In response to last week's report on Sudan by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the humanitarian agency Church World Service says that the debate over the location and composition of a war crimes tribunal diverts attention from the immediate priority, which must be ending the ongoing genocide and attending to humanitarian needs. CWS reports that so far, the needs have remained un-met after months of security struggles.

Reports from Darfur are "discouraging," according to CWS Executive Director and CEO Rev. John L. McCullough. "Insecurity and detention of NGO staff have meant that programs in some camps for the displaced have either been scaled down or curtailed completely for short periods."

"The transport of food has been affected, meaning an increase in malnutrition particularly in the age group of 10 and younger," McCullough added.

Although the euphoria that has been triggered by the widely-celebrated Jan. 9 signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement was "unprecedented in our part of the world", UN Under-Secretary for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland said the continuing atrocities in Darfur could derail the Comprehensive Peace Agreement.

In agreement with Egeland’s statement, the CWS office at the United Nations, together with Africa Action, a Washington-based group, joined to again call for the international community to act immediately to stop the ongoing violence.

"The African Union monitoring mission in Darfur must be reinforced," said Africa Action’s Ann-Louise Colgan, Director of Policy Analysis and Communication, and Marie Clarke Brill, Director of Public Education and Mobilization.

Earlier, when McCullough spoke at a public seminar at the United Nations in November 2004, the CWS Director asked when the international community would take the necessary steps to act on behalf of Sudan’s 1.5 million displaced people, mostly women and children. Since the conflict in Darfur in early 2003, an estimated 70,000 people have been killed in the vast and impoverished region in the west of Sudan.

While over 1.5 million people are internally displaced, another 200,000 others live as refugees in neighbouring Chad, where a meeting took place last Thursday between Sudanese officials and Darfur rebels to discuss implementing the ceasefire agreements. According to reports, the talks were attended by international mediators and Alpha Oumar Konare, the chairman of the African Union commissions.

Currently, Church World Service—which serves as the relief, development, and refugee assistance ministry of 36 Protestant, Orthodox, and Anglican denominations in the United States—is reportedly helping to support a US$17.5 million effort with international partners alongside the Sudan Council of Churches to provide shelter, medicine, water, and tools to people living in camps, having fled their villages under attack.




Kenneth Chan
Ecumenical Press