[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 133 (Thursday, November 18, 2004)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E2031-E2032]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              ASSISTING THE PEACEKEEPING EFFORT IN DARFUR

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. CHARLES B. RANGEL

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                      Wednesday, November 17, 2004

  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, the ongoing crisis in Darfur, Sudan 
continues to be an issue of high concern to the American people. 
According to United Nations and U.S. officials, the situation in Darfur 
is the worst current humanitarian and human rights crisis in the world.
  Out of a population of 7 million people, 1.2 million are internally 
displaced, 200,000 have been forced into exile, and an estimated 70,000 
civilians have been killed. The crisis necessitates not only financial 
assistance, but also that of a military and logistical nature. A 
November 17, 2004 editorial in the Washington Post spoke to the current 
state of the Darfurian peacekeeping effort.
  Despite widespread condemnation by the international community 
regarding the Darfur genocide, few in the West have been willing to 
offer troops or logistics to the peacekeeping effort. The African Union 
has attempted to fill the void through its seven hundred man observer 
force. However, the AU force is severely undermanned and underfunded.
  The AU asserts it will need $80 million just to sustain a force of 
3,000 for one year. Many experts believe that an additional 30,000 to 
60,000 troops will be needed to adequately secure the Darfur region. 
This is in addition to the need for logistical support and increased 
provision of military vehicles and aircraft.
  The AU will no doubt need assistance in such an endeavor. America, as 
the greatest military power in the world, should not allow this 
deficiency to continue. Indeed, the U.S. currently has a contingent of 
2,500 troops in nearby Djibouti, from which it can initially draw. The 
U.S. military airlifted several hundred African soldiers from Nigeria 
and Rwanda into Darfur last month, but this represents the only major 
U.S. logistical operation to date.
  More can and must be done by the U.S. in providing military and 
logistic resources for the Darfur peacekeeping effort. The 
Administration has long cited the liberty and freedom of the Iraqi 
people as a rationale for its military commitment in that country. I 
know we all agree that the people of Darfur deserve the same, so I am 
hopeful that progress can be made on this important issue.

               [From the Washington Post, Nov. 17, 2004]

                          Diplomacy and Darfur

       A full arsenal of diplomatic tricks has been tried on 
     behalf of Darfur, the western province of Sudan where the 
     government is orchestrating genocide. A number of A-list 
     statesmen--Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair, Secretary of 
     State Colin L. Powell, U.N. Secretary, General Kofi Annan--
     have journeyed to Sudan to demand an end to the killing; 
     still the genocide continues. Cease-fires, undertakings and 
     protocols have been negotiated and signed; still the genocide 
     continues. Two U.N. Security Council resolutions have 
     condemned the government's behavior; still the genocide 
     continues. Tomorrow and Friday, in a triumph of hope over 
     experience, the Security Council will convene an 
     extraordinary session in Kenya, hoping to shine the spotlight 
     on Sudan's suffering. But unless the council members

[[Page E2032]]

     stiffen their rhetoric with sanctions, they will spotlight 
     their own impotence.
       Sudan's pragmatic dictatorship has bowed in the past to 
     determined external pressure. It expelled Osama bin Laden and 
     negotiated an end to its long-running war with rebels in the 
     south, both thanks to the threat of sanctions. But Sudan's 
     rulers do not make concessions if they don't have to do so, 
     and they believe they can exterminate tens of thousands of 
     people in Darfur and get away with it. When outsiders wax 
     especially indignant, the junta signs another protocol and 
     makes a tactical concession. But its strategy remains 
     unchanged: to cement control over Durfur by decimating the 
     tribes that back various local rebels.
       The first phony concession came in April. Sudan's 
     government signed on to a cease-fire promising to ``refrain 
     from any act of violence or any other abuse on civilian 
     populations.'' Since then the government has participated in 
     unprovoked assaults on villages, murdering men, raping women 
     and tossing children into flames that consume their huts. In 
     July Sudan's rulers signed a communique with Mr. Annan, 
     promising to ``ensure that no militias are present in all 
     areas surrounding Internally Displaced Persons camps.'' Since 
     then militias have continued to encircle the camps, raping 
     women and girls who venture out in search of firewood. In 
     August Sudan's government promised Jan Pronk, Mr. Annan's 
     envoy, to provide a list of militia leaders. No list has been 
     forthcoming. Last week, in a concession that perhaps 
     reflected nervousness about the approaching Security Council 
     meeting in Kenya, the government signed two new protocols, 
     committing itself among other things to protect the rights of 
     Internally Displaced Persons.'' A few hours later, government 
     forces stormed a camp for displaced people.
       In sum, the considered judgment of Sudan's rulers is that 
     they can flout international commitments with impunity. 
     Unless that judgment can be changed, the Security Council 
     session in Kenya will not achieve anything. Sudan's 
     dictatorship must be credibly threatened with sanctions that 
     target officials responsible for war crimes, and these 
     officials must also be made to face the possibility of 
     prosecution. Beyond that, outsiders need to recognize that 
     there is little prospect of security for Darfur's people--and 
     therefore little prospect of a return to destroyed villages, 
     a resumption of agricultural production and an escape from 
     starvation--without a serious peacekeeping force. Gen. Romeo 
     Dallaire, the U.N. commander in Rwanda during the genocide a 
     decade ago, has suggested that a force of 44,000 is needed. 
     Charles R. Snyder, the senior State Department official on 
     Sudan, has estimated that securing Darfur would take 60 to 70 
     battalions.
       More than a year and a half into Darfur's genocide, the 
     United States and its allies have proved unwilling to 
     consider that kind of commitment. They have moved at a 
     snail's pace to support a 3,500-strong African Union force, 
     which in any case would be inadequate; the record of 
     deploying underpowered peacekeepers in war zones is that the 
     peacekeepers get humiliated. The allies are starting to 
     discuss another U.N. resolution, but this seems likely yet 
     again to lack a real threat of sanctions. Up to a point, this 
     is understandable: Security Council members such as China are 
     opposed to strong action, and the United States is conserving 
     limited military and diplomatic resources for Iraq and the 
     war on terrorism. But Darfur's crisis is so awful that the 
     usual balancing of national priorities is immoral. Some 
     300,000 people may have died in Darfur so far, and the dying 
     is not yet finished.

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