DISASTER IN DARFUR - UCSB Department of History - University of ...

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humanitarian relief and protection…,” and Canada’s Foreign Minister, Bill Graham,
announced that “It is imperative that agencies providing humanitarian assistance have
immediate, safe and unhindered access to Darfur.” [Press Release, USAID, February 3,
2004; Norwegian Foreign Ministry of Foreign Affairs Press Release, February 4, 2004;
Statement by Bill Graham, Foreign Affairs Minister, Ottawa, February 5, 2004] When
the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue in Geneva sought to broker an agreement for
humanitarian access both the SLM and the JEM readily agreed, but Khartoum refused
arguing disingenuously that the issue of humanitarian access had been politicized, used
for military gains, and subject to manipulations. Besides, when President Bashir
announced on 9 February that the Sudan army and militias had crushed the rebellion the
proposed peace talks in Geneva were obviously irrelevant. Three days later the rebel
forces, now numbering some 27,000 men, shot down two army helicopters and in the
succeeded weeks launched hit-and-run attacks near El Fasher and cut the road from
Khartoum to Nyala, the capital of Southern Darfur State.
As the escalation of the humanitarian crisis in Darfur continued the international
media could not avoid comparing it to the genocide in Rwanda at its tenth anniversary in
April 2004 during which the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, could
not remain silent. Genocide in Darfur was much on his mind, for he had been the head of
the UN Peacekeeping Mission in Rwanda in 1994 at the time of that systematic slaughter.
On 7 April he declared that “If [full humanitarian access] is denied, the international
community must be prepared to take swift and appropriate action. By “action” in such
situations I mean a continuum of steps, which may include military action….The
international community cannot stand idle.” [Agence France-Presse and Reuters, April 7,