Address Of Sen. Patrick Leahy
The Crisis In Darfur
Senate Floor
Tuesday, September 19, 2006

Mr. LEAHY. It is disheartening to be back on the floor of the Senate to once again talk about a looming humanitarian catastrophe in the Darfur region of Sudan. Despite the partial peace agreement signed in May between the Sudanese Government and one rebel faction, the three year civil war in Darfur has intensified in recent months and the situation is rapidly deteriorating.

Today, Darfur faces a more complex and brutal environment where rebel groups have splintered and one has joined forces with the Sudanese Army, strengthening the Janjaweed militias that have long used rape, murder and mayhem to gain control of the region.

On August 28, Sudanese Government forces launched a major offensive in Darfur to finish off any opposing rebels, in direct violation of the Darfur Peace Agreement and cease-fire accord. As a result, tens of thousands more civilians have been forcibly displaced, bringing the total to more than 2 million people.

Relief organizations that have not already left the region face near impossible hurdles to reach hundreds of thousands of desperate people in need of food, water, and medical attention who are also vulnerable to the intensifying and indiscriminant aerial bombings.

The well-intentioned 7,000-member African Union peacekeeping force is understaffed, under-equipped, and has been unable to stop the violence in Darfur. Estimates of the number of people who have died from war and disease in Darfur range as high as 450,000.

The United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 1706 that would replace the African Union force with a much larger UN force empowered to protect civilians, but the Sudanese Government not only rejected the resolution but demanded that the African Union withdraw from the country after its mandate expires at the end of this month.

While the United Nations, the African Union and most of the international community are united in support of a larger UN peacekeeping force, the government in Khartoum has repeatedly refused, presumably fearing that the UN could pose a challenge to its own ability to act with impunity.

It is ludicrous that a lone despot, Sudan’s President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, can obstruct the deployment of a UN peacekeeping force to stop genocide from continuing in his country. He has even gone so far as to threaten to attack any UN force that enters Sudan.

Despite the Bush Administration’s diplomatic efforts in pressing for urgent international intervention to ease the Darfur crisis, China and Russia managed to thwart passage of a stronger UN Security Council resolution.

And on August 20, the Arab League committee on Sudan backed the Sudanese president’s refusal of a UN peacekeeping force and further distanced itself from any responsibility for the situation in Darfur.

The diplomatic inertia on Darfur is illustrative of just how much America’s credibility and influence has eroded in the eyes of the world, largely due to our misguided policy in Iraq.

Having squandered the trust and confidence of our allies, particularly those in the Arab world, the Bush Administration’s leverage with which to solve other regional and global crises is weakened. Darfur is one example. The impasse over Iran’s nuclear program is another.

It is tragic how much damage this Administration’s policies have caused to America’s leadership on so many issues that require the cooperation and support of other nations. The price in Darfur is an emboldened Sudanese regime that has managed to defy U.S. diplomatic pressure, and the deaths of thousands of innocent people.

Urgent and immediate action is essential to save Darfur from further catastrophe.

First, the President will today finally appoint a Presidential Special Envoy to Sudan. I and others had called for the designation of a special envoy for Sudan for months, so this long overdue decision is welcome.

Second, although the African Union troops are too few and lightly equipped to stop the violence, they are serving as witnesses for the rest of the world at a time when the government in Khartoum commits atrocities and makes it more difficult for humanitarian organizations and journalists to operate.

The United States and other nations must continue to support the African Union until a UN peacekeeping force is deployed, which would take at least four to six months.

There should be no doubt that our first priority is to get UN peacekeepers on the ground as soon as possible, but in the interim, if African Union troops are forced to leave at the end of September, the last line of protection will be lost and an even worse period of lawlessness and slaughter will begin.

Third, the Administration should call upon the European Union and the UN Security Council to impose financial, travel, and diplomatic sanctions against the Sudanese leadership, rebel forces, and others who are responsible for the atrocities in Darfur.

Fourth, the United States must increase diplomatic pressure on countries friendly to Khartoum – particularly Russia, China, and members of the Arab League – to use their influence to convince Sudan to support a UN peacekeeping force. This, unfortunately, is not made easier by our weakened influence with these nations.

Fifth, the Administration must urge all United Nation member states to accelerate implementation of Security Council Resolution 1706 and the deployment of UN peacekeepers to Darfur. The White House should be working more vigorously to persuade countries to commit troops and funds for the UN force.

Finally, in circumstances like this the United Nations should be empowered to deploy troops to prevent the mass murder of civilians, irrespective of the stubborn, self-serving opposition of the government of the country.

When a country’s corrupt, abusive leader, lacking any legitimate mandate from the people, flagrantly violates UN resolutions and a cease-fire agreement and embarks on a scorched earth campaign which threatens the lives of countless innocent people the UN should be able to go in.

Mr. President, if Darfur were in Europe, we would have responded differently. Although belated, our response, as the leader of NATO, to the ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia put a quick end to the atrocities there.

Darfur is on a different continent, but the forcefulness of the response to genocide should not depend on where genocide occurs or the race, ethnicity or nationality of the victims.

I have no illusions about the difficulties of ending this conflict, nor do I question the sincerity of those who have tried to do so. But the efforts that have been made so far have been woefully inadequate.

The situation in Darfur calls for far more intensive, sustained, and high level attention than the Bush Administration and other countries have provided thus far.

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