Millions About To Die

The situation is Darfur is rapidly deteriorating. It's sad that it takes George Clooney to get the world to pay attention to a genocide staring them in the face. The weakness of the UN Charter, which must ask permission from a host nation to send in a peacekeeping force, is in evidence here. But in many ways the UN is a convenient scapegoat for the inability of individual countries to accept responsibility for mass murder while they stand by idly. NATO, or a bolstered AU, or even ad hoc coalitions could enter the Sudan to save the lives of these people. But they have as yet not stepped up to the plate. I was encouraged that President Bush chose to mention Darfur, unsolicited, in his press conference yesterday. But the position of the United States government for going on two years has been that this is a genocide. And precious little has been done about stopping the killing. I'm not talking about humanitarian aid: the world has done their part in that, led by the United States. I'm talking about disarming the janjaweed and allowing Darfurians to end their ceaseless life in fear.

I'm happy that Tony Blair is demanding that the international community do something. And I'm glad that an international series of events are planned for tomorrow. I'll endeavor to visit one in my community. But the time for talk is over. In two weeks the Khartoum government will expel the meager African Union forces that have been the only thing standing in the way of mass death. Air attacks have increased in recent weeks, and women cannot leave their villages without fear of rape, yet will starve if they stay in their camps. This is unacceptable. Having lived through Rwanda and Bosnia, it is unacceptable for me to silently witness another ethnic cleansing. This is beyond politics, and is about basic human rights. The Khartoum government must be held accountable for mass murder, and must be stopped. Today. Right now. no exceptions.

Here's something you can do. There's a lot more where that came from.

UPDATE: Mark Leon Goldberg notes that the President's remarks on Darfur were almost entirely about what the UN has to do, instead of his country's responsibility. Again, the UN is the scapegoat.

First things first: Legally speaking, the Security Council does not need to pass another resolution to deploy peacekeepers to Darfur without Khartoum’s permission. However, the logistics on the ground in Darfur require that Khartoum grant its consent; the 17,000 troops authorized by Resolution 1706 somehow need to get to the remote region, and once there, they would need to be supplied.

To be sure, this is frustrating the U.N. process, but it is not an insurmountable diplomatic obstacle. So far, China and Russia, which have close ties to the government of Sudan, have been unwilling to press the Khartoum into accepting the blue helmets. If President Bush were truly serious about stopping the genocide, he would pick up the phone, call Hu Jintao and Vladamir Putin, and make Darfur a priority of our bilateral relations with China and Russia.

The UN is where countries that don't get along can dump all their tensions and find a convenient body to blame.