There is a school of thought that argues that by the time the United Nations Security Council applies its attention to a crisis anywhere in the world, that crisis will already be out of hand, or the moment to intervene effectively will have passed. That is an argument that is particularly apposite in relation to what is going on in Darfur. The same school of thought also contends that when the UN does finally accept that something must be done, it will do the wrong thing, and do it so slowly that it merely compounds an already hopeless situation. And here we have Darfur again. Given the opportunity to act firmly and decisively, for once to present a united front to face down an aggressor and to protect those who cannot defend themselves, the UN has chosen the path of least resistance. It has shied away from using its power for good in favour of mealy-mouthed attitudes and toothless threats of some future, ill-defined, approbation. <\/p>\n
So it is no to sanctions, and yes to yet more empty gestures, lest it offends those nations who have much to gain economically by cosying up to the Khartoum regime, and who gain pleasure by thwarting the aspirations of those who backed the war in Iraq, however well intentioned those aspirations may be.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Just got back from Budapest last night. I’ve got a ton more pix to post. I hope to write up the last day or so on Sunday and post everything then. Meanwhile, here’s an article in The Scotsman about Darfur. While I’m glad that the world’s finally paying attention to what’s going on there, the … <\/p>\n
Continue reading “Home”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sudan"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4C7K-4u","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":265,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/and-boy-are-my-arms-tired","url_meta":{"origin":278,"position":0},"title":"And, boy, are my arms tired!","author":"Gil","date":"June 14, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm back from California. I'll ramble extensively about it tonight. Until then, here's an e-mail response I received from Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), regarding the Sudan query I sent him last month:Dear Gil:Thank you for expressing your concerns about Sudan.I appreciate your concerns regarding the civil war ongoing in Sudan,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Sudan"","block_context":{"text":"Sudan","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/sudan"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":583,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/more-sudan","url_meta":{"origin":278,"position":1},"title":"More Sudan","author":"Gil","date":"July 26, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Nicholas Kristof of the NYTimes is insanely pissed off at the media for ignoring the genocide in Darfur:When I've asked television correspondents about this lapse, they've noted that visas to Sudan are difficult to get and that reporting in Darfur is expensive and dangerous. True, but TV crews could at\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Sudan"","block_context":{"text":"Sudan","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/sudan"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":348,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/au-report-from-darfur","url_meta":{"origin":278,"position":2},"title":"AU report from Darfur","author":"Gil","date":"September 21, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"It's a poor choice of words, but here's a harrowing report from the commander of the South African contingent of the African Union's monitors in Darfur: Colonel Barry Steyn [...] says he counts bodies of Sudan army and Janjaweed victims each week and sends classified reports to Addis Ababa. Describing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Sudan"","block_context":{"text":"Sudan","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/sudan"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":339,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/darfur","url_meta":{"origin":278,"position":3},"title":"Darfur","author":"Gil","date":"September 27, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Skip ahead if you're sick of reading about the genocide in Darfur. Samantha Power wrote a great piece in The New Yorker a few weeks ago about Darfur. Here it is. I didn't link to it earlier because I couldn't find any sort of searchable archives at the magazine's site.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Sudan"","block_context":{"text":"Sudan","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/sudan"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":939,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/clooless","url_meta":{"origin":278,"position":4},"title":"Clooless","author":"Gil","date":"May 3, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"I think Nina Shea gives George Clooney a little too much, um, credibility in this essay about his cluelessness re:Darfur, but I'm with her on the idea that maybe it's not Bush's fault. I've been pretty quiet about Darfur lately, mainly because I'm beaten down by the idea that it's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Sudan"","block_context":{"text":"Sudan","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/sudan"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1422,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/change-of-approach","url_meta":{"origin":278,"position":5},"title":"Change of Approach","author":"Gil","date":"April 2, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"According to Jackson Diehl in the WaPost, it looks like we might see some progress in stopping the war in the Darfur region of Sudan: [L]ast Monday President Bush's anger rocked the Oval Office when aides presented him with a plan for sanctions against the Sudanese government. Raising his voice,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics (implicit)"","block_context":{"text":"Politics (implicit)","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/politics-implicit"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}