Darfur Update - Washington Post editorial

The Post had a great editorial today on the big roadblock to ending or ameliorating the genocide in Darfur - which they point out is spreading to nearby regions.

China and Darfur - washingtonpost.com

... the key to this tragedy lies not in the killing fields of western Sudan nor even in the White House. It is to be found instead in Khartoum, Sudan's booming capital. The sleek new office towers sprouting up in the commercial district explain why Sudan's government has resisted American and European pressure to end the genocide. But they also show why Arabs and Asians -- and especially the Chinese -- have the power to influence Sudan and the responsibility to use it.

Sudan has been subject to U.S. sanctions since the 1990s. It has been condemned in numerous United Nations resolutions, and Western firms that do business there risk alienating customers and investors. And yet a $4 billion complex of offices, parks and hotels is rising at the confluence of the White and Blue Niles, complete with the new sail-shaped headquarters of Petrodar, a Chinese-Malaysian-United Arab Emirates oil partnership. Thanks to these investors, along with Kuwaitis, Saudis, Indians and Pakistanis, Sudan's petro-economy is flourishing. This year the economy is expected to grow 13 percent on the back of oil exports, most of which go to China.

... the bigger question is why China, along with Sudan's other Arab and Asian partners, feels free to trample on basic standards of decency. China's economic model rests on access to Western markets -- access that can't be assured given popular resentment of China's growing trade surplus. Equally, China seeks acceptance at the world's diplomatic top table -- and this cause is unlikely to be advanced if China is perceived to be complicit in genocide. Imagine the newspaper ads leading up to the Beijing Games in 2008: Human rights campaigners will call on the world to boycott the Genocide Olympics.

Not everyone sees it the Washington Post way. In the last day I've received emails from two friends of mine explaining the failure to stop the genocide in Darfur.

(1) "he could remove a dictatorship that TODAY is allowing
tens of thousands of its citizens to be killed.  Of course Shrub (ed. note: That's Bush)
wouldn't impose shock and awe on Sudan even in that case, because
there's no oil there." So we intervened in Iraq for the oil, but since there's no oil in the Sudan, why bother? (ed. note: See the WaPo editorial for the refutation - there's plenty of oil in the Sudan, and China is importing it, while sending arms to Sudan and blocking UN action).

(2)"The Africa Action report... urges the U.S. to put the lives of the people of Darfur above the counter-terrorism concerns that have tied Washington to Khartoum, constraining a more robust U.S. response to the genocide and emboldening the Sudanese government ..." It's a new one on me that Washington is connected to Khartoum (capital of Sudan) for anti-terrorism purposes.

Comments

[John Lally]

Faranda: "It's a new one on me that Washington is connected to Khartoum (capital of Sudan) for anti-terrorism purposes."

See L.A.Times' Ken Silverstein's 4/29/05 article,"Official Pariah Sudan Valuable
to America’s War on Terrorism":
http://www.globalpolicy.org/empire/terrorwar/analysis/2005/0429sudan.htm

[tom faranda]

John

Nowhere in the LA Times article you reference does it suggest the U.S. has put anti-terrorism concerns above concern for Darfur victims or that Washington is "tied" to Khartuom.

It does say that the two intelligence agencies have cooperated with each other and that they have a working relationship.

The article (written more than 18 months ago) ends with this:

"Last month, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice sent a letter to the Bashir government calling for steps to end the conflict in Darfur. But the letter, reviewed by The Times, also congratulated Sudan for increased cooperation with an African Union mission to Darfur. It also said the administration hoped to establish a "fruitful relationship" with Sudan and looked forward to continued "close cooperation" on terrorism."

This seems to me to be completely appropriate diplomatic language. What should they have said?

The Global Policy Forum, which has the LA Times article posted, also has a number of articles on their website regarding the situation in Darfur. One of the first ones to come up through their search facility was this:

http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/sudan/2006/0427imperialists.htm

from "Worker's World" April, 2006, and entitled "What Imperialists Don't Say: Oil Is Behind Struggle in Darfur."

According to this article the "Western Imperialists" (France, Britain and of course the U.S.) are competing with China for Sudan oil.

It seems to me that if the Global Policy Forum wants to be credible, they probably shouldn't have neo-communist publications posted on their website.

By the way, did you see the Global Policy Forum "Fair Use Notice" at the bottom of all their articles? They feel they can post other publications complete works on their website, without authorization from the copyright owner. Not link to the article, simply post it on their site. They say that constitutes fair use!

Where is Spitzer when you need him?

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