❧❧❧ Whatever you can do or dream, you can BEGIN IT. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Goethe ❧❧❧
❧❧❧ You were born whole, not broken. Sandra Hammel ❧❧❧
The House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa held a hearing on ethnic cleansing and the continuing humanitarian crisis in Southern Sudan. The hearing comes one day after Southern Sudan’s largest rebel group declared a cease fire. Southern Sudan voted in January to split from the north, but rebel forces continued to fight with government in the new country.
At 14:50 US NJ Representative Donald Payne speaks of Darfur.
Photos of Bombardment killing Nuba Indigenous People in Kurchi village (Sudan).
Sudan ~ where President Obama once said the Darfur genocide must be stopped. Now, he supports those who commit the genocide (Khartoum), because of politics.
"These photos were taken on Sunday, 26th June, (2011) in Kurchi village in the Nuba Mountains by Younis Jamal, a field officer with Nuba Relief and Rehabilitation and Development Organization, the sister organization of the SPLA/M (NRRDO), who wants them to be circulated widely, so the world can see what the Sudanese military is doing to unarmed civilians in South Kordofan.
Sudan's Al-Bashir is distinguishing himself by conducting three ethnic cleansings simultaneously; Darfur, Abyei and South Kordofan. Nothing stops him."
I sometimes write the President about genocide in Sudan. Three times I got a reply, but that was in the early days of his administration.
Tonight I wrote the letter below via www.whitehouse.gov/contact. Politicians claim that when you vote for them and they win that they have a mandate from the people. But assumption is presumptuous. So often, we vote against someone and not for someone.
July 4, 2011
Dear President Obama,
I believe compassion and empathy are the best of our human quallities As a human being who has worked since 2004 to bring attention to the Darfur genocide, I have watched as two USA administrations, the Bush and Obama, have stood idly by while Darfuris & now Sudanese in the Nuba Mountains region of South Kordofan get bombed by Khartoum. Your administration has chosen to side with Khartoum. I want to let you know that your administration has left me thoroughly frustrated and angry.
Never before had I involved myself in a campaign until your first one for President. I gave money to your campaign repeatedly, though I could not afford it. I rented a car to drive from where I reside in Rhode Island to volunteer to go door-to-door in NH for the week running up to the NH primary. I worked here in RI doing the same, but more comprehensively. I phone banked for you in NJ.
I say all this to tell you this: I cannot vote for a Republican for President this next election. But I cannot do any of the things that I did previously for your campaign this time. Why? I hope you get this letter and wonder that very question.You had me believing that your word was dependable. You had me believing you would be a President that I could be proud of.But I no longer believe that. I have watched you very closely-what you have said and done and what you haven’t said and done. My feelings of being betrayed by you started soon after Scott Gration spoke once you appointed him Special Envoy to Sudan. He obviously spoke for you. And he chose supporting Khartoum over the people Khartoum systematically has been eliminating.
I will be forced to vote against the Republican Presidential candidate this time and that will mean I will have to vote for you. I want you to know though you will get my vote, however you have lost something more important. My respect for you. And my trust in what you say that you will do. I made a small film for a Compassion Film Festival, DARFUR – THE ABANDONED GENOCIDE, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YG-6mQx8jI
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and in the film, it has you saying over and over what led me to believe that you would not let the people down of Darfur.But you have done just that. No President that I can put my trust in would have done this.
The Darfur genocide “IS a stain on our souls”, as you said once. And genocide will go on as long as there is no accountability. Whenever you have a choice between right and wrong about genocide as a leader, there is only one that should allow you to sleep.
Sandra Hammel
This appears after you click "Send"~
Thank you for contacting the White House.
President Obama is committed to creating the most open and accessible Administration in history. That begins with taking comments and questions from you, the American people, through our website.
The U.N. peacekeeping mission UNMIS has been a part of the problem in South Kordofan, where many Nuba, although northern Sudanese, joined south Sudan’s war for a democratic “New Sudan.” Established in March 2005, after the Comprehensive Peace Agreement ended the 22-year civil war, the mission was headed until 2010 by a man who colleagues say was given to calling the Nuba “monkeys.” On his watch, the lack of initiative of UNMIS and perceived complicity with Khartoum was a cause of deep frustration, and anger, to its most committed staff. UNMIS was also spectacularly uninformed about the reality of South Kordofan.
In 2008, I published a report that detailed the resurgence of government-supported militias in South Kordofan – including in a village called Al-Fayd – and concluded that “many now view war in the Nuba Mountains as inevitable.” UNMIS pooh-poohed the report, which it said was “far from the reality on the ground.” Fast-forward to April this year, on the eve of war, and an attack by militia who, according to UNMIS, “killed … looted … burnt houses and raped.” The village? Al-Fayd.
How little UNMIS knew. How little it cared to know! And how it has come to haunt the mission now that its own men are, in its own words, facing increasing “intimidation and obstruction” in South Kordofan – including from the militias it said did not exist.
July 3, 2011 — Over the past four weeks, Government of Sudan (GoS) troops and allied militia have carried out a vicious and murderous attack on the people of the Nuba Mountains in the Sudanese state of South Kordafan. This is the very same government that perpetrated genocide in Darfur and continues to carry out devastating attacks on the region. Tellingly, Sudan’s president, Omer Al-Bashir, is already wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity for the atrocities perpetrated in Darfur.
MIGs and Antonov bombers have created havoc in the Nuba Mountains; farms, tukuls, and churches have been burned to the ground; close to 100,000 people have been forced from their villages out into the wilderness and up into barren mountains; and untold numbers have been killed.
In Kadugli, the capital of South Kordafan, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) have gone door to door in search of suspected members and supporters of the Sudanese Peoples Liberation Movement (SPLM) and executed them on the spot. GoS troops have also planted land mines throughout the area. In Dilling, GoS soldiers carried out their own search for members and supporters of the SPLM and upon locating them slit their throats.
While there are UN troops (United Nations Mission in Sudan or UNMIS) in the Nuba Mountains they have largely served no purpose. If truth be told, they are actually exacerbating the situation. First, they do little more than largely observe the violence and certainly nothing to attempt to halt it. Second, two sources inside the Nuba Mountains, both of whom must remain unnamed, reported that Egyptian soldiers with UNMIS were seen raping local women in Kadugli as the latter sought sanctuary from the surrounding violence. Third, when a massive group of civilians sought assistance at UNMIS headquarters in Kadugli they were purportedly told to leave and go to Dilling, some 120 miles away — a horrific journey on foot in the face of the ongoing attacks. Finally, there are reports that UNMIS personnel told people to head north when seeking safety, thus apparently leading them directly into the hands of the GoS troops. It is no wonder that rumors are afloat that those Egyptian soldiers with UNMIS are on the payroll of Khartoum.
Various reasons are aswirl as to why GoS troops attacked the people of the Nuba Mountains. First, some four weeks ago, Al-Bashir threatened that if the people of the region did not readily accept the newly elected Ahmed Haroun, who is wanted by the ICC on over 40 counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes for the horrors perpetrated in Darfur, as their governor, they would suffer the consequences. In fact, in a speech in Kadugli, Al-Bashir stated that his soldiers would chase the Nuba people up into the mountains as they did in the 1990s, leaving them without food to starve to death once again. Second, when members of the Sudanese Peoples Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), who, along with the vast majority of people in the Nuba Mountains, voiced their vast disappointment that Abdel Aziz, a popular and former commander of the SLPA, had been cheated out of the governorship as a result of a rigged election and also refused to take off their uniforms when ordered to do so, GoS troops attacked them. Third, many believe that the real reason behind the attack is that Al-Bashir wants to gain absolute control over South Kordafan and the border area with South Sudan in order to strengthen his hand in negotiations over Abeyi, a oil rich region straddling the border between the north and the south. Finally, there are rumors that Al-Bashir wishes to gain control of as much land as possible along the border, an area that is poorly demarcated, as he also prepares for future negotiations with the new state of South Sudan.
Al-Bashir’s propensity for killing those with whom he disagrees, who question his authority and/or policies, who challenge his dictates, whose land he desires, and/or who he looks upon with distain and wants gone is well documented. He’s done it previously in the Nuba Mountains (in the 1990s when he carried out genocidal acts and virtually starved people to death), in Darfur between 2003 and today during which over 400,000 blacks Africans perished, and he is back at it once again in the Nuba Mountains. And the world should never forget or overlook the fact that just because the Comprehensive Peace Agreement has been signed by the north and south, Al-Bashir, as president of Sudan, oversaw a large part of the north-south war that resulted in some two million deaths.
Clearly, Al-Bashir specializes in perpetrating crimes against humanity, genocidal actions, and genocide, and he does so whenever he wishes in the belief that he can do so with impunity — the ICC or any other court or tribunal be damned.
For the sake of the people of the Nuba Mountains, for the sake of civilization, for the sake of our own decency, we, and the rest of the world, must show Omar Al-Bashir that he is wrong — and that impunity does not reign.
Samuel Totten is a genocide scholar based at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville. He served as one of the 24 investigators with the U.S. Atrocities Documentation Project in eastern Chad. His most recent book is An Oral and Documentary History of the Darfur Genocide (Praeger Security International, 2010). He was last in the Nuba Mountains in January 2011 conducting research for a new book, Genocidal Actions Against the Nuba Mountains People: Interviews with Survivors of Mass Starvation and Other Atrocities.
By MAGGIE FICK, Associated Press – Monday July 4, 8:45 am USA ET, 2011
JUBA, Sudan – Sudan's president will speak at independence celebrations in the south this weekend, officials said Monday, just days after he vowed to continue a military offensive in a border region.
Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir supported the January referendum that paved the way for the oil-rich south to secede and become the world's newest country on Saturday.
However, recent tensions in the border state of South Kordofan and the disputed region of Abyei have raised fears that the split could be a violent one.
The southern government said Monday that 30 African heads of state including al-Bashir will travel to Juba for this weekend's celebrations. British Foreign Secretary William Hague and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon also are expected to attend.
Many issues remains unresolved around the split including oil rights and wealth sharing. Representatives from both sides spent have spent weeks negotiating in Ethiopia's capital.
Two decades of civil war with northern Sudan decimated the oil-rich south and left more than 2 million dead on both sides.
The south lacks infrastructure and basic services, is aid-dependent and suffers from frequent floods during its five-month-long rainy season.
Despite its rich oil reserves, the south has no refineries and must transport its oil through pipelines to a northern port on the Red Sea.
Al-Bashir said in a June 22 speech that he would block the south's access to the pipelines unless a favorable wealth-sharing agreement was reached.
U.N. peacekeepers are in the northern border state of South Kordofan, but a spokesman for the Sudanese government said Sunday they should leave immediately after the south becomes independent.
Such a move could leave tens of thousands of southern-supporting civilians without U.N. protection. A U.N. spokeswoman in Southern Sudan said any such decision would be made by the U.N. Security Council.
Tensions in the area have displaced more than 70,000 people.
Western advocacy groups have warned that al-Bashir's government is attempting ethnic cleansing and even genocide in the region against the Nuba people, a black African group targeted in the 1990s in government-sponsored violence that left as many 200,000 Nubans dead.
My opinion: The Nobel Peace Prize for President Obama was premature, to say the least.
October 9, 2009 Obama: Nobel Peace Prize is 'call to action'
President Obama said Friday that he was "surprised and deeply humbled" by the decision of the Norwegian Nobel Committee to award him the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize.
The committee said it honored Obama for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."
Obama said he viewed the decision less as a recognition of his own accomplishments and more as "a call to action."
The decision appeared to catch most observers by surprise. Nominations for the prize had to be postmarked by February 1, only 12 days after Obama took office. The committee sent out its solicitation for nominations last September, two months before Obama was elected president.
The Nuba Mountains are situated in the Sudanese state of South Kordofan. A remote and beautiful place, the people suffered terrible atrocities by the forces of the Sudan Government during a 21 year civil war. The Comprehensive Peace Agreement, signed in 2005 with the help of the UK and US governments, gave South Kordofan and the Nuba people a degree of autonomy. Their traditions could continue even when Sudan split into two and they remained in the North after largely supporting the Sudan People’s Liberation Army of the South in the war.
The countries will split on 9th July 2011 - and the Sudan government has chosen the time before the split to carry out attacks on the Nuba people - clearly an attempt at ethnic cleansing.
The people living in South Kordofan comprise of Christians, Muslims and animist people who live side by side and who suffered so badly in the civil war that some families who fled high into the mountains have not dared to venture down in the past 6 years of peace.
Now the capital of South Kordofan, Kadugli, is a virtual ghost town, people have been executed on the spot and others have fled without belongings (for fear of being shot if found to be escaping) The SAF government forces are also fighting with the SPLA and the people, terrified, hungry and increasingly sick, are stuck in the middle. Many headed for the UN compound on the outskirts of Kadugli seeking shelter. The UN has been unable to step in because it “does not have the mandate” The UN is also due to leave Sudan once the new South Sudan comes into being. Leaving the Nuba people to their fate.
The international community helped broker the deal that has put the Nuba people where they are - it must take action now to stop the killing of peaceful innocent men, women and children. Please do whatever you can to raise awareness of this terrible situation. Thank you.
A father cradles his child, killed by Sudan Government bombing of Kurchi, Nuba Mountains 27th June 2011.
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Sudanese Struggle to Survive Endless Bombings Aimed to Quell Rebels
Tyler Hicks/The New York Times
As the Sudan government bombs rebels, the Nuba people have been forced to spend much of their daily lives in the rocky caves far above the valley floor. More Photos »
LEWERE, Sudan — Fatima Ramadan, mother of six, froze, her eyes shooting up to the sky.
“Antonov!” she yelled.
Little girls threw down the pebbles they were playing with. Toddlers, sensing danger, started to wail. About two dozen people grabbed the young and dashed up the mountainside into a cave. It was hot and dark inside, and the children’s eyes were wide with fear.
“I don’t like this place,” said Kaka, a 10-year-old girl.
Nobody does. And yet thousands of people live like this.
As the July 9 division of Sudan nears, the government in Khartoum is scrambling to crush any rebellious chunks of the territory that will remain its own. Its forces have been relentlessly pounding the Nuba Mountains from Russian-made Antonov bombers for weeks, demanding that tens of thousands of rebel fighters dug in here disarm and drop their insistence on more autonomy for the distinctive Nuba people. Hundreds of civilians have been killed, including many children. Bombs have been dropped on huts, on farmers in the field, on girls fetching water together, slicing them in half with buckets in their hands.
As the area inches toward becoming fully engulfed in war, the Nuba caves offer a crucial refuge.
Every morning at sunup, Ms. Ramadan trudges up a hillside, about 1,000 feet high, lugging pots, water jugs, mats and blankets, the children huffing behind.
She nestles her cooking fire in a crack in the mountain wall, to conceal the smoke. The young mothers around her dangle their legs over ledges as they nurse. Older children play a game similar to jacks, using pebbles on the precarious heights. Old men just sit and stare. At dusk, which usually signals the end of the sorties, most descend. Very few young men are with them.
“These caves have saved my children’s life,” Ms. Ramadan said. A couple of hundreds yards below her is the evidence: jagged chunks of shrapnel, gaping bomb craters and a tree trunk with a huge hole blown straight through it. The bombings have shifted west in recent days, away from the Lewere Valley toward what is emerging as the front line in an area called Korchi. But the fear endures like a scar.
“Even the sound of a car sends us running,” Ms. Ramadan said.
In another time, perhaps, a hike up this mountain would be a treat. The views from the top are amazing. The undulating Nuba heartland stretches for miles into the hazy distance, the tawny hilltops clear save for some scratchy green brush and a few trees stubbornly clinging to the rocks. Down below, thatched-roof huts squat together. A few people swing hoes. A few women plant on their knees, as if they are praying. A tan stripe — the only road — slices across the valley floor.
“This is all about land,” said Saida Bakhait, who is also hiding in a cave with her children.
“Bashir,” she says, referring to Sudan’s president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, “needs our land and he wants to finish us off.”
But if war comes, it will not be an easy fight.
“Be tough! Be strong! Protect our land!” shout legions of young men — “freedom fighters” they call themselves — as they march through the mist-shrouded valleys at dawn to add to the rebels’ numbers. They do not have guns, so they train with sticks. Many are freshly carved, the wood still white.
Land is often code for identity and the Nuba see this as a fight for their cultural survival. These mountains are an outpost of traditional beliefs and Christianity (though there are Muslim Nuba, too) in northern Sudan. Many people here did not wear clothes until the 1970s, when the government passed laws forbidding nudity. Anthropologists have celebrated the Nuba for their singing, dancing, ferocious wrestling tournaments and dizzying number of languages, with nearly every major set of hills having its own tongue. Their land is among the most fertile in all of Sudan.
Because they had been subjugated by Sudan’s Arab rulers for generations, the Nuba sided with southern rebels during the latter half of Sudan’s north-south civil war, in the 1980s and ’90s. The government responded by bombing the hillsides, wiping out villages and incarcerating hundreds of thousands of Nuba in so-called peace camps where many were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint. People fled to caves then, too.
A peace treaty signed in 2004 called for Nuba to have a say in determining how much autonomy they would get — again, protecting their unique culture was a priority — but autonomy never came. Now, it seems, the government’s sudden interest in Nuba is timed to the south’s independence on Saturday. Khartoum may feel it has to send a signal that even after the south breaks off, the result of decades of struggle for liberation, it will not tolerate other secession movements.
“They lost southern Sudan with bitterness, and now they are projecting that bitterness on us,” said a Nuba man named Kuku.
In one place near Lewere, hundreds, perhaps thousands, are camped in caves. At least that is what some soldiers were saying. According to them, an entire village has uprooted itself to a mountaintop.
“But we can’t let you see it,” said a local elder at the foot of the mountain. He is sympathetic but firm.
“It’s the only place that hasn’t been bombed yet,” he said. “The last thing we want is for al-Bashir to know about it.”
Cambridge, Massachusetts Source: openmediaboston.org- Democracy Now host Amy Goodman presented a "Celebration of Independent Media" Thursday at Cambridge Forum, moderated by Jordan Weinstein, host of NPR’s Morning Edition on WGBH-FM. Relating stories from her coverage of (and arrest at) the 2008 Democratic and Republican National Conventions, Goodman discussed the important role independent media plays in facilitating meaningful and informative public discussions.
............................................................... Press Needs To Be 4th Estate Instead of for the State - Amy Goodman Uploaded by UpTakeVideo on Apr 11, 2011
Text at Youtube ~
Democracy Now's Amy Goodman recounts her arrest at the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul Minnesota and talks about how the press has sunk to a new low by agreeing to be embedded with police to cover political conventions. She is speaking at the 2011 National Conference For Media Reform in Boston.
Complicit
An individual is complicit in a crime if they are aware of its occurrence, have the ability to report the crime, but fail to do so. As such the individual effectively allows the criminals to carry out a crime despite easily being able to stop them, either directly or by contacting the authorities thus making them a de-facto accessory to the crime rather than innocent bystanders.
Law relating to complicity varies. Usually complicity is not a crime although this sometimes conflicts with popular perception. See The Finale (Seinfeld episode). At a certain point a person that is complicit in a crime may become a conspirator depending on the degree of involvement by the individual and whether a crime was completed or not.
THIS IS A MUST LISTEN. I have transcribed some of the highlights:
1) around 11:15 Ms. Goodman says: Obama said: "Make me do it" - this needs to be taken to heart for ending genocide, including on the Darfuri people since February 2003.
2) 8:18 speaking to the journalist/media: "the deepest problem is being embedded in the establishment, here in this country. We have a special role to play. My brother and I wrote a book, called Static and the reason we called it this, the reason in this high tech digital age, in the time of this high def television, and digital radio, still all we get is static. This veil of distortion and lies, and misrepresentation, and half-truths, that obscure reality, when what we need is the media to give us is the dictionary definition of "static": criticism, opposition, unwanted interference, we need a media that covers power, not covers for power (8:56). We need a media that is the fourth estate, not for the state, and we need a media that covers the movements that create static and make history. Which is why I want to dedicate Democracy's Now's presence here this weekend and all my wonderful colleagues who are here, to Manning Marable, who we lost last week, this wonderful scholar, who on the day that his book was to be published, 3 days before, he died, who wrote the book, Malcolm X,
the Life of Reinvention...who teaches us deeply what movements mean....we need a media democracy movement, that follows on the traditions of the great movements in the history of this country. He tells the story of A. Philip Randolph, the greatest organizer of the twentieth century, who organized the 1963 March on Washington, who organized the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, who was to brought to meet with FDR by Eleanor Roosevelt, who when he described the condition of black people in the country, the condition of working people in the country, FDR responded to him, "I don't disagree with anything you've said, but you've got to make me do it." Make. Me. Do. It. What a lesson for today. 10:17 As we move into the next election in 2012, as we gather here on Friday and learn that the House passed a resolution that says they will not support net neutrality, as 3,00 people gather here in Boston.
As we see an FCC, that unfortunately has not followed through on Obama's promise and the FCC's Chair promise to stand with net neutrality, to reinforce it. I think we have to remember what FDR told A. Philip Randolph. In fact, it's something that President Obama, when he was running for President, said to a questioner when he was in a backyard of a New Jersey home answering questions of people who might support him, and someone asked him about the Middle East. He said, "What are you going to do about it?" And he told the A. Philip Randolph story, and repeated what FDR said. "Make me do it." Make. Me. Do. It. 11:13
Your job leaving this weekend, is really answering that challenge. Of how you think the media should be able to operate in this country, of what it takes to build independent media. To build an internet that is open and free for all. It's the answer to corporate globalization. Grass roots globalization over the world. We see the importance of that free and open internet, when universally Mbarak was condemned for hitting the kill switch on the cell phones and the internet in Egypt. Which reminded me how important it was, that we had independent media on the ground. 12:00
Sharif Abdel Kouddous ~ You couldn't have had finer, more elequent reporting bringing you this extremely personal, yet epic historic struggle of the people in the streets in Egypt. From Shariff's incredible perspective, as a son of Egypt, himself. As he landed in Egypt, coming from New York, from Democracy Now, he figured out a way to get around the internet shutdown. 13:35
3) 13:35 "And he tweeted out, "no matter what happens, this will never be Mbarak's Egypt again." that's the power of independent media...when you know their names, their stories, their families, you care and it makes it much harder to target.
4) 14:16 "...I see the media, as a huge kitchen table that stretches across the globe, that we all sit around and debate and discuss the most important issues of the day, war and peace, life and death, anything less than that is a disservice to the service men and women of this country who can't have these debates on military bases...anything less than that is a disservice to a democratic society." 14:49
5) At 14:55 - "...we have to understand how it is these despots remain for so many decades. The questions Western pundits asked, you know, those people in Washington on all those networks, who know so little about so much, explaining the world to us and getting it so wrong. This Despots remained because they had a Coat of Armor: Mubarak, $2 billion a year from the United States, a Coat of Armor, made in the USA, one of the few things that is still made in the USA. Two billions dollars a year, most of that money going to the weapons manufacturers, from General Dynamics, to Raytheon, to Lockheed Martin, to Boeing. We have to be able to kill this story because the people on the ground in Egypt, and Yemen, and Bahrain, in Tunisia, they understand it. We need a media that bridges the gap, so that we can understand. We come from the trigger end. They're at the target end. And we need a media that bridges, so we all can understand and participate in a global discussion about how we want to live in a global world."
6) 16:17 through 18:15 I just want to end with the words... of Kareem Amer...his blog is dedicated to Hans and Sofia Scholl, this young Egyptian blogger dedicating his blog to Hans and Sofia Scholl, a young brother and sister, who formed the White Rose Collective in Germany in World War II. They thought, "What can we do in the face of the Nazi atrocity?' They weren't Jewish, they were German Christians. But they knew they wanted to expose, to ensure the Germans could never say they didn't know. And so together with their Professor and other workers. They started to publish pamphlets. Because information is power. They published six pamphlets in all, the fourth pamphlet was written the words:
"WE WILL NOT BE SILENT." They passed these out in cover of night, they dropped them in an alley, in a market, in a classroom. And eventually they were caught by the
Gestapo. They were tried. They were convicted. And they were beheaded.
But that philosophy, that motto should be the hyppocratic oath of the media today. We Will Not Be Silent.
The accompanying 97 minute audio recording of the speech is available for download from Internet Archive, or can be streamed using the player below.
Khartoum — A Sudanese organization called 'Youth for Change' made a call for demonstrations in all parts of Sudan on March 21st in a new bid to bring about a mass uprising similar to the ones in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya.
The group's spokesperson Magdi Okasha said that their ultimate goal is to topple the regime.
This came as opposition parties launched a fierce attack on the Sudanese government and vowed to push for change by mobilizing their supporetrs to take the streets.
Leaders from the opposition parties convened at the headquarters of the Popular Congress Party (PCP) in which they saw a replay of a video showing a female activist recounting her alleged rape by agents from the National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS).
Police and NISS officers cordoned the PCP HQ as families of detainees and opposition supporters lifted banners and shouting anti-government slogans.
The leaders of the opposition parties who form the National Alliance Forces called for the release of PCP leader Hassan Al-Turabi who remains in jail since January with no formal charges being brought against him.
Sudanese Communist Party (SCP) leader Mohamed Ibrahim Nugud expressed solidarity with the PCP "despite past bitterness" in order to work on the issue of freedoms, calling for dispatching a delegation to hold meetings with the revolutionary forces in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt for coordination and exchange of ideas.
The deputy Secretary-General of the Sudan people Liberation Movement (SPLM) Yasser Arman, echoed Nugud's call and voiced rejection of the concept of politically motivated arrests and torture by the NISS.
Arman made a demand for spreading democracy to fight against corruption and tyranny, noting that the Sudanese state "is a failed and outdated one that needs update and renewal".
He further suggested establishing a new capital other Khartoum describing it as the source of the wars waged throughout the Sudan.
For his part, the chairman of the Alliance opposition Farouk Abu Issa said a commission would be formed that would work on spreading freedom and defending against torture and preventing it, stressing that crimes of torture is punishable without statute of limitations.
Sudanese youth have called for anti-government protests which were violently dispersed by security forces starting on January 30. The movement failed to take on mass appeal and dozens of activists remain detained without charge.
Sudanese President Omer Hassan al-Bashir has promised to step down at the next election in four years, after 26 years in power. His party took over in a 1989 bloodless coup.
But growing voices of dissent, even from within his ruling party, are calling for more immediate action to prevent the kind of popular uprising that toppled long-serving leaders in Tunisia and Egypt and has spread to other nations including Libya.
IT'S HARD TO RALLY AN UPRISING ON FACEBOOK WHEN YOU LIVE IN REFUGEE CAMPS WITH NO COMPUTERS - SUCH AS IT IS FOR DARFURIS
INGREDIENTS OF A GENOCIDE:
PERPETRATORS, UNARMED CITIZENS,
A WORLD THAT TURNS THE OTHER WAY ................................................................
I made this video January 1, 2010
Things have not gotten better for the Darfuri people. President Obama gave us all indications that he would do better than he has regarding Darfur and genocidal regimes. His US Special Envoy Gration to Sudan has been nothing short of a disaster. Gration is slated to leave his Sudan post to be Obama's Envoy to Kenya.
It is unthinkable what President Obama has done regarding Darfur. How does he define terrorism? I believe genocide by a government on its own people is terrorism. But Obama has decided to remove Sudan and its President Omar al-Bashir from the state-sponsored terrorist list of the USA. Bashir is indicted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity. And Obama decides to reward him.
Before and following the Southern Sudan referendum (January 2011) to vote to become a separate country, the escalation of bombing of Darfur villages is ignored by Obama, as well as by the media.
It is hard to rally an uprising on Facebook when you live in makeshift camps with no running water, no electricity, no computers.
Since 2003, the world has turned its deaf ears and blind eyes to Darfuris.
"We can't say 'Never again' and then allow it to happen again." You know who said that? Answer: Barack Obama
"CHANGE" and "HOPE" words Obama ran on for his candidacy of President. Imagine that. The Darfuris renamed their makeshift schools after him in the refugee camps. They believed him. Once.
Notice all the countries being reported on in the news recently on this map.
Sudan is next to Egypt which we have had news coverage on. Also in the news and on this map are Yemen, Jordan, Libya, Iran, Bahrain, Saudi Arabi and nearby, but not on this map: Tunisia.
Sudan is in this picture and NOT being reported on by our USA media.
THE STORY MEDIA and PRESIDENT OBAMA NEGLECT DAY AFTER DAY. A story untold, news unreported STILL GOES ON and on and on.....since 2003. Eight years and counting. The holocaust lasted 12 years. Four years to go at this rate and Darfur will be the longer genocide.
On a Whitehouse conference call within the last two weeks, it was confirmed that President Obama is removing the genocide-supporting government of Sudan from the USA state-sponsored terrorist list. He has changed. "Change" with Obama has turned out to be nothing like he said he would be.
As I said in my letter to him (Dear President Obama - Defing Terrorism in Terms of Genocide and Darfur ):
Obama has betrayed the Darfur people, including most recently waiving the protection for Darfuris created in an agreement ~ The Darfur Peace and Accountability Act- DPAA (Darfur_Peace_and_Accountability_Act explained) (H.R. 3127/S. 1462). This apparently has been done so that the USA can remove Sudan from a USA list of state sponsors of terrorism. This is WHILE the Sudan government bombs Darfur civilians because of their ethnicity, which amounts to a state sponsored terrorism all by itself. Rightly so, Senator Obama complained that Bush was selling out Darfur. And at that time, Senator Obama was proud of forcing linkage via DPAA to justice being done regarding Darfur. Obama, as President, is waiving the requirements within the DPAA to protect Darfuris.
Darfur rebels claim that bombing is ongoing in central Darfur. The alliance of the Liberation factions (Sudan Liberation Movement - Abdel Wahid, Sudan Liberation Movement – Minni Minawi, and Karbino) said that bombing is still ongoing in areas of Jebel East and around Shangil Tobaya. The aerial attacks have been reported for weeks now.
Ibrahim Suleiman Abdullah, speaking from the field behalf of the alliance of Liberation Forces, told Radio Dabanga that the air strikes targeted the civilian populations in Wadi Mora and some of the villages there. They also caused death among the livestock and caused thousands flee.
Ibrahim described the situation of civilians who fled the bombing as very bad, noting that some fled from areas of Jebel East into Wadi Mora. They are awaiting the arrival of UNAMID and humanitarian organizations to save them, Ibrahim told Radio Dabanga.
Meanwhile, the UNAMID peacekeepers reported aerial bombardment near Sortony, approximately 110km west of El Fasher, North Darfur, Sunday at around 1730hrs.
UNAMID sent an assessment mission to Wadi Mora. The Mission “continues to evaluate the findings” of the Mission. The peacekeeping mission has not made any of its reports public, but it disclosed in a press statement yesterday that the team found “a number of villages were abandoned, and a large number of their inhabitants have moved to Tawilla and Zamzam camps.”
About 31.000 displaced people arrived at Zamzam Camp during the past days, fleeing from Shangil Tobaya Camp and the surrounding villages following aerial bombardment there on 17 and 18 February.
A witness in Zamzam described the conditions of the thousands of newly displaced people as “very bad”. He said there is no process to record their arrival or provide them with any food or tents for shelter.
Cases of diarrhea have emerged among children of the new arrivals, the witness at Zamzam told Radio Dabanga.
One of the leaders of Zamzam Camp appealed to international organizations and the United Nations to immediately intervene and provide humanitarian and medical aid to the tens of thousands of newly displaced people in the camp. In remarks broadcast today on Radio Dabanga, the leader described the situation of the new arrivals as grave.
Last Saturday, UN-African Union peacekeeping mission said there was a “recrudescence” (worsening) of violence in the areas where these 31.000 people have fled from. The UNAMID chief issued a statement saying he was “particularly disturbed about reports of the most recent recrudescence of violence between Government of the Sudan soldiers and a combined group of elements from several rebel movements, in the region of Shangil Tobaya, 66 kilometers south west of El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur.”
JUBA, Sudan (AFP) – Over 20,000 people fled clashes last week between rebels and the army in south Sudan's troubled Jonglei state in which over 200 people died, a senior official said on Thursday.
"People have run from the fighting, and 20,000 people have been displaced," said Stephen Kuol, Jonglei's state education minister, releasing the findings of an assessment mission to the devastated Fangak region in which he took part...
...Many of the victims -- the majority of them civilians -- reportedly drowned in a river as they tried to escape the two days of fighting.
Kuol, who comes from the area and who helped to bury some of the victims in mass graves, said he witnessed "floating corpses" following the violence last week, which he described as "mass butchery."
Several officials in the county administration died, as well as the deputy head of both the prison and army based in the area, Kuol said.
Followers of the renegade southern general George Athor are accused of carrying out the attacks, which broke a ceasefire many had hoped would end the conflict.
They came just days after formal confirmation of the results of the January 9-15 referendum on southern independence, in which almost 99 percent of southerners voted to split with the north...
...Analysts have said that maintaining security in the fledgling southern nation, which is due to win international recognition in July, will be a major challenge. Read the full article: Source: afp
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Noteworthy
Official date January 30, 1933 - the Beginning of the Holocaust.
The lead up and the ending
After the 1932 elections it became clear to the Nazi leaders that they would never be able to secure a majority of the votes and that they would have to rely on other means to gain power. Leading up to the 1933 elections, the Nazis began intensifying acts of violence to wreak havoc among the opposition. At the same time, with cooperation from local authorities, they set up camps as concentration centers within Germany. One of the first was Dachau, which opened in March 1933. These early camps were meant to hold, torture, or kill only political prisoners, such as Communists and Social Democrats. Eventually, the Nazis imprisoned Jews, Gypsies, Jehovah's Witnesses, homosexuals, critical journalists, and other undesirables.
These early prisons, usually basements and storehouses, were eventually consolidated into full-blown, centrally run camps outside of the cities and somewhat removed from the public eye. By 1942, six large extermination camps, located in Nazi-occupied Poland, had been established.After 1939, with the beginning of the Second World War, the concentration camps increasingly became places where the non-political enemies of the Nazis, including Jews and POWs, were either killed or forced to act as slave laborers, and kept undernourished and tortured.
The holocaust ended in specific places when the Allies liberated the camps in 1944-1945. The official end to the holocaust did not come until the end of WWII and all German troops surrendered.
The holocaust ended in specific places when the Allies liberated the camps in 1944-1945. The official end to the holocaust did not come until the end of WWII and all German troops surrendered.
December 28 1945
"We heard a loud voice repeating the same words in English and in German: "Hello, hello. You are free. We are British soldiers and have come to liberate you." These words still resound in my ears." Hadassah Rosensaft, inmate of Bergen-Belsen.
The House of Representatives is expected to vote TOMORROW on unprecedented humanitarian aid and disaster assistance cuts.
Just how much is at stake? $1.7 billion of life-saving humanitarian aid are on the chopping block -- funding that directly impacts the lives of millions of Sudanese and Darfuri people.
I organized the Rhode Island Torch Relay which was one of many around the country and the world.The Rhode Island Torch Relay took place October 27, 2007. I was grateful that you as Mayor of Providence agreed to and spoke at this event in the Ceremony portion that took place at the Rhode Island State House on a rainy afternoon.The t-shirts for that day were made and read “I Carry the Torch for Darfur”.I have posted some of this Ceremony on youtube.I know your heart is in the right place regarding preventing and ending genocide and ask you to vote against the cuts of humanitarian aid that assist in saving lives of Darfuri people that have lived in refugee camps since 2003 trying to escape a Sudanese government-sponsored genocide against the unarmed people of the Darfur region.This aid impacts lives of millions of Sudanese, Darfuri people.
Violence in Darfur is on the rise. We simply cannot afford to cut aid for millions of refugees in one of the world’s most volatile regions at this time.
Proposed cuts in programs that provide life-saving aid to Darfur and all of Sudan include:
$431,000,000 in International Disaster Assistance $582,000,000 in Migration and Refugee Assistance $687,000,000 in the Food for Peace Program
These severe reductions run counter to the United States’ commitment to peace in Darfur and Sudan. Funding should be restored to these critical accounts that support Sudan. I ask you, US RI Representative Cicilline, to vote NO on passage of House Bill 1.
Thank you for your making decisions based upon principle.
I look forward to your reply and would like to sit down to talk with you about this defining issue.
Sandra Hammel
Use Your Voice to Stop Genocide RI
Genocide will only stop with us demanding it - Our leaders have taught us this
"The most important things belong first, not last or never."
Words of the Earth by Cedric Wright
If you want peace, work for justice إذا كنت تريد السلام ، أعمل من أجل العدالة
Targeting: The President of the United States Started by: Operation Broken Silence
The information about this petition ~
The White House announced on February 10, 2011 that U.S. Special Envoy to Sudan Scott Gration has been elected to become the new U.S. Ambassador to Kenya. The removal of Gration from Sudan will leave the special envoy post vacant. Seeing a dramatic rise in violence and genocidal attacks against civilians in Darfur as well as months worth of work remaining in south Sudan to ensure a democratic, secure, and peaceful transition for the world's newest nation, a seasoned diplomat needs to...
The White House announced on February 10, 2011 that U.S. Special Envoy to Sudan Scott Gration has been elected to become the new U.S. Ambassador to Kenya.
The removal of Gration from Sudan will leave the special envoy post vacant. Seeing a dramatic rise in violence and genocidal attacks against civilians in Darfur as well as months worth of work remaining in south Sudan to ensure a democratic, secure, and peaceful transition for the world's newest nation, a seasoned diplomat needs to immediately replace current Special Envoy Gration to help put Sudan back on the road towards peace.
This petition calls for the following:
1. President Obama to appoint a new, U.S. Special Envoy to Sudan, one who is seasoned diplomat experienced in conflict prevention/resolution, African affairs, as well as Sudan itself.
2. The new U.S. Special Envoy to enforce the abandoned U.S. Sudan policy of a balanced approach regarding pressures and incentives. Implementation has been largely incentives-based and rewarded a regime which is guilty of genocide.
3. The new U.S. Special Envoy to immediately focus on ensuring peace negotiations for Darfur take place outside of Sudan, reinvigorating Darfur peace negotiations, engaging civil society in both south Sudan and Darfur so that their voices may be heard concerning peace efforts and the issues which plague them, fight to empower UNAMID to better protect civilians in Darfur, and heavily push for a democratic, secure, and peaceful transition of southern Sudan into a sovereign state.
EVEN MSNBC HAS REPORTED THE STORY IN EGYPT. AND THAT IS SAYING SOMETHING SIGNIFICANT, BECAUSE THEY ALMOST NEVER REPORT NEWS OUTSIDE THE USA. TAKE DARFUR, FOR EXAMPLE. MOST OF THE MSNBC POLITICAL SHOWS NEVER MENTION DARFUR. RACHEL MADDOW HAS, BUT EXTREMELY RARELY.
RECENTLY AND EVEN IN THE LAST SEVERAL MONTHS, WHICH IS NOT SO "RECENT", THE GOVERNMENT OF SUDAN HAS BEEN BOMBING AND BURNING DOWN DARFUR VILLAGES. The USA government has been ineffective in this issue for the last two years under President Obama (as well as the eight years of George W Bush's Presidency) and US Special Envoy to Sudan, Scott Gration's words have played into the hands of the very government behind the crimes against humanity - the genocide on the Darfuri people.
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Sudan army bombs north Darfur, threatens to burn down UNAMID base
January 27, 2011 (KHARTOUM) – Sudanese army on Wednesday carried out an aerial bombardment on rebel-controlled areas in north Darfur and threatened to "burn down" a base of the UN-AU hybrid peacekeeping mission (UNAMID) in the area.
Troops of Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) clashed a day before on Tuesday with rebels from the Sudan Liberation Movement of Abdel Wahid Al-Nur joined by combatants of the disaffected SLM faction of Minni Arkoi Minnawi in Tabit area, 45 kilometers from El-Fasher, the provincial capital of North Darfur state.
On Wednesday, SAF forces resumed bombardment of Tabit area, which prevented a UNAMID’s verification team based in Shangil Tobaya from accessing the area, the hybrid operation said today.
The mission further reported that at 06:00pm (local time) approximately 200 SAF soldiers, on 40 vehicles, surrounded the mission’s base in Shangil Tobaya and the adjacent makeshift camp.
The commander of SAF forces, who detained four people in the area, initially said they were there to persuade displaced persons to return to their homes. Moreover, the SAF commander later threatened to "burn down" the makeshift camp and the UNAMID site if the peacekeepers continued to interfere. UNAMID said SAF forces had eventually left after its peacekeepers held their grounds.
The standoff between SAF and UNAMID comes at a time when the mission faces international calls to act as aggressively as its mandate authorizes it to act in protecting civilians.
Members of the UN Security Council (UNSC) on Wednesday received a briefing via a video link by UNAMID chief Ibrahim Gambari and later criticized the Sudanese authorities for curtailing the mission’s right to access areas in the region.
The US envoy also appeared unhappy with the mission’s failure to function in accordance with its mandate to protect civilians.
"UNAMID is a Chapter 7 mission, with a robust protection of civilians mandate. And the United States view and the view of many members of the Council, as expressed today and on numerous previous occasions, is that we expect UNAMID, as one of the UN’s largest and most costly operations, with one of the most robust mandates passed by this Council, to be very active and, when necessary, aggressive, in fulfilling its mandate to protect civilians," Rice said.
Internally Displaced Persons from Darfur told Sudan Tribune that the recent violence displaced thousands of people as the government troops and militias continue to harass the civilians and burn their villages.
A female teacher from Tabit reached by Sudan Tribune after their arrival to Zamzam IDPs camp near El-Fasher said since the bombing of 25 January, the villagers, 17000 families, fled to Zamzam, and Rwanda camps near Tawilla.
"People are homeless in the valleys and roads as the army block the roads," she said, adding "this is the new policy of peace".
A local chief from Al-Salam IDPs camp told Sudan Tribune that the Sudanese troops burnt down seven villages in the area located south-west of El-Fasher on the period of Saturday to Tuesday of this week.
Oumda Atem Osman said the army detained 80 people from Abu Zarka area in north Darfur. He further said their belongings and properties were looted by the militiamen who attacked the villages jointly with the army.
He further deplored the position of the peacekeepers on the ground adding that in the areas of Tawilla and Korma the militiamen seized the harvest of farmers but the UNAMID members were unable to stop them.
The Human Rights Watch (HRW) today denounced the growing violence against civilians in Darfur and urged the international community to not forget Darfur by focusing only on the independence of South Sudan.
"While the international community remains focused on South Sudan, the situation in Darfur has sharply deteriorated," said Daniel Bekele, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "We are seeing a return to past patterns of violence, with both government and rebel forces targeting civilians and committing other abuses."
UNAMID is the largest U.N.-funded peacekeeping mission established in 2008 under VII of the United Nations Charter to protect civilians in Darfur region. The mission’s current strength stands at 88% of its total 26,000 authorized strength, but it says its job to secure the remote area is difficult in the absence of a peace deal between Khartoum and rebels.
Meanwhile, Sudan’s official news agency SUNA reported on Thursday that SAF’s commander-in-chief of the western military zone had declared the areas of Tabit and all areas in east Mara Mountains “completely devoid” of rebel forces.
Darfur conflict broke out in 2003 after rebels belonging mostly to African ethnic groups took up arms against the government. At least 300,000 people died and 2.7 million lost their homes since the conflict erupted, according to UN estimates.
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Sudan army surrounds, threatens to burn down UNAMID camp
A Sudanese army force of 200 soldiers on 40 vehicles surrounded the exit of an UN – African Union military camp yesterday in Shangil Tobaya. A senior officer at the head of the force then threatened to burn down the military camp and an adjoining refugee camp. The threat came at about 6:00 p.m., after the UN forces unsuccessfuly tried to prevent the army from threatening and arresting refugees at the neighboring camp. The army arrested three people in the camp.
“The SAF commander at the scene stated that they were carrying out their duties and intended to persuade the IDPs to return to their original camps. He then threatened to burn down the makeshift camp and UNAMID team site, if the peacekeepers continued to interfere,” UNAMID reported in an e-mailed statement yesterday.
The makeshift camp next to the UNAMID base sheltered thousands of people who had fled during the events of December 2010.
UNAMID also reported that it was unable to complete a “verification mission” from its Shangil Tobaya base to Tabit, where fighting broke out Monday, due to “resumption of aerial bombardment in the area.”
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Two Sudan journalists in court, risk death sentence
(Reuters) - Sudan has charged two journalists with trying to overthrow the government, a crime punishable by death, for publishing an article saying the impoverished east of Africa's largest country may secede.
Sudan's oil-producing south voted this month in a referendum on secession from the north, promised under a 2005 peace accord which ended decades of civil war. It now looks set to become independent on July 9.
Many in the north blame the split on Khartoum's failure to share power and wealth with marginalized areas.
The western Darfur region is in the throes of an eight-year insurgency and the east has the country's deepest levels of poverty despite hosting its only port and largest gold mines.
"The accused were practicing their rights to express their opinion freely as guaranteed under the constitution and the many charters of human rights which Sudan has signed," Mutasim al- Amir, one of the defense lawyers, told Reuters on Thursday as the journalists made their first court appearance in Khartoum.
The hearing was postponed as some witnesses were still in the eastern city of Port Sudan, where the accused were first arrested before being transferred to the capital.
Both journalists work for a weekly paper published in the east called Sout al-Bar'out, named after a religious leader.
Khartoum has brought eight charges against them, the most prominent being trying to overthrow the constitutional government, an offense punishable by death.
On January 9, the first day of voting in the south's referendum, the paper published an article saying the marginalization of the east could give rise to calls for secession there.
The editor-in-chief of the paper, Abu Eisha Kazim, and the author of the article, Abdel Gadir Bakash, were arrested the following day, they said.
(Additional report and writing by Opheera McDoom; Editing by Maria Golovnina)
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Sudan army bombs Darfur, threatens peacekeepers: UN
Thu Jan 27, 2011 5:52pm GMT
By Andrew Heavens
KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Sudan's army bombed rebel positions in Darfur and later surrounded and threatened to burn down a refugee camp and peacekeeping base nearby, the region's joint U.N./African Union mission said on Thursday.
The incident took place as Washington's envoy to the United Nations, Susan Rice, criticised Khartoum for obstructing peacekeepers and said the international force needed to take a more aggressive stance in the region.
Darfur has been hit by sporadic fighting almost eight years after mostly non-Arab rebels took up arms against the government, accusing it of marginalising Darfur.
Violence, while down from the mass killings seen at the start of the conflict, has risen over the past year after rebels walked out of floundering peace talks and one insurgent force, which had signed an accord with Khartoum, went back to fighting.
Darfur's UNAMID peacekeepers on Wednesday sent out a mission to investigate the site of recent fighting between the government and rebels close to the north Darfur town of Thabit, UNAMID said in a statement on Thursday.
"(The) verification mission ... was unable to complete its mission yesterday (Wednesday) after the resumption of aerial bombardment in the area," said the statement.
UNAMID spokesman Kemal Saiki confirmed the bombing was by "the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) air force".
Later on Wednesday, a group of 200 Sudanese government soldiers in 40 vehicles arrived at UNAMID's camp in the nearby settlement of Shangil Tobay, UNAMID said.
"(The soldiers) surrounded the team site's exit as well as the adjacent makeshift camp, where thousands of civilians recently displaced by the December 2010 clashes have settled," read the statement.
The Sudanese army detained four displaced people at the camp, said UNAMID.
"The SAF commander at the scene ... then threatened to burn down the makeshift camp and UNAMID team site, if the peacekeepers continued to interfere. The UNAMID Blue Helmets stood their ground and the SAF troops eventually departed," said the statement.
A U.N. official said the government soldiers had wanted to search the refugee camp for rebel fighters but the UNAMID force there stopped them. No one was immediately available for comment from Sudan's army.
Susan Rice on Wednesday said UNAMID had to be more aggressive in protecting civilians and ensuring humanitarian aid workers had access to needy people in Darfur.
"We expect UNAMID ... to be very active and, when necessary, aggressive in fulfilling its mandate to protect civilians," Rice told reporters, adding that Washington has been "frustrated and dismayed by repeated instances of UNAMID being denied access and its freedom of movement restricted."
UNAMID chief Ibrahim Gambari told the U.N. Security Council via video link that he informed his military and police chiefs on January 4 that the force "would adopt a more robust posture and no longer create the impression of seeking permission for movement."
...................................................... January 27, 2011 US Deputy National Security Advisor Denis McDonough. The full discussion can be found here.
First Satellite Images Available of SAF Troop Deployments Near Sudan’s Volatile North-South Border
1/27/11 | Enough Project
WASHINGTON, DC — The Satellite Sentinel Project (SSP) has confirmed that the Sudanese Armed Forces, or SAF, has deployed company-sized units of troops equipped with light armor and artillery in areas of South Kordofan around the oil-producing Abyei region and other strategic areas along Sudan’s volatile North-South border. However, the project’s first report also indicates that the SAF troops do not appear prepared for imminent forward movement.
I love my life. I love where I live. And I am passionate about my passions. I love to dance. Necessary to live: music, piano, singing, writing, acting, painting.
I have been fighting for and supporting the arts all my adult life. Since 2004, I have been working with other activists to end the Darfur genocide.
I have traveled to Europe many times since my early twenties. Places I have been: many USA states including Hawaii, Montreal, Canada, Barbados, France, Spain, Luxembourg, England, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Greece and Germany - and have wonderful memories.
My last trip was in May - June 2013 to Spain.
I would like to travel to Europe and Kyoto, Japan.
I love the southwest where I have visited Hopi, Navajo, Zia and San Idlefonso potters.
Life is exciting and I intend to live it full-out to the end.
B.S. and M.M., both in music
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Khartoum, Sudan Stop Genocide Time
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Spain Time
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Melbourne Time
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RAFA NADAL -BRING BACK LONG PANTS - SLEEVELESS TOPS
Double Click on Videos to Enlarge
Darfur - The Abandoned Genocide - a video by Sandra Hammel
Want to help? Call 1~800~GENOCIDE
"May I Suggest" by Susan Werner
Satchita - Playing for Change
Stand By Me ~ Playing for Change
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Genocide is not only a word,
it is crying of the whole human race.
There is nothing redeeming about being silent
when speaking up is the humane thing to do.
The honor and integrity of the human race is at stake.
