[allAfrica.com] [celtel.com] Understanding the Darfur Conflict Vanguard (Lagos) OPINION August 19, 2004 Posted to the web August 19, 2004 By Joel Gure The conflict is really nothing more than fighting between nomads and farmers over scarce resources. AFRICAN leaders, meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, July 7, have asked the Sudanese government to intervene in the conflict, raging on in the Darfur region of the country, where thousands of civilians have reportedly died and about a million more have been displaced. Early reports of the conflict have come mainly from the western media, which claimed that the conflict was being perpetuated by Arab militiamen, nicknamed Janjaweed, against the black African civilian population. The US has specifically accused the Sudanese government of backing a genocide campaign of extermination against the black African population of the region, a charge the government has denied. The African leaders have, however, proclaimed that the Darfur conflict has not amounted to genocide. They have not even indicted the Sudanese government of complicity in the conflict. Instead the African Union (AU) Peace and Security Council issued a statement saying that "even though the crisis in Darfur is grave with unacceptable levels of deaths, human suffering and destruction of homes and infrastructure, the situation cannot be described as a genocide." In other words, the AU is saying that the US position on the Darfur conflict is not entirely true, and that the accounts of the conflict have been exaggerated somewhat. That is the clearest message yet from the regional body that the US, and indeed any government, however powerful it considers itself to be, cannot impose its opinion on the rest of humanity. There are always alternative means of verifying claims, especially that involving conflicts like the one in Darfur. The AU has conducted its own investigations and has come up with its findings, which is not quite in line with that of the US. US policing assignment The US has appointed itself the policeman of the world and has always played this self-appointed role selectively, in utter disregard of international opinion. It is not surprising that the US was quick to jump to the conclusion that the conflict in Darfur was an ethnic genocide campaign, and that the Sudanese government has everything to do with it. The US has, since the inception of the current warmongering Bush administration, been suspicious of the government in Khartoum. The US has considered Sudan part of, what it regards, an axis of evil, alongside other countries like Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Syria and North Korea. This accusation of the US therefore, is something akin to calling a dog a bad name in order to hang it. Is this accusation a prelude to a US led invasion of the country? We have already seen what became of Afghanistan, after the US accused the government there of harbouring terrorists, and what is becoming of Iraq, after the US accused Saddam Hussein of amassing weapons of mass destruction. Is Sudan next in line? Just recently the US congress passed a resolution asking for the intervention of its government in the Darfur crisis. African intervention The AU is determined not to give the US a pretext to conduct an imperialist expansionist campaign on African soil. The AU has already directed a deployment of about 300 African peacekeeping forces to the troubled region. The Sudanese government, on its part has accepted the gesture. The government, in response to the African initiative, is meeting with the government of neighbouring Chad to discuss how to bring the conflict to an end. Africa can deal with its own conflicts and has always dealt with its conflicts without necessarily relaying on the US or on Europe. Sierra Leone, Liberia, Rwanda, Burundi, Mozambique, Angola, South Africa and Zimbabwe are countries in which African initiative have helped in resolving crisis. Intervention from outside has always compounded the problem. For instance, by emphasising the differences between "Arabs" and "Black Africans" in the Darfur conflict, the US would merely worsen the ethnic tension, and undermine African solidarity. There are no Arabs in Sudan. Sudan is an African country of diverse ethnicity, just like Nigeria, and emphasis therefore ought to be placed on peaceful co-existence not on ethnic origins. The conflict is really nothing more than fighting between nomads and farmers over scarce resources, which, with a little help from rebels, has exploded into the current conflict leading to high proportion of casualties on both sides. Sudan should be helped to develop greater awareness and tolerance of the different cultures and traditions that exist in that vast country. No one understands the Sudanese situation better than the African leaders, who have now intervened in the crisis. Western perception of the crisis would only result in escalation. For instance the US and Britain have sponsored a resolution at the UN Security Council calling for sanctions against the Sudanese government. That action alone undermines the initiatives of the African leaders and would, if the resolution is passed, also undermine the efforts of the Sudanese government in trying to contain the conflict.   =============================================================================   Copyright © 2004 Vanguard. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). =============================================================================