One Year After Declaring It Genocide, U.S. Congress Still Yet to Act

[G_j]

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0725-10.htm

Published on Monday, July 25, 2005 by OneWorld.net

One Year After Declaring It Genocide, U.S. Congress Still Yet to Act to Protect Darfur's Citizens, Groups Charge
by Abid Aslam

WASHINGTON - Congress has done little to protect lives in Darfur in the year since it declared, unanimously, that mass killings there amounted to genocide, a leading U.S.-based advocacy group has charged amid an upsurge in violence in the western Sudanese region.

''Legislative action on Darfur has failed to build on the strong statement of bipartisan support'' shown on July 22, 2004, when Congress issued its declaration, said Salih Booker, executive director at Africa Action.

''Congress has focused on sanctions and divestment, which are insufficient to stop genocide, and it has let the administration off the hook for its appalling apathy on this crisis,'' said Booker. His organization has led calls for urgent multinational intervention to quell fighting that has killed some 400,000 and driven more than half the region's 5.5 million people from their homes and villages over the past three years, according to estimates from U.N. agencies and advocacy groups.

On Sunday, Sudan's army and rebels accused each other of fresh attacks on villages and convoys starting last Friday. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, on a visit to Sudan last week, urged the government to end the violence.


..more..
--------------

meanwhile the Bush admin. treads softly because the Darfur government is now 'helping in the war on terror' :argh:

[G_j]

1. kick

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

2. kick

[G_j]

3. US has reestablished friendly relations with the Khartoum government

http://www.politicalaffairs.net/article/articleview/1539/1/109/

Sudan Scuffle Bigger Deal than Genocide?
By Joel Wendland

After a scuffle between Sudanese government security officers and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s entourage overshadowed Rice’s visit to the violence-torn country, human rights organizations criticized the Bush administration and the international media for failing to address the serious situation in Darfur, a southern state of the Sudan.

<snip>
Meanwhile, just months after the administration’s genocide declaration and a resolution by the UN Security Council to bring war criminals before the International Criminal Court (over a US abstention), the US reestablished friendly relations with the Khartoum government and restored aid, intelligence collaboration and other ties.

Additionally, the US refused to adopt sanctions against the Sudanese government and has failed to provide assistance to the small African Union peacekeeping mission called into Darfur to protect refugees.

Africa Action, an African affairs human rights organization, expressed "outrage" yesterday at what it called "the misplaced priorities of US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice during her first visit to Sudan."

Yesterday’s scuffle between Sudanese security officers and Rice’s team generated "greater attention and indignation from US officials and international media" than has the ongoing genocide in that country read a press statement from Africa Action.

..more..

[G_j]

4. kick?