wfn.org | [PCUSANEWS] Darfur: 30 days is too long to wait for help, CWS

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Note #8452 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

04351
August 5, 2004

Darfur: 30 days is too long to wait for help, CWS says

by Anne Walle
Church World Service

NEW YORK - Global humanitarian agency Church World Service Wednesday called
on U.S. citizens to immediately pressure the United Nations and world bodies
to intervene more quickly and definitively to protect more than one million
black Africans threatened by the escalating crisis in the Darfur region of
Sudan.

	In a second national flash e-mail campaign to its constituents, on
its website and through contacts with media, CWS is urging people to write to
U.S. Ambassador to the UN John Danforth, urging immediate action and greater
pressure on the Sudanese government to bring the violence to an end.

	According to U.N. estimates, reports CWS Executive Director and CEO
the Rev. John L. McCullough, almost 500 refugees perish daily in Darfur or in
makeshift camps in neighboring Chad.  "With so many lives at risk, thirty
days is far too long," McCullough says, referring to the time for compliance
allowed by a U.N. Security Council resolution passed last week.

	Other aid agencies and human rights organizations concur with that
fear, citing the region's current rainy season as breeding ground for
epidemics, and diseases already showing signs of manifesting.

	Violent Arab Janjaweed militia, reportedly backed by the Sudan
government, are blamed for the deaths of up to 50,000 black African villagers
in Darfur. An estimated 1.2 million people have fled their homes and are now
in makeshift camps elsewhere in the region or in neighboring Chad.

	Despite claims by the Sudan government that it is disarming the
militia, latest reports from Darfur indicate continued if not increasing
attacks on villagers.

      Declared genocide by the U.S. Congress last Friday, Darfur's heightened
violence prompted the U.N. Security Council to adopt a resolution July 30
that threatens to impose sanctions on Sudan in 30 days if its government
doesn't take action to disarm, apprehend, and prosecute the Janjaweed - and
to provide access by aid agencies seeking to supply food, drinking water, and
medical supplies to an estimated 300,000 displaced people facing imminent
starvation.

	"The longer the international community waits, the longer violence
and atrocities against civilians will occur," says CWS's McCullough.

      The CWS advocacy campaign urges:

	* the support of an international peacekeeping force to restore order
and secure humanitarian zones to facilitate assistance for refugees and
internally displaced persons;

	* insistence that the government of Sudan disarm and apprehend
Janjaweed militias;

	* a demand that the government of Sudan provide full access to
humanitarian groups to Darfur, and make all government resources available
for the delivery of aid.

      Early in July, CWS issued a $1,750,000 fundraising appeal, launched a
nationwide direct mail campaign, and increased its national advocacy efforts
on behalf of those affected in Darfur.

      CWS Director of Emergency Response Rick Augsburger says, "We've raised
a quarter of a million dollars in about a month's time. We're confident we
can reach the campaign goal, particularly now with greater world and media
attention turned to Darfur."

      Beginning in July, and over the next 18 months, CWS is assisting in
providing food, medicines, access to clean water, agricultural inputs and
tools, and trauma care to 500,000 of the most vulnerable people in the Darfur
region. The program includes a supplemental feeding program for 50,000
affected children.

      Over the weekend, CWS partners bringing aid to Kubum and Um Labassa,
100	 kilometers west of Nyala, reported having their trucks stuck in
wadis or gullies, due to the rainy season, and fear the roads may be totally
cut off soon.

      According to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian
Affairs (OCHA), there are approximately 10,000 internally displaced people
(IDPs) in Kubum alone and about 2,400 in Um Labassa.

      CWS partners working through the coalition umbrella of Action by
Churches Together (ACT)/Caritas say the real need for displaced people Iin
the Um Labassa and Kubum area is shelter.

      Meanwhile, in a weekend of to-and-fro'ing, Sudan's government in
Khartoum first rejected then reluctantly agreed to the U.N. Security Council
disarmament resolution on Darfur. As of an Associated Press report Aug. 2,
the country's army had labeled the U.N. resolution on Darfur as a
"declaration of war."

      The U.N. resolution was passed 13-0 (China and Pakistan abstaining). If
Sudan fails to comply within 30 days to the Security Council resolution, the
council will consider further action.

	Contributions to support relief work in Darfur may be made through
Presbyterian Disaster Assistance - call PresbyTel at 1-800-872-3283 - or sent
to Church World Service Sudan-Darfur Crisis Appeal #640B. Secure
contributions may be made online via our website at
www.churchworldservice.org or sent to Church World Service, P.O. Box 968,
Elkhart, IN 46515.

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