You Can Help Stop the Genocide in Darfur

In February of 2003, conflict broke out in the Darfur region of Sudan. The fight began with Sudanese rebels attacking government facilities, as the result of severe economic hardship and years of internal fighting. The government sponsered militia groups known as "janjaweed" militia to retaliate. 

Had the fighting been confined to military groups, that would have been no more or less tragic than any other war. But the Janjaweed responded to the rebel attacks by launching wholesale attacks on any village in any area they considered to be disloyal to the government. For the past three years, these attacks have continued and spread. Whole cities have been and are being burned to the ground. Over 400,000 people have been killed and millions more are homeless and starving. Looting runs rampant. Mass rape happens on an unimaginable scale. At least 2.5 million people have lost their homes. At least three million are starving. 

Most of the displaced men, women, and children are living in camps, dependent on the help of assistance from international groups such as UNICEF and Doctors Without Borders, protected only by a small, determined but vastly inadequate group of African Union peacekeepers. They live on less than subsistance rations and they dare not leave the camp. The women are afraid togather firewood beyond the camp borders for fear of rape and/or murder. Medicine, despite the valient efforts of Doctors Without Borders and other international groups, is in terribly short supply. 

To make matters worse, groups who are trying to help are being forced to withdraw most, or in some cases all, of their personnel due to the extreme danger and lack of security. Save the Children and Relief International, for instance, were actively helping but have been forced to leave due to Janjaweed attacks on their workers and their equipment and vehicles. Oxfam, which has been extremely active in providing assistance, has had to close some stations for the same reason. Cars carrying medicine and suppies are regularly hijacked. At least twelve aid workers have been killed since May of this year.