Over 250 people have died in fighting in remote areas of Darfur over the last week as a result of disputes over “native administration positions.” These attacks have happened on two main tribes, the Gimir tribe which has internal conflicts (killing over 100), and attacks from other tribal fighters on the Habbaniya tribe. The full story can be found here:
http://africa.reuters.com/top/news/usnJOE4BE0AQ.html
Over 500 fighters attacked the Habbaniya tribe last week, causing 5,000 villagers to flee for their lives and resulting in the deaths of around 150 civilians and 6 peacekeeping officers. These attacks are not new, and are a part of a long string of attacks and counter attacks, adding to the already complex struggle happening in Sudan. Experts guess that the five year conflict has killed over 200,000 people and displaced over 2 million.
This is some of the first news coverage being given to the tribal conflicts that have arisen out of the greater fight happening in Darfur, the fighting between the Government and rebel militias. While at first, the problems in Darfur were due to rebels rising up against perceived wrongdoings by the government, the influx of arms into the area has turned traditionally small tribal rivalries over things such as grazing lands and traditional rights into armed conflicts. Both the rebels and the government have been arming tribes, in the hopes that they will fight amongst themselves to weaken the tribal system, and also using the weapons to “buy” the loyalty of some of the tribes so that they will help in the fight against the government or be a counter-insurgency against the rebels. Both of these groups need to stop this practice, because it is hurting the people of Darfur even more then they already have been, causing them to become even more inextricably linked to the fighting. While the “buzz” over Darfur has died down over the last year, we must not forget what is happening and keep putting pressure on our government to do something to help the real victims of this fighting - the people of Darfur.
Kubik - BacaBerita dan Raih Pulsa
5 years ago
1 comment:
I agree that we must keep putting pressure on our government to help the people of Darfur. It is tragic that the fighting and hundreds of thousands of deaths there have become a past cause of the moment. It is unfortunate that this is often the case, even on college campuses where we are supposedly becoming more well-informed and educated about the world.
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