wfn.org | NCC Executive Board Calls for Urgent Action on Sudan

["Carol Fouke" <cfouke@ncccusa.org>]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NCC EXECUTIVE BOARD ASKS URGENT INTERVENTION IN THE SUDAN

May 18, 2004, CHICAGO, Ill. b Urgent intervention to stop the killing in
Sudan was the call of the National Council of Churches USA Executive Board in
a resolution adopted unanimously today during its spring meeting here May
17-18.

The Board committed the NCC and its member churches bto intensifying their
effortsb to stop the apparent attempt at ethnic cleansing in Darfur, western
Sudan, that already has claimed tens of thousands of lives and displaced a
million people, and that risks deepening to genocide.  

It condemned the involvement of all parties perpetrating genocide in the
Sudan and called upon the government of Sudan to bring an end to this
practice immediately, including stopping attacks by its military and proxy
militia against civilians in Darfur.

And it called on the U.S. government bto continue to press the Sudanese
government to bring to a halt this unfolding horror and to support
appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian, conflict resolution and peace
enforcement efforts by the United Nations to these ends.b

Todaybs resolution also called upon the international community and
non-governmental organizations to investigate and monitor reports of crimes
against humanity being committed in Sudan.

Among those voicing passionate support for the action was Bishop Vicken
Aykazian of Washington, D.C., Ecumenical Officer of the Diocese of the
Armenian Church of America.  It is estimated that 1.5 million Armenians
perished between 1915-23 in the Armenian Genocide, and that a million were
deported forcibly.  

bMy family is victim of the first genocide of the 20th century,b scattered
to the far corners of the earth, said Bishop Aykazian.	bI am very much
concerned when I see that people in other nations now are being massacred as
well b in Sudan, simply because they are black.  Ten years ago, in Rwanda,
in front of the civilized world, one million people were slaughtered.  The
same thing is happening now in Sudan.  The NCC must take this very seriously
and do something.b

On April 23, the NCC sponsored an observance of the 10th anniversary of the
Rwandan Genocide, held in Los Angeles and featuring Samantha Power, who won
the Pulitzer Prize for her book bbA Problem from Hellb: America and the
Age of Genocide.b  

She and other speakers noted that despite the worldbs pledge to bnever
againb allow genocide, the world is not stepping up effectively to stop the
killing in Sudan.

bKnowing the history of genocide in the 20th century, beginning with the
Armenian Genocide through the Jewish Holocaust and ending with the Rwandan
Genocide, we are appalled that this legacy of death and destruction should be
carried into the 21st century,b the Board stated.

Todaybs resolution by the NCCbs Executive Board, whose 80 members are
delegates from the Councilbs 36 Protestant, Orthodox and Anglican member
churches, reaffirms and extends the Boardbs extensive 2002 resolution on the
continuing crisis in the Sudan.  

In todaybs action, the Board also commended actions already taken by member
communions and recommended that they prayerfully consider further actions
that they might take, individually and together as the NCC, conducive to the
establishment of peace in Sudan.

NCC General Secretary Bob Edgar urged U.S. churches not to let current
preoccupation with Iraq, the elections, the Middle East and the U.S. economy
distract them from action on Sudan.  bThis is an urgent moment,b he said.

-end-

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