Ethnic Media, Activists Decry Crisis in Sudan
Asbarez Armenian Daily, Council of Islamic Organizations of Greater Chicago, News Report, Compiled by Peter Micek, Posted: Jul 16, 2004
WASHINGTON -- Armenian activists joined with Rep. Charles Rangel and leading African American and human rights activists at a demonstration July 13 outside the Sudanese Embassy calling for United States and international pressure to end the genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan.
The Washington protest, organized by the Sudan Campaign, featured the arrest of rep. Charles, Rangel, a senior Democrat and New York Congressman who serves as the Ranking Member on the influential United States House Ways and Means Committee.
Staff and activists with the Armenian National Committee of America also participated in the protest. Armenian and Black media gave ample coverage to the protest.
"When human lives are in jeopardy, there should be outrage,” Rangel said.
Some 30,000 have already perished over the past 18 months in Darfur, Sudan, with approximately one million forced to flee their homes. If the Sudanese government does not allow for the distribution of international humanitarian assistance, the death toll could rise to 350,000, according to conservative estimates.
In a July 15 press release, the Council of Islamic Organizations of Greater Chicago, said “an apparent ethnic cleansing campaign” against non-Arab, ethnic Sudanese has led to refugee camps with little access to food or medical care.
“It is a neglected humanitarian tragedy,” said Jihad Shoshara of the Council’s newly created Darfur Awareness and Relief Program.
Rangel was arrested for trespassing after stepping to the door of the Embassy. He was released within hours from a Washington, D.C., jail after paying bail of 50 dollars. Former member of Congress and current president of the National Council of Churches Robert Edgar was arrested at the Sudanese Embassy the next day.
Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) Executive Director Aram Hamparian, Government Affairs Director Abraham Niziblian and ANCA interns, led by Director Arsineh Khachikian, joined the midday protest which included some 150 activists and representatives from a diverse coalition of Sudan Campaign partner organizations including the Congressional Black Caucus, Center for Religious Freedom at Freedom House, Institute on Religion and Democracy, American Anti-slavery group, Wilberforce Project, and Christian Solidarity International, among others.
"We marched today, in the name of all Armenians, to do our part to help end the cycle of genocide," said Hamparian. "As the descendants of survivors of the Armenian Genocide, we bear a special burden to fight intolerance and to demand moral leadership—and decisive action—from our government to prevent hundreds of thousands of deaths in Darfur."
Niziblian, in an interview with the Associated Press (AP), was quoted as saying that, "A lot more people should be protesting and taking to the streets now."
The Sudan Campaign is led by Rev. Walter E. Fauntroy, co-founder of the Congressional Black Caucus, and Joe Madison, a civil rights activist and radio personality in the Greater Washington, DC area. The group has been holding noon-time protests in front of the Sudanese Embassy for the past month, during which several leading human and civil rights activists have been arrested.
During his remarks, Madison announced that he is launching a hunger strike until the Sudanese government takes action to end the obstruction of humanitarian assistance from reaching hundreds of thousands in need in Darfur.
Over the past month, the ANCA has called attention to the atrocities in Sudan through a series of letters to Congressional offices, urging them to take a stand to stop the cycle of genocide through support of Congressional initiatives regarding Sudan as well as for the Genocide Resolution (H.Res.193, S.Res.164), which reaffirms United States commitment to the principles of the Genocide Convention.
On June 23, Niziblian participated in a press conference organized by the Congressional Black Caucus and Africa Action. The ANCA has urged Armenian Americans to add their names to the Africa Action petition drive for Sudan, by visiting www.africaaction.org.
The coming rainy season in Sudan will make roads impassable, obstructing relief efforts to the camps, the Council of Islamic Organizations of Greater Chicago said. The United Nations, it said, has called the situation in Darfur “the world’s greatest humanitarian crisis.”
It is a neglected humanitarian tragedy, said the Council’s Jihad Shoshara.
“There are people who are dying and nobody knows about it.”
The Council opened a relief fund and asks, “Muslims and fellow Americans of all faiths,” to spread awareness of the situation and contact elected representatives.
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User Comments
The Hottentot Research Society on Jul 20, 2004 at 01:54:01 said:
(Please Spread the word). CHAPTER 13
-->Too Late?
The Sudan
26 September 1884-26 January 1885
‘In the name of God the merciful and compassionate….
Those who believed in us as the Mahdi, and surrendered, have been delivered, and those who did not were destroyed…’
Muhammad Ahmad, the Mahdi, to Gordon Pasha of
Khartoum, 22 October 1884
‘From the top of the Serail’, wrote Gordon on September 1884, jotting it down in his journal with the innocence and vulnerability of a small school boy writing home to his mother,,.,,,, The country was clear of Dervishes for the moment and the local people seemed to be wavering, Gordon felt strong enough to recapture Berber, the key to re-opening communications with Egypt. But first he sent his victorious army and four streamers to attack El Ilafun. Once again giving the command to Muhammad Ali Pasha. The district was wooded and rich in grain, oil and coffee. Like his neighbors, the local Chief, Sheikh Obeid, has sided with the Dervishes, but he was known for his unusual sanctity and prestige this gave him, second only to the Mahdi’s in this district. The attack on El Ilafun, a village on the river-bank, went off exactly as planned and one streamer returned to Khartoum loaded with booty. Then victory went to Muhammad Ali’s head. He asked Gordon for permission to leave the streamer and pursue the enemy to a second El Ilafun, a village fifteen miles inland, the birthplace of the Sheikh. Gordon had misgivings. It was deep in the woods. (Many Egyptian soldiers had been cut off there during the original conquest of the Sudan.)------an excerpt from ‘The Scramble for Africa’