LET THEM EAT HUMOUS:

Sudan: The forgotten genocide (Fred Bridgland , The Scotsman, May 21st, 2004)

For in truth, a decade after the world recoiled with horror from Rwanda’’s genocide, government-backed Arab militias have killed tens of thousands of black Africans in the region and driven others from their homes.

Kofi Annan, the United Nations’’ secretary general, warned seven weeks ago that an international force might be necessary to prevent a repeat of Rwanda’’s tragedy in Darfur, an arid area the size of France that is home to both black and Arab tribes. "The risk of genocide remains frighteningly real," Mr Annan said.

Just as Rwanda’’s former government gave weapons to Hutu militias to massacre Tutsi tribespeople, so Sudan’’s National Islamic Front (NIF) regime has armed an Arab militia so it can kill, rape and pillage non-Arabic-speaking black Africans.

But the international community has done little to help the people, other than to debate whether events there should be described as "genocide" or "ethnic cleansing".

Mr Annan said he felt a deep sense of foreboding over the situation. He added: "Whatever terms it uses to describe the situation, the international community cannot stand idly by." [...]

The ethnic cleansing/genocide is an attempt by the NIF to replace the black population of the comparatively fertile Jebel Marra area with Arab settlers, humanitarian groups say.

"The aim is to kill as many people as possible and drive the remainder from their lands, destroying the fabric of rural society," reports the specialist journal Africa Confidential. "Proxy militias torch villages and exterminate villagers, slaughtering livestock and poisoning wells with corpses to prevent residents returning. Gang rape of women (often branded afterwards) and children reinforces the terror and helps to produce an ‘‘Arab’’ next generation. Abduction is widespread in Darfur, with groups of women flown away by helicopter."

The spearhead of Khartoum’’s assault is a 20,000-strong Arab militia called the Janjaweed (Men on Horseback). The Janjaweed frequently attacks after Sudanese MiG fighters and helicopter gunships have softened up the targets. Janjaweed fighters are paid an initial $100 (££56) and given licence to loot. [...]

The slaughter in Darfur is entirely racist, as the blacks of Darfur are Sunni Muslims, the same branch of Islam as Sudan’s Arabs.

There is more than a little irony in seeing Kofi Annan call for foreign intervention to stop an Arab government from slaughtering its people, but the situation is too tragic for humour. We all know who he means when he speaks of the responsibilities of the “international community”, but perhaps we should reflect a bit on who he doesn’t mean. What Arab or Islamic voice is speaking out here? Christians act to save Christians (and intervene to condemn warring Christians as in Ireland) and Jews go to heroic lengths to aid and protect Jews. Is the fate of these wretched people of any interest to their billion co-religionists from Rabat to Jakarta?

Not that you would notice. One of the features of cultures of victimhood is a lack of a sense of responsibility, not only for one’s own fate, but also that of others. We in the West can be woefully naive about our ability to save or help peoples in remote and savage lands, but at least we get upset enough to try. Does the fact that such an impulse is so foreign to so much of the Muslim world explain some of the current difficulties in Iraq in the sense that Iraqis must make tremendous leaps of faith to even dare hope that someone really does want to help them?

The leaders of the Arab League are meeting in Tunis this weekend. The agenda consists of the Palestinian issue, Iraq and political reform. Of course we wish them a pleasant time and every success.