(Arial photo of Darfur refugee camp)
The conflict in Darfur, the Western province on Sudan is the most protracted of the 21st century. Since 2003, the people of Darfur have sustained violence, genocide, starvation, disease and profound misery. While estimates range, Amnesty International puts the death toll at 300,000 (95,000 killed and more than 200,000 dead from conflict-related hunger or disease), while 2 million Darfurians have sought refuge in neighboring Chad and the Central African Republic and live in squalid conditions in refugee camps. Click here or here for more background on the conflict in Darfur.
Those international actors committed to stopping the violence in Darfur have expressed despair over the slow pace of the peace process. Today the Washington Post published a column that offers a shred of optimism. In the column Andrew Natsios, the Bush administration's special envoy to Darfur from October 2006 to December 2007, and a former U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Administrator and Special Coordinator for International Disaster Assistance and Special Humanitarian Coordinator for the Sudan, explains “Why I Think we Can Still Save Darfur.”
Back in a 2004 Natsios gave a speech to a Joint UN-EU meeting in Geneva in which he declared that the situation in Darfur at that time was “the worst humanitarian crisis in the world today.” In today's column he again declared: “Anyone serious about saving Darfur knows that the situation on the ground is still anarchy.” He powerfully describes what he took away from a 2005 visit to the region:
“I came face to face with something often lost in the well-meaning debate over Darfur: the seething undercurrent of rage that could explode at any moment among the survivors of Khartoum's atrocities, who have been crammed into squalid displacement camps with no work, no leadership and no hope. Time weighs heavily on people with such awful memories, particularly when they have little else to do but nurse their fury.”
Natsios still holds on to hope that an international coalition, lead by the US, and with the support of civil-society delegations, can deal with the crisis. His recipe for a peaceful solution to the conflict goes like this:
“The United Nations and the African Union, encouragingly, are now trying to create “civil society councils” to represent the residents of the camps at the peace talks. But the Sudanese regime, feeling predictably edgy about new leaders with deep roots in their communities, is disrupting the selection process. And some rebels also dislike the idea of councils that they can't control; I’ve been told that one rebel leader — Abdul Wahid al-Nur, who has been living safely in Paris for nearly two years — has threatened through his henchmen in the camps to kill anyone who volunteers to serve on the councils.
Reaching a deal won't be easy, but the path ahead is clear: The United States, with other concerned countries, must insist that the councils in the camps be selected without interference, that civil-society delegations to the peace talks be increased in size and authority, that Darfur's Arab tribes get seats at the table, and that Sudan's neighbors stop arming rebel warlords. The longer Darfur languishes without a peace agreement, the greater the risk of more explosions in the camps like the one I witnessed and the less the chances that the incoming peacekeeping troops can succeed.”
He concluded: “Darfur's people need help, and they can wait no longer.” This refrain has been repeated since 2003. While optimism is hard to come by, the international community will need more than a positive outlook to put an end to this devastating conflict.
