AGEOD Forums

I'm writing this messages to ask you to contribute to saving numerous human lives only with a few mouse clicks.

I'm sure you have heard over the last few years of Darfur , this region in Africa where entire populations are being exterminated by the Sudanese army and their militias only because of their identity. Humanitarian NGOs have also been threatened and had no choice but to withdraw from this region and leave the surviving population in agony.

You'll find here some background facts about this crisis :

http://www.savedarfur.org/pages/background (in English)

http://www.urgencedarfour.info/ (in French)

If you prefer a video, here's some among many that one can find on the Web :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71a9g6rY-pU

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xhiru_sos-darfour

Now, you certainly heard or read that the situation was "not that simple", that there were "complex political and economic issues" at stake and that it explained the lack of political determination to put pressure against the Sudanese government. Instead of this, commissions have been created to debate whether this was an actual genocide, war crime or crime against humanity.

The situation is actually very simple: Children, women and men, all innocent and unarmed civilians, continue to be killed in all impunity and in an unbearable manner in the 21 st century.

Jacky Mamou, the president of a French association on the Darfur crisis, informed us of the necessity to mobilize the French and European population and get their help to put pressure on our political leaders. They organized this European petition, which you can sign on the web or via postal mail.

The number of signatures so far is about 250,000 that is half of the number of killed in Darfur thus far !

They are aiming for 1,000,000 signatures . I'm sure we can help them, provided that we all act upon it, reach this number and hopefully go way beyond.

I invite you to sign this petition in order to put pressure on our political leaders so that they have, at last, the courage to take action against this dramatic crisis.

This petition is at : http://www.europetition-darfour.fr/
(in English and in French)

Thanks in advance!

Please do but some thoughts, my opinion.

While I support ANY effort to end the suffering in Darfur I fear nothing will happen unless the UN, the G8, G20, etc, establishes a sort of rogue regime council that actually has some balls. We have a system to rehabilitate failed economies, the IMF. A country that cannot pay it's debts goes through the IMF rehabilitation process, maybe paying cents on the dollar of their debt, and comes out the other side back in the international system with hopefully new financial rule sets to keep the country integrated with the world financially. This keeps said country from 'failing' and falling under the influence of 'BAD PEOPLE or REGIMES.' What the world lacks is a the ability to act against 'failed' regimes,' which inevitably leads to someone, say a President, 'inventing a threat' to justify the taking out of a 'Bad Regime' that nobody really liked. Maybe cause a Big Splash in an area of 'Bad Regimes' and hopefully bringing about change in said area.

The UN is like your local Prosecutor, they can indite the bad regime, and pass resolution after resolution describing the bad behavior. But in the world we live in there are no cops, no one who can actually do something about it. UN Peacekeepers? A joke. The have no power to actually do anything, just observe and report. Unless Peacekeepers have full logistical and moral support, powers of arrest and detention, and the ability to shoot back if provoked, NOTHING can or will happen. Somalia and Rwanda showed the 'bad guys' that you only need to kill one or two peacekeepers, white ones preferably, and support for intervention drops among the industrial countries. We are seeing this repeated with the Darfur militia's recent killings of AU Peacekeepers. Until we have a system in place that not only can take down bad regimes, but rehabilitate them into functioning members of the Global Society, and yes that includes financially functioning as well, we get Iraq's and not The Balkan's.

The US could play the role of Global cop very well. So too NATO. 'You need that bad regime taken down? No problem. How's next Tuesday for you. And it will cost $4 Billion." It's the rebuilding we suck at. What's needed is the PEACE CORPS on Steroids; Civil Affairs, Engineers, Lawyers, 40 year-old beat cops (guys who know how to diffuse a situation without pulling their gun,) NOT inexperienced-in-life 18 year olds with trigger-fingers. Use the Marines or the French Foreign Legion, someone to cover these 'System Administrators,' and act against the bad guys who will kill because they see no future for them in the way the world is constantly progressing.

As much as I dislike Bush, he was right in saying that Bin Laden and his ilk hate us for our freedoms. They do. Their version of the world is not a positive one. Look at the role of women in 'Traditional' Islamic societies versus 'Secular' Islamic Societies, or against the US and Western Europe. The men lose their dominance; they lose their power. Bin Laden and his ilk want to make it so painful for the industrialized CORE of the world to engage in the Middle East and North Africa that we will turn away from them, walling them up behind closed & militarized borders, ala the Cold War, and consign 1/3 of Humanity to the total control of religious zealots. Want a sneak peak at his version of society? Look no further than Afghanistan under the Taliban, England under Cromwell, France under the Bourbons, Spain under the Inquisition, Russia under Lenin. Make no mistake, Bin Laden is this centuries Lenin. And after Lenin came Stalin. I'm not worried about Bin Laden, it's his replacement that keeps me up at night.

It will take one or a group of SELFLESS nations that can see the positive gain 10, 20, maybe 30 years down the road, and accept the price in Blood and Treasure that it will require to get there. We must not shy away from places like Darfur, Rwanda, the Middle East, Mexico, Venezuela, and those costs. Rather we need to engage them, financially, humanitarianly, and yes even militarily, however painful. It will take nations, nay societies, that accept that some things will have to change internally; in their economies, their laws, and their lifestyles, to let the rest of the world to just begin to enjoy the blessings and freedoms we in the West take for granted every-single-day.