Janjawid jihadis begin Darfur incursion

[SteveGrenard]

And while we bicker about head scarves and the excesses of the Shari’a courts and debate whether all muslims or just some muslims are responsible for these things, the real tragedy has begun to unfold in the Horn of Africa, a tragedy perpetrated by muslim Arab militias, providing a fresh example of what happens when these scum achieve any real power. In the name of Islam these jihadists are nothing more than thugs and criminals with a mandate from allah and their Arab dominated government. Things will get worse. The Janjawid are posters for why the spread of islam needs to be checked. Will muslims opposed to this go to Darfur and fight these militias? Will Saudi arabia and other Islamic states voice their opposition? So far not a peep. It will be interesting to see what position the Arab League takes at a meeting in Ethiopia (see last quote below):

THE residents of Abu Gerein aid camp counted 35 government lorries moving under the midday sun. Some were armed with heavy machineguns, others packed with soldiers. Behind them came horses carrying the feared Arab militias known as Janjawid. Women and children scattered as the gunmen rode in. Kadija Abakr Abdelrahman ducked into her simple home in search of safety. “There was a man, Arab, Janjawid,” she said, simply, six days later in the gloom of El Geneina hospital, holding Aasha, her three-year-old daughter on her hip.

He had demanded money, levelling his AK47 at the toddler. “I told him there was nothing, but he insisted, ‘I will shoot, I will shoot, I will shoot’,” she said, wiping a tear from her cheek. He wasn’t bluffing. He shot Aasha in the neck twice. She will live. But by the end of the day 13 people had been killed in three waves of attacks on the camps around Sirba, in western Darfur. Another 18 lay injured and more than 200 homes had been burnt to the ground. Three and a half years after the farming tribes of Darfur took up arms against an Arab-dominated regime in Khartoum, the killing continues.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2457420,00.html


And from the Council on Foeign Relations today:

The international community remains deadlocked over what to do about Darfur. Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir has blocked the deployment of a 20,000-strong UN peacekeeping force there for the past three months. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan convened a conference in Ethiopia on Thursday to address the region's escalating violence (AP). Darfur is currently occupied by an undermanned, underfunded African Union (AU) force lacking a mandate to protect civilians. Annan proposes the deployment of an international force (LAT) on the border of Chad and Sudan or a hybrid force of AU and UN troops.

During the three-month stalemate, the situation in Darfur has gone from bad to worse. Arab janjaweed militias, backed by the Sudanese government, have stepped up attacks against civilians. Human Rights Watch has documented cases of aerial bombings of civilians by Sudanese government forces. Several humanitarian organizations have pulled out of the region, closing refugee camps and leaving some 300,000 Darfurians without aid. And camps are no guarantee of protection: A Darfuri told UN envoy Jan Egeland the Janjaweed are now patrolling inside the camps, threatening the refugees (Reuters) not to stay.

http://www.cfr.org/publication/12044/deadlocked_over_darfur.html?breadcrumb=/

Things have been very bad in the Horn of Africa for years. Today they just got worse.

Outgoing secretary-general of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, is attending high-level talks in Ethiopia to discuss the Darfur crisis on Thursday.

The talks will also be attended by senior officials from the United States, the European Union, Russia and China, along with representatives from Congo, Gabon, Egypt and the Arab League.

The meeting comes after a series of attacks in Darfur, in western Sudan, which led to the deaths of at least 40 civilians.

The Sudanese government is also expected to send representatives to the meeting, despite Khartoum’s opposition to U.N. involvement in Darfur.

http://themedialine.org/news/news_detail.asp?NewsID=15706

 

[Bikewer]

It's been what, two years now since Colin Powell declared "genocide", and yet nothing is done. NPR has had ongoing articles on the situation, including one on The World yesterday detailing new attacks in Chad from the same militias.
The commentators speculate that Sudan wishes to destabilize the entire region, eliminating any threat from the African Union.
Meanwhile, China has big oil contracts....

They also interviewed young, wealthy folks of Arab extraction in Khartoum, who are living the good life and feeling the benefits of oil-wealth while not 200 miles away in Dharfur, gang rape and murder are the norm.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I wouldn't have said anything in western Sudan was in "the Horn of Africa". It's the sticky-out bit with Somalia, Djibouti, and Ethiopia, isn't it?

Hey, if you didn't want to hear pedantic bickering, you shouldn't be online.

 

[fuelair]

Ah, yes another group of azzwipe Muslim fundie murderers the Jondikwad.

 

[SteveGrenard]

(a)I wouldn't have said anything in western Sudan was in "the Horn of Africa". It's the sticky-out bit with Somalia, Djibouti, and Ethiopia, isn't it?

(b)Hey, if you didn't want to hear pedantic bickering, you shouldn't be online.

a. Yeah, I should have said the greater horn of Africa, try these:

http://www.peaceworkmagazine.org/pwork/0204/020413.jpg

http://images.google.com/imgres?img...s?q=greater+horn+of+africa&svnum=10&hl=en&lr=

b. Where did I say I didn't want to hear pedantic bickering?
Where did I say the bickering was pedantic? OOps. I am bickering.

 

[Skeptic]

It will be interesting to see what position the Arab League takes at a meeting in Ethiopia

They'll condemn israel. Why do you ask?

 

[Darth Rotor]

http://www.cfr.org/publication/12044/deadlocked_over_darfur.html?breadcrumb=/

Things have been very bad in the Horn of Africa for years. Today they just got worse.

Compare this war to the 19 year civil war in Mozambique. Who is arming which factions from outside the Sudan?

Secondly, how does the UN come into the Sudan, one of Boutros Boutros Ghali's infamous "failed states" (Haiti, Sudan, Afghanistan, Mozambique) as anything other than an invader to supress a civil war, to conduct peace enforcement on a scale that renders the Bosnia operation trivial in comparison? (In terms of the scope of the UN Mandate required.) How can the UN characterize any intervention as other than blatant Global Federalism?

How does one get all five permanent members to vote "yes" to an armed intervention? (IMO, you can't. I don't think the Chinese give a crap, though I think some of their leadership would jump at the chance to lead such a UN operation if it gets them a bigger political foothold in Africa.)

The new Secretary General has his work cut out for him. I think he will see the Sudan as a plate of spoiled kimchee.

DR

 

[SteveGrenard]

They'll condemn israel. Why do you ask?

Where was this question? I don't see a question.

But here is one:

will the Arab League condemn the Janjawids or not?

 

[Garrette]

They also interviewed young, wealthy folks of Arab extraction in Khartoum, who are living the good life and feeling the benefits of oil-wealth while not 200 miles away in Dharfur, gang rape and murder are the norm.

They're not the first. bin Laden spent productive years there upon leaving Saudi Arabia.