The Sudan Crisis



What is happening in Sudan?

The Islamic Arab government of Lt. Gen. Omar el-Bashir is simultaneously trying to suppress two rebellions. One civil war, against black African rebels in the south, has been dragging on for 20 years; 2 million people have died in that conflict. In 2003, black Africans in the western region of Darfur also rose up against the government in Khartoum, the nation’s capital. El-Bashir responded with a systematic campaign of ethnic cleansing. Sudan’s air force has repeatedly bombed the villages of Darfur, dropping crude bombs onto the straw-roofed huts. Then the Janjaweed—Arab militias mounted on camels and horses, armed with AK-47s and whips—sweep in to murder the men, rape the women, kidnap the children, and steal the cattle. More than 30,000 people have been slain, and 1 million have fled their homes. Most of the refugees are starving, and some are dying in the mine-strewn border region of neighboring Chad. One U.N. official has called the carnage “the world’s greatest humanitarian and human-rights catastrophe.”

- The Week

Action: Tell Secretary of State Colin Powell and Congress to do something to help.