Posted on 07/02/2004 3:07:56 AM PDT by Timeout
This is a perfect symbol of the U.N.'s deliberate blindness. Here are some snips from the article.
When Annan visited the "settlement" Thursday afternoon all 3,000 refugees who had been there as late as Wednesday were gone. In a move that befuddled U.N. officials, the Sudanese villagers in the camp were moved overnight and in the morning, said Jan Egeland, the U.N. undersecretary general for humanitarian affairs. They were loaded into government trucks "apparently to be dumped," he said, at the gates of the already overcrowded Abu Shouk camp, 12 miles away.
...The Sudanese government's social affairs minister, Ahnoun Mohammed Ebrahim, said the villagers were moved to protect them from possible flooding and disease in the low-lying area when the seasonal rains come. He dismissed suggestions that they were transported to lessen the impact of the crisis for Annan's visit...
"Every day we move people," Ebrahim said to reporters...
"Of course it's a concern," Annan said, referring to the movement of the refugees at Meshkel camp. "We are trying to sort it out. The team on the ground is following it up actively." ...
[Last] Thursday when Annan visited Zam Zam camp, 11 miles south of El Fasher, no militiamen were in sight. Smiling and waving women riding donkeys lined the road to the camp to greet him. But on Sunday, the Janjaweed (militias) roamed the area, riding horses and camels while cradling guns. ...
And this caps it all:
Annan requested a private meeting with a group of women in the camp. ..Note the switch...the women want security to return to their homes. Annan offers security "as long as you are in this camp". U.N.-believable."We lost our houses. They were burned. Some of the Janjaweed rode horses and camels using guns, and then there were bombs," one woman said.
Another woman said her sister was riding a donkey when her village was bombed.
"Her body was divided in half," she said. "Now I must care for her 11 children."
A midwife said she knew of 20 rape victims at the camp.
Annan told the women: "Most of you want to go home as soon as possible. What does the government have to do to make that happen?"
Several women replied, "Security."
"I agree with you. . . . Nobody is going to force you to go home without security," Annan said, touching his heart. "As long as you are in this camp we are going to do everything we can to protect you."
The women clapped and called out in Arabic, "God willing."
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Bump.
Didn't Goebbels have a similar regimen for the Jews incarcerated in the Warsaw Ghetto?
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
-George Santayana.
I remain simply amazed by the media's lack of concern at the U.N.'s inaction on Sudan. I know...what did I expect?! They're still so disappointed that mass refugee camps didn't appear after the Iraq war, poor dears. They'll never hold Kofi accountable. It's all America's fault.
I also think that the horrific-yet simultaneously inspiring-stories of survivors like Francis Bok, have helped to concentrate the mainstream media's attention on this episode of mass genocide directed at Sudan's indigenous Christian/Animist population.
Now that the fighting has spread to Darfur, and begun to affect Muslims, we'll probably start hearing from crackpots like Louis Farrakhan. Hopefully, "Calypso Gene" will finally have some useful comments to offer.
Overall, I think the press is starting to get the message. Though I must admit, it's awfully easy to overlook the systematic rape, murder and expulsion of Sudanese black Muslims, especially after you've been looking the other way-regarding Sudan's other dissident minorities-for the past two decades.
You nailed it. I hadn't even thought of the holiday-weekend angle.
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