinforce peace talks by supporting the negotiations and trying to pressure other rebel groups into joining peace talks. In fact, if peace talks start next week, it would be a great time for everyone to contact their representatives and urge that Canada support negotiations, monitor agreements, and otherwise make sure that the parties do not revert to violence again.

Stay tuned for more information on this exciting development... Continue reading this article...

Darfur Digest - February

Due to a technical problem, our listserv software has been nonfunctional for the past five weeks. This has meant that we weren't able to send out the January Digest via the listserv and we won't be able to send out the February Digest via the listserv either, unfortunately. Please share the Digest (attached) with anyone who might need it. The executive summary is below. Apologies again for the inconvenience - we are working to resolve the issue.

Executive Summary

Canadian Politics and Darfur: The confluence of American President Barack Obama's inauguration and the return of Canadian parliament may create new opportunities for Canadian action on the Darfur crisis.

Security in Darfur: Tensions in Sudan are growing as the possibility of an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court (ICC) against the President of Sudan, Omar al-Bashir, looms on the horizon. The last two weeks of January saw an upswing in violence as rebel groups in Darfur jostled with each other and government forces for land and power. The Government of Sudan (GoS) broke the unilateral ceasefire it announced in November by bombing positions of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), the largest rebel movement in Darfur. Meanwhile, the joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force (UNAMID) continues to try to make a difference but remains overstretched and ill-equipped.

Negotiations and Engagement in Darfur: The International Criminal Court (ICC) continued to examine the evidence against Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir to determine whether or not a warrant should be issued for his arrest. While China maintained its support for the Government of Sudan (GoS), the new American administration made a number of strong statements on the crisis in Darfur. The Qatar-based Arab-African Committee on Darfur, whose main function is to discuss Arab-African action to restore peace in Darfur, finally met after a number of delays. An increase in rebel factions over the past year and new friction between rebel groups is stalling the peace process.

The Humanitarian Situation in Darfur: The resiliency of the aid community in Darfur is apparent as they continue to plan long-term operations in the face of uncertainty. If an arrest warrant is issued for Sudan's President, a backlash restricting access to the United Nations mission and to humanitarian relief work could be damaging for Darfur's civilians. Tension is mounting in the country as the UN makes contingency plans. Sudan's government has sent a team of traditional leaders from Darfur to address the International Criminal Court in favour of Omar al-Bashir. Yet aid work continues as NGOs begin to plan in advance of the rainy season.

Policy Recommendations

1. Build on Canada's recent commitments to Darfur by appointing a Special Envoy to the region. A Special Envoy could strengthen Canadian policymaking on Darfur in three key ways: 1) providing the world with a public face for Canada's efforts on Darfur, 2) providing a presence on the ground in Sudan, and 3) coordinating an integrated "all of Sudan" approach to Canadian peacebuilding. Specifically, a Special Envoy could play a key role in assisting efforts of the Darfuri rebel groups to form a unified and coherent bargaining position, a critical success factor for renewed negotiations.

2. Form an all-party parliamentary special committee on Darfur whose goal it will be to determine viable actions for the Canadian government to undertake to lead in ending the crisis in Darfur. The committee should 1) exist for a specified period of time, 2) travel to Sudan to collect facts, 3) be fully resourced by the Canadian government and 4) have equal party representation.

3. Engage more actively with the Obama administration to identify new opportunities for collaboration and cooperation on Darfur.

4. Engage more actively in multilateral diplomacy at the UN to bring renewed prominence to the Darfur issue internationally and rally greater international support for conflict resolution efforts.

Continue reading this article...

Back From Sudan - Anne Wagner

I'm sorry to have been so derelict in my blogging duties of late, but luckily there are many Stand'ers out there doing really interesting, inspiring things to cover for me. The blog post below was written by Anne Wagner, a Stand leader who just returned from her second trip to Sudan. Anne is consistently one of the loudest voices for action in Darfur and has accompanied Members of Parliament to the region to see first hand the results of the genocide. She has found that visiting Sudan turns MPs into stronger advocates and supporters of Stand's message.

If you would like to hear more about her trip, you should stop by the South Dining Hall of Hart House at the University of Toronto at 7 PM on Monday, January 26th.
--

I returned from Sudan last week – an inspiring journey that motivates me to continue advocating for change in Darfur and strengthen Canadian policy on genocide.

I interviewed Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), tribal leaders and camp administrators. Notably, I was also very fortunate to track down some of the people I interviewed last year. Here is Amou's story:

Last year, I interviewed Amou as she was surrounded by her six children. Two of her children, infant twins, did not look strong enough to survive. Amou described to me the atrocities she had survived—her husband was killed in Darfur, and she had to lead her children here to the camp, where they did not have shelter, or enough food or water.

Twelve months later, I ran into Amou again during my first walk around the camp. At first, she was shy to talk to me, but her face lit up as soon as I asked her about her children. She was amazed I remembered she had six. I was surprised and thrilled to find out all of her children were still alive. The resilience of the people in the camp, who found enough food, water and shelter to sustain Amou's family, had ensured the survival of these children through the harshest of conditions.

The people in the camp witnessed nearby floods that ruined crops; they received very little aid and an influx of new residents. They are still surviving. I told Amou that I had been showing the picture of her and her children back in Canada, and was explaining to people what I had seen in the camp. She asked me what I planned to do this year.

What do we plan to do this year? This is where you can help me, Stand supporters! What will Stand tell Amou and her children next year?

Continue reading this article...

Along the Border

There is an article in a recent New Yorker that gives a really good anecdotal account of life in the refugee camps in Chad. It's a long read but full of first hand accounts, historical narratives, and in-depth commentary on the situation along the border between Sudan and Chad. It begins with this juicy line...

"Everything is fine, until the moment when it is not. And when that moment comes it can be very quick and very bad."

It continues to talk about the aid workers who enter such situations and what they encounter upon arrival. This story comes from 2003, the outbreak of violence in Darfur:

"In mid-afternoon, [the UNHCR worker] arrived in Adré, a town of ten thousand inhabitants directly across the border with Darfur. Travelling along the border, he saw hundreds of people encamped in makeshift shelters of reeds and straw, with rags and tattered blankets suspended overhead on sticks. Under the midday sun, the temperature could soar to a hundred and ten degrees. Dry winds and sand storms parched the terrain and sucked moisture from anything animate. Women and children dug deep into the sand of the dry riverbeds to find water and foraged miles into the countryside collecting wood to sell at the markets. As Sturm and his team continued along the border, the hundreds became thousands. About seventy-five per cent were women and children, hollow-eyed and lank-skinned from hunger and despair and fatigue. Interviews conducted later by Human Rights Watch and Doctors Without Borders told of families being burned alive in their homes, and of men who had been forced to watch, in the moments before their own deaths, as their wives and daughters were raped. Some refugees had been there for months, and more came every day. Every so often, they saw in the distance a column of black smoke rising from another burning village. In the month before Sturm’s arrival, thirty thousand new refugees had crossed into Chad. The total number gathered along the four-hundred-mile border with Darfur, by rough estimates, came to seventy-seven thousand."

Continue reading this article...

Darfur Digest - January 2009

I. Executive Summary

Canadian Politics and Darfur: With the prorogation of parliament until January 26, there have been no new developments on Canadian politics and Darfur this month. This month‟s section will therefore take the opportunity to examine the past year‟s key developments in Canadian politics regarding the crisis in Darfur.

Security in Darfur: The situation in Darfur remained unstable in December despite renewed
efforts at peace negotiations. The United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping
Operations warned that violence has not decreased since the deployment of the joint United
Nations-African Union peacekeeping force one year ago. The camps for internally displaced
persons continued to be a source of violence and tension in the region and there have been
reports of the use of child soldiers by almost all groups involved in fighting. Clashes occurred
throughout the region, with police officers being killed and the reported assassination of a rebel
group leader. Sexual slavery and forced labour was the focus of a report released this month that
said thousands of people were affected.

Negotiations and Engagement in Darfur: More UNAMID troop contributions were deployed to the Darfur region by Gambia, Ethiopia and Uganda. Ban Ki-Moon asserted that a mission should be deployed in Chad to deal with the overflow of the conflict from the Darfur region. Susan Rice was appointed as the UN Ambassador for the United States and is expected to bring positive change to the Darfur issue. Chief ICC Prosecutor Moreno-Ocampo continues to push for the indictment of President al-Bashir on charges of war crimes and genocide. The peace process is once again put on hold with the SLM‟s rejection of Qatar as a mediator.

The Humanitarian Situation in Darfur: As 2008 ended, refugees were killed and injured in several IDP camps, while six aid workers were abducted and beaten. Sudanese officials are
interfering with non-governmental organizations who they accuse of spying for the ICC,
according to several UN reports. An activist group also launched accusations at Khartoum for
abducting Darfur civilians during raids and forcing them into sex work for soldiers. Significant
amounts of money were donated to fund humanitarian work in Darfur through charities and the
European Commission.


II. Policy Recommendations

1. Build on Canada's recent commitments to Darfur by appointing a Special Envoy to the region.
A Special Envoy could strengthen Canadian policymaking on Darfur in three key ways: 1)
providing the world with a public face for Canada's efforts on Darfur, 2) providing a presence on
the ground in Sudan, and 3) coordinating an integrated “all of Sudan” approach to Canadian
peacebuilding. Specifically, a Special Envoy could play a key role in assisting efforts of the
Darfuri rebel groups to form a unified and coherent bargaining position, a critical success factor
for renewed negotiations.

2. The Canadian government should pursue targeted divestment from Sudan conditioned on the
Sudanese government's cessation of atrocities in Darfur and active engagement in the peace
process.

3. Canada‟s mission to the UN should engage more actively in multilateral diplomacy at the UN
to bring renewed prominence to the Darfur issue internationally and rally greater international
support for conflict resolution efforts. Continue reading this article...

End Slavery in Darfur

This just in from Stand'ers Scott Fenwick and Joel Stephanson - Thousands Made Slaves in Darfur. During the North-South war, Sudan became famous for the slave trade. Armed by the government as proxy militias, Arab tribes on the border with the South would raid Southern villages and kidnap children to sell as slaves in the north. The justification for this practice in many ways was based on ethnicity...in fact, many in the "Arabized" north refer to the more "African" southerners as "abeed," which means slave in Arabic. Because the southerners were viewed as an inferior race, the practice of slavery was accepted all too often.

This BBC article points out that the slave trade is still alive in Darfur, even among government soldiers who kidnap young boys and girls as slaves. I don't know whether there is still the same "rascist" element to it, but it would not surprise me considering the government-sponsored militias and government troops see themselves as more "Arab" and thus superior to ethnic groups like the Fur. (just to remind people, almost everyone in Darfur is a muslim).

Unfortunately, in civil war scenarios like Darfur, it is extremely difficult to combat something like this. Joel Stephanson has recommended checking out the Darfur Consortium, a group of Africa-based and Africa-focused NGOs working to bring peace and justice to Darfur. Otherwise, we need to continue working to bring attention to ongoing human rights abuses like this and demand action from our leaders. If anyone has any other ideas on how to take action to prevent slavery in Sudan, please sound off in the comments section.

And thanks to Joel and Scott for bringing this issue to our attention! Continue reading this article...

One Year Later

The New York Times recently had this important editorial on Darfur. It's good to see that there is still some attention out there for Darfur, an issue that it seems many people have started to give up on. It starts with this:

"In January, President Bush said this about Darfur: “My administration called this genocide. Once you label it genocide, you obviously have to do something about it.”

Yet, last week — nearly one year later — this is what the International Criminal Court prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, told the United Nations Security Council about Darfur: “Genocide continues. Rapes in and around the camps continue. Humanitarian assistance is still hindered. More than 5,000 displaced persons die each month.” How can this still be?

One of the most interesting parts of this article to me was that the author seemed to be celebrating the role of the International Criminal Court and Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo for finally putting some real pressure on the government in Sudan. While the killing has not stopped, the government of Sudan has taken a few superficial steps towards peace, such as calling a ceasefire and pledging to prosecute war criminals. Although these steps at the moment seem to be merely aimed at saving face rather than genuinely working towards peace, it is precisely these sorts of moves that Canada, the US, and other nations should pick up on and build off of. Even a superficial step can turn into reality if there were other nations holding the government accountable to the pledges it makes and the words it speaks in this time period. So I tend to agree with the author of this article - Moreno-Ocampo has generated some real pressure....now it's just time for some one else to pick up on the "ripe moment" he has helped create.

Continue reading this article...

Darfur Digest - December

Stand’s Darfur Digest is a monthly report which contains analysis on current events relevant to the crisis in Darfur and offers a unique Canadian perspective. It chronicles developments in four areas: Canadian politics, the security situation, negotiations and engagement, and humanitarian affairs.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

I. Executive Summary

Canadian Politics and Darfur: Newly-appointed Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon issued a statement supporting the Government of Sudan’s announcement of a unilateral ceasefire in Darfur. There was no mention of Darfur in the Speech from the Throne. Defence Minister Peter MacKay hinted that Canadian troops could still play a role in Afghanistan after the 2011 end-date for the mission, but if not, Canadian Forces could be called to participate elsewhere in the world.

Security in Darfur: The security situation in Darfur came under international attention in November as Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir announced a ceasefire in the region. Despite this, days after the ceasefire announcement there were reports of bombings and UNAMID peacekeepers being attacked. The Indonesian Formed Police Unit (FPU) conducted its first confidence building mission to Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps in Northern Darfur.

Negotiations and Engagement in Darfur: The ICC Prosecutor presented evidence against three rebel commanders for their role in the September 2007 attack against peacekeepers in Darfur. The Arab League and the African Union called on the UN Security Council to suspend the July 2008 ICC charges against al-Bashir. However, the Bush administration has stated that it will veto the effort. In mid-November the Sudanese government called for a ceasefire. This ceasefire, however, was short lived as rebel groups accused the government of attacking an area in northern Darfur. One of the rebel groups (JEM) demanded direct talks with Khartoum and said it would not go to a planned peace conference in Qatar if it involved a large number of Darfur's fractured insurgent movements.

The Humanitarian Situation in Darfur: The United Nations launched the 2009 Work Plan for Sudan in November, valued at $2.2 billion, but a global recession could make it hard to attract the necessary money. On the ground, aid workers fear that Darfur IDP camps will breed long-term dangers, as frustration mounts among the civilian population and violence hampers humanitarian work. A recent UN investigation uncovered that Sudanese officials are working with Chadian rebel forces against the aid community. Meanwhile, dry roads means more access for aid vehicles to reach isolated populations, while the UN relief chief visited Darfur at the end of November.

II. Policy Recommendations

1. Build on Canada's recent commitments to Darfur by appointing a Special Envoy to the region. A Special Envoy could strengthen Canadian policymaking on Darfur in three key ways: 1) providing the world with a public face for Canada's efforts on Darfur, 2) providing a presence on the ground in Sudan, and 3) coordinating an integrated “all of Sudan” approach to Canadian peacebuilding. Specifically, a Special Envoy could play a key role in assisting efforts of the Darfuri rebel groups to form a unified and coherent bargaining position, a critical success factor for renewed negotiations.

2. The Canadian government should pursue targeted divestment from Sudan conditioned on the Sudanese government's cessation of atrocities in Darfur and active engagement in the peace process.

3. Canada’s mission to the UN should engage more actively in multilateral diplomacy at the UN to bring renewed prominence to the Darfur issue internationally and rally greater international support for conflict resolution efforts.

Please forward this to other people interested in making a difference for the people in Darfur.

To receive a copy of the Digest, feel free to send me an email at itemple@standcanada.org
Continue reading this article...

The Problems of Peacekeepers

To pick up on an interesting discussion that was happening earlier on this blog, I'd like to point out an interview with Alan Doss, the head of MONUC, the peacekeeping force in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), in TIME Magazine. Here are some excerpts:

What implications does the success or failure of MONUC have for other peacekeeping operations?
Every case is different. Darfur is very different. Every time a U.N. peacekeeping force deploys, it raises lots of questions. But yes, there are issues raised by our experience that will have a long-term effect. There is a very fine line between peacekeeping and peace enforcement. Our mission was equipped for peacekeeping. And as one of my officers says, you don't go to war in blue helmets and white tanks. When we shift from a monitoring group to one that takes on military elements, we have to change the way we operate...But I think that one should not forget that there have been a lot of achievements. Three to four years ago, the country was dividing into three parts. That was overcome. Most of the country now has peace. This is a country that is literally back from the dead. There is progress...

One important point to take from this statement is the fact that peacekeeping has to be adapted to every scenario. There are distinctions to be made between peacekeeping - the monitoring of a peace agreement; peace enforcement - the enforcing of a peace agreement through force; and peace making - the imposition of peace through the use of force. It is generally agreed that the UN is only capable of peacekeeping because of its lack of resources, confused command structure, inability to make quick decisions, and other challenges. Peacekeeping, however, in its traditional form is meant to be a symbolic protection force more than anything else - a way to overcome the security dilemma whereby neither side will disarm for fear that the other side will not disarm. They deployed to countries that have recently had a peace agreement and allow the rival factions to disarm without losing face while also holding them to their agreements. A more recent version of traditional peacekeepers, like those in Congo or Darfur, are able to use violence to protect civilians or themselves but are still not meant to be actual "peace enforcers". The fact that peacekeeping works in certain scenarios is evident in the progress that has been made in other parts of the Congo.

But what happens when a peace agreement doesn't hold and complex violence breaks out as in Darfur or Congo? There is still no real agreement on what is to be done when the situation is not amenable to peacekeeping. The peacekeepers surely can't start attacking government troops who are committing atrocities because they will be attacked or kicked out of the country. Furthermore, as we've all heard in both Darfur and Congo, they don't have enough troops or resources to effectively "wage war" against violent elements that may be targeting or attacking civilians.

Unfortunately, I don't know how to make peacekeepers better. When it comes down to it, people need to start discussing the practicalities of these scenarios. How do you adapt different mandates to different environments? Is peace enforcement by the UN possible or even desirable? What is clear is that peacekeepers on their own are not able to be the "solution" to a civil war, whether in Darfur or Congo.

I'll end this post with Mr. Doss's quote about R2P, which I think supports this discussion nicely.

The Responsibility to Protect [or R2P, a concept of humanitarian intervention] was only adopted by the U.N. in 2005. How much is MONUC feeling its way here? Is MONUC an experiment?
R2P is a huge step forward ... But the question remains: How do we actually do it? We have come up against the sharp end of R2P. We can claim that responsibility, but actually doing that in North Kivu, with a collapsing army, a resurgence of ethnic groups — well, that raises fundamental questions. When we make these statements, we have to be careful that we have the means to match our mandate. Continue reading this article...

A Vision of Chaos

I would like to take a moment away from the focus on Darfur to highlight the worrying events of the past week in the Great Lakes Region of Africa. While Stand focuses almost exclusively on Darfur and Sudan in its activities (with good reason), it is important to our fundamental mission of making preventing genocide a cornerstone of Canadian foreign policy to stay informed about all pertinent events in the world.

For those who don't know, over the past week the eastern region of North Kivu in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has embarked on a spiraling descent into further violence and chaos. North Kivu is a resource-rich area that has been more or less at the center of the various wars and violent conflicts in the region since the end of the Rwandan genocide in 1994 (many of the Hutus responsible for the Rwandan genocide fled to this region). Last year, a mortality survey conducted by the International Rescue Committee concluded that 5.4 MILLION people have died as a result of war and violence in the DRC since 1998. That's the most amount of people killed in a conflict since World War II. DRC currently plays host to the largest peacekeeping force in the world, at 17,000.

The most recent bout of fighting began in late August when a peace agreement between the government and a rebel group led by Gen. Laurent Nkunda collapsed. Since then some 250,000 people have been forced to flee their homes.

In the past week the situation has deteriorated dramatically due to a very serious and well-crafted offensive by Nkunda's rebels. Hundreds of thousands of people have fled their homes, especially around the provincial capital Goma. Many aid agencies including Oxfam, MSF and IRC have suspended their most if not all of their activities and evacuated most of their personnel. The rebels are now besieging Goma, although things have momentarily calmed down following a cease-fire last night. It is yet to be seen whether the cease-fire will hold. Nkunda claims that he is fighting to protect ethnic Tutsi populations and make sure they get a fair share of the region's resources. Most experts seem to think that he is being supported in some way by the Rwandan government (though of course Rwanda denies this).

Unfortunately, eastern DRC must be one of the most difficult regions in the world to provide minimum standards of protection, with its volatile mix of ex-genocidaires, ethnic tensions, warlords, resources, weak and corrupt government, and interfering neighbors. Outside interference and interventions are difficult enough in a case like Sudan where its more obvious who "the enemy" is. In North Kivu government soldiers have been accused of raping, pillaging and killing civilians as they flee in the face of the better-trained enemy. The rebels also commit horrible acts of violence and are responsible for the majority of the displacement. The UN peacekeeping force (MONUC) has had some notable successes in the past, including by enforcing agreements with gunships at times, an approach to peacekeeping that would more accurately be called "peacemaking" or "peace enforcing" and is controversial to say the least.

So what can we do? Not much, unfortunately. The first thing I would recommend to everybody is to get informed. Do some research, find out about the situation, ask your professors about it. Also, a letter to a newspaper or politician is never a bad idea when trying to bring attention to a bad situation. Getting attention to the conflict is definitely the first step.

I would welcome anybody else's thoughts in the comments section about what we can do to help settle the conflict and prevent the deadly violence that seems all too often to consume the DRC. Continue reading this article...

Back to Darfur

With all the excitement over the elections over the past few weeks, events in Sudan have been a little ignored. Unfortunately, that doesn't mean that the situation has improved at all. In fact, it may just be getting worse again.

To update everyone on the situation, I would like to highlight an article in the Christian Science Monitor from last week:

"Last month saw heavy fighting between government troops and rebel factions in North Darfur. Many of the areas targeted by the government were under control of the only rebel group to have made peace with the government in 2006, contrary to the agreement's cease-fire. Tens of thousands of Darfuris are believed to have been displaced, many of them still hiding in the mountains afraid the bomb-dropping Antonov planes will return...

...Analysts have characterized the current conflict as low-level, compared to the height of the conflict in 2003-04, when government troops and allied militias allegedly burned villages, raped women, and looted animals en masse. But many Darfuris say the conflict is worse today than it was almost five years ago. Rape, looting, and killing by government police are weekly occurrences in camps for the displaced, residents say...

..."People who have been here a long time say this conflict is as bad now as it has ever been," one UN official said. "Things are going to worse before they get better."

So business as usual in Darfur. The government threatens and attacks people in the camps for displaced people. Humanitarian organizations which are supporting millions of people with life-saving work are constantly harassed and pressured to leave. Lawlessness and insecurity are the name of the game.

Meanwhile, in what has become almost a signature move, Omar al-Bashir, the president of Sudan, is once again making a mockery of international peace and justice. This time, he has convened a conference in Khartoum to elaborate a comprehensive vision for peace in Darfur. The only problem: no rebels were invited. None. Zero. Zilch.

Not surprisingly, I don't have a lot of faith in this initiative, which seems very clearly designed to try to deflect the possibility of an arrest warrant against the President from the International Criminal Court. That said, there are a lot of actors involved, including the members of the African Union, the Arab League (traditional Bashir supporters), some civil groups, and international mediators, so wouldn't it be great if I were proven wrong? As I've mentioned before, I think it would be amazing if Sudan's own fledgling civil society were gradually able to hold some sort of peaceful influence on the government. Still, I wouldn't hold your breath...
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