Genocide in Sudan

July 15th, 2005 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0) |

In 1994, a horrible case of genocide erupted in Rwanda in which nearly a million Rwandans were murdered. A feature film was made in 2004 that tells the story of Paul Rusesabagina,¹ a hotel manager who took in many refugees for which he put his life and the life of his family in danger. Hotel Rwanda is a moving film that brings to light the atrocious events that occured in Rwanda in the mid 90’s. I was only ten years old at the time, and I had actually never heard anything about the genocide until the movie. Because I was so young, I don’t feel so bad for not knowing about it, and more importantly, not doing anything about it. The genocide in Rwanda may have ended, but there is a new situation which demands our attention.

Says savedarfur.org:

Violence and destruction are raging in the Darfur region of western Sudan. Since February 2003, government-sponsored militias known as the Janjaweed have conducted a calculated campaign of slaughter, rape, starvation and displacement in Darfur.

It is estimated that 400,000 people have died due to violence, starvation and disease. More than 2.5 million people have been displaced from their homes and over 200,000 have fled across the border to Chad. Many now live in camps lacking adequate food, shelter, sanitation, and health care.

The United States Congress and President George W. Bush recognized the situation in Darfur as “genocide.” Darfur, “near Hell on Earth,” has been declared the worst humanitarian crisis in the world today.

That this is still going on is simply unacceptable. The UN estimates that fifteen to thiry thousand are being killed every month. “According to recent reports by the World Food Program, the United Nations and the Coalition for International Justice, 3.5 million people are now hungry, 2.5 million have been displaced due to violence, and 400,000 people have died in Darfur thus far. The international community is failing to protect civilians or to influence the Sudanese government to do so. ”

So what do we do? The Bible says tell us to learn to “do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, [and] plead the widow’s cause” (Isaiah 1:17, ESV). Although it might seem like we are helpless, we can help. Savedarfur.org has a page with suggestions on how to take action, with lots of helpful tools to get you started. I am simply taking the first step by posting here, getting the news out.

While thinking about the whole situation last night, and brainstorming ways that I can raise awareness of the situation in Sudan, I realized that I can use my job as an RA at school to raise awareness. We are required to have a new bulletin board every month, and mine haven’t always been the greatest.² I am going to create a bulletin board about Sudan, with information about how to get involved, how to spread the message, etc. Maybe I can make a packet and have some RAs from every dorm put one up, so that it’s not just in my building.

More information:

1. Paul Rusesabagina, I’ve heard, will be speaking at Luther College (my alma mater) some time in the next academic year. ↩
2. Two examples: “Am I Addicted to Caffeine?” and “A History of the Chicago Cubs.” Not exactly groundbreaking material. ↩