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From The Washington Post - It's Happening Again.
And another excellent, moving column by Nicholas Kristof of the NY Times about the same subject as the WP story – the genocide that is poised to occur in Sudan. A couple of months ago I wrote about the situation in the Sudan and how it didn't seem as if the U.S. - and other countries - had really learned anything from the massacre that occured in Rwanda in the early 1990s. I continue to be ... well, dumbfounded, really ... at the unwillingness to call this situation what it is.
Genocide.
I can't help but think that the only reason the U.S. government hasn't called it as such is because the Bush Administration is too busy fighting failing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq to get involved (militarily or humanitarily) anywhere else.
At this point, I really think our efforts are better used elsewhere. Not that I'm advocating a "cut and run" out of the Middle East, it's just ... it's just a shame that as a country we've overextended ourselves to the point that we are unwilling to get involved where we are desperately needed.
But maybe that's also because Sudan doesn't have anything we want, or need, and therefore we don't much care to concern ourselves with their internal struggles. Survival of the fittest, baby. The meek shall inherit the dearth.
There's an online petition being created that will be sent to Secretary of State Colin Powell that urges him and the U.S. government to acknowledge the actions in Sudan as genocide. The petition contains some very good background information about what is happening there, as does the Human Rights Watch website.
Posted by Highwaygirl on June 23, 2004 03:41 PM to the category Current Affairs