Sudan Jihad Update from Reuters:
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council on Thursday voted to create a United Nations peacekeeping force in Sudan's Darfur region to avert a new humanitarian disaster, but the Khartoum government rejected the resolution as "illegal."
The vote to send the force to Darfur once Sudan has agreed to its deployment passed with 12 votes in favor, none against and abstentions from Russia, China and Qatar, the only Arab council member.
The United Nations wants to replace and absorb an African Union force in Darfur, which has only enough money to exist until its mandate expires on September 30. It has been unable to halt the humanitarian catastrophe in the west of the country.
The resolution calls for up to 22,500 U.N. troops and police officers and an immediate injection of air, engineering and communications support for the 7,000-member African force.
The measure, drafted by Britain and the United States, is designed to allow planning and recruitment of troops for an eventual handover as well as to put pressure on Khartoum.
It certainly would, as the jihadists have threatened to turn their weapons on the Sudanese government if it accepted a UN peacekeeping force (as well as the peacekeeping force itself), which might be marginally more effective in stopping the genocide in Darfur.
"It is imperative that we move immediately to implement it fully to stop the tragic events unfolding in Darfur," U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said. "Every day we delay only adds to the suffering of the Sudanese people and extends the genocide."
The Darfur conflict erupted in February 2003, when non-Arab rebels took up arms against the government. In response, the government mobilized Arab militias known as Janjaweed, who have been accused of murder, rape and looting.
Fighting, disease and hunger have killed some 200,000 people and driven some 2.5 million into squalid camps.
Rebel groups have splintered and are now also conducting atrocities. Bloodshed has only increased since the government signed a peace agreement with one rebel group in May and Sudan is planning to send some 10,500 troops into Darfur, which the West fears will lead to full-scale war.
US OPTIMISTIC OF SUDAN CONSENT
In Washington, the State Department's top official on Africa, Jendayi Frazer, who met Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir this week, said she believed he would eventually consent to the U.N. force.
But in Khartoum, Ali Tamin Fartak, a presidential adviser, told Reuters, "Our stand is very clear, that the Sudanese government has not been consulted and it is not appropriate to pass a resolution before they seek the permission of Sudan."
Another presidential adviser, Majzoub al-Khalifa, told Al Jazeera television that the resolution was "illegal."
[...]
Russia and China supported the force but said Sudan's consent was needed first. Qatar pointed to Sudan's plan to send troops to Darfur, which it called positive.
A senior State Department official, Kristen Silverberg, said it was "inexplicable" that Russia and China had abstained "in light of the very grave and serious and deteriorating security situation."
For starters, Khartoum is a good business partner for both: That includes arms sales, and of particular urgency for China, oil.
The resolution allows U.N. troops to use force to protect U.N. personnel and facilities and prevent attacks and threats against civilians.
God Russia and China are so morraly bankrupt! Every vote that comes up that is helpful and needed they either vote against or abstain. Then again the UN is no better! Really what good is the UN? I say we get out!
This issue is talk, talk, talk. It is a genocide. It is time to get tough.
Do Westerners understand North Sudan has been helping terrorists? Do they understand, like Rwanda, this is a genocide? Do they understand the African slave trade is still alive and well in Sudan? Do they understand Sudan is Islam in its' purest form... and nobody wants to confront that because it will make Muslims angry.
Like all villians, Muslims do not want the world to know about Sudan.
Everybody cares about Philistines, anyway. They want Muslims to have their conquered holy land back so they can get back to telling Jews about how God hates them and has cursed them forever.
Nobody cares how ruthless the Arabic-Afican Sudanese North is killing the poor African Christians and Animists of the South all for the sake of forcing Sharia on them.
After all, they are civilized people beyond actually being culpable of genocide.
Sudan... Rwanda... these types of places... and what the Free World has done in these situations... tell you all you need to know about the Left and who they really are.
have you heard from the "Democrat Black politicians" on this issue? l guess its okay for arab muslims to kill black Africans, oh well they were the original slavers of blacks, and continue to this day. where are the outcrys from "liberals"...still waiting..oh the oppresor is not white,, there you go is the answer.
Zena
It's the same reason the Black Caucus has been silent about Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe.
Not to mention the fact that Mugabe has been stealing farms from white farmers whose families have been there for generations so he can give them to former "soldiers" who support him.
Robert Gabriel Mugabe, the president of Zimbabwe -- which the U.S. has dubbed an "outpost of tyranny" -- is a world-class troublemaker. He has cosied up to China and calls Iran "a critical partner." If U.S. intelligence agencies weren't so pre-occupied elsewhere, they might openly accuse him of supplying Congo uranium to his old pals in North Korea.
The dictator recently encouraged speculation that America had caused droughts by unspecified "chemical weapons." Famine, however, is largely the result of Mr. Mugabe's seizures of productive white-owned farms.
ZIMBABWE'S annual inflation slowed slightly to 1,184.6 percent in June,(highest inflation rate in the world) but remained high enough to dampen any hope of a quick economic recovery.
President Robert Mugabe's government has branded Zimbabwe's inflation rate -- which is the highest in the world -- its chief enemy as it battles an 8-year recession which analysts say is stoking social tensions.
The country's worst economic crisis since independence in 1980 is being marked by shortages of foreign currency, fuel and food, along with rising unemployment and deepening poverty.
Parliamentary elections in March 2005 were judged by international monitors to be egregiously flawed. In April, Zimbabwe was reelected to the UN Commission on Human Rights, outraging numerous countries and human rights groups. In mid-2005, Zimbabwe demolished its urban slums and shantytowns, leaving 700,000 people homeless in an operation called “Drive out Trash.” In 2006, the government launched Operation Roundup, which drove 10,000 homeless people out of the capital.
Zimbabwe's neighbor Botswana has virtually militarized its borders to stop the people of Zimbabwe from crossing. They have erected electric fences, guard towers and will arrest anyone crossing. Prior to this action , tens of thousands of people were crossing the border.
ALL IS NOT WELL IN ZIMBABWE UNDER MUGABE.
The sad-sack African Union peacekeeping force just announced it's quitting, and will be out of Sudan by the end of September.
With the fall of Rhodesia and South Africa, is there an African country that is not a chaotic hell-hole?