*EPF305 07/07/2004
U.S. Congressmen Warn of Impending Crisis in Darfur
(Call for immediate AU, U.N. humanitarian and political action) (700)

By Tara Boyle
Washington File Staff Writer

Washington -- Two U.S. congressmen who recently returned from the western Sudanese region of Darfur have declared it is time for the international community to act, describing in grim detail the poor living conditions in camps that have become a refuge for the thousands of Sudanese civilians driven from their homes by Arab militias.

"The Sudanese government should be given a very short time frame, and if they don't provide [security for civilians], the international community must step in before thousands more die," Senator Sam Brownback (Republican of Kansas) told reporters at a July 6 press conference.

Brownback and Representative Frank Wolf (Republican of Virginia) visited Darfur during a three-day trip to Sudan in late June. At their press briefing, they released a report detailing what they saw there and recommending steps the Sudanese government and the international community must take to prevent further civilian deaths.

"We heard countless stories about rape, murder, and plunder," Wolf said after showing video footage of refugee camps the two lawmakers visited. "We talked to rape victims. We saw the scars on men who had been shot. We watched mothers cradle their sick and dying babies, hoping against all odds that their children would survive."

Nearly 1.2 million civilians in Darfur have been driven from their homes by pro-government militias known as the Jingaweit. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has predicted that at least 300,000 people will likely die of malnutrition and disease by the end of 2004 as a result of the violence and resulting displacement of populations.

Secretary of State Colin Powell, who visited Darfur June 29 and 30, has pressured the government of Sudan to rein in the Jingaweit and allow relief organizations better access to the region. Wolf and Brownback made similar recommendations in their report, and also called on the United States to make public the identities of those responsible for civilian deaths in Darfur.

The two congressmen also outlined a series of recommendations for the African Union (AU) and the United Nations. The AU should send additional cease-fire observers to Darfur to ensure that attacks do not resume, they said. The United Nations, meanwhile, should pass a Security Council resolution calling for an immediate end to the attacks, send human rights monitors to the region, ensure that civilians are protected and receiving humanitarian aid; and set a deadline for the government of Sudan to comply with a cease-fire agreement it signed in April.

Sudan also should be removed from the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, they said.

Above all, Wolf and Brownback stressed, the international community must act quickly before the rainy season sets in and it becomes difficult or impossible to reach many refugees.

"We have a chance, but it's a narrow window, to really reduce the level of death and suffering in Sudan's Darfur region. We can do it ... but the window is small, and the need for aggressive action is now," Brownback said.

Wolf emphasized the significance of ethnicity in the attacks on civilians.

"It is clear that only villages inhabited by black African Muslims were being targeted. Arab villages sitting next to African ones, miles from the nearest town, have been left unscathed," he said.

Women who have been raped by militiamen reported they were told that they were slaves and that "their skin was too dark," Wolf added. "While they were being raped, they said, the Jingaweit told them they were hoping to make a lighter-skinned baby," he said.

Wolf and Brownback praised the U.S. government for its efforts to address the humanitarian crisis in Darfur. To date, the United States has pledged nearly $300 million in humanitarian aid for the region.

"The State Department and the Bush administration have really done a good job. ... It is now time, though, to get other members of the [U.N.] Security Council and other people to be equally active. If they do, I think this problem can be dealt with," Wolf said.

(The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

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