Omer Ismail, a Sudanese national and co-founder of the Sudan Democratic Forum and the Darfur Peace and Development Organization, spoke those words during a press conference today in the Capitol building. The event, organized by the Save Darfur Coalition, brought together US Representatives, religious and community leaders, and activists—all coming together to denounce the atrocities in Darfur and to renew the call for action. The press conference was organized in response to the recent decision by the Sudanese government to expel NGOs responsible for supplying life-sustaining necessities to millions of civilians in Darfur. As Mr. Ismail suggests, bullets are not the only means employed by the Sudanese government for killing people; the Bashir regime has learned from past experience that starvation and disease can be highly effective killers.
The decision to cut the lifeline for millions of civilians in Darfur is essentially a no-loss gamble for Bashir at this time; he is now holding millions of lives hostage—lives which mean nothing to him aside from their usefulness as a bargaining chip with the international community. It will have no effect on the conscience of Mr. Bashir if every man, woman, and child in Darfur suffers and dies from starvation and disease due to the loss of international assistance. The lives—and deaths—of these people only matter to Bashir insofar as he can use them as leverage against the international community. Unfortunately, this is a tactic that has been successful for Bashir in the past—he believes that eventually, if he causes enough suffering, if the atrocities are heinous enough then the resolve of the international leaders will crack.
Bashir has seen the resolve crack before; he has used every means at his disposal to debase, devalue, and destroy the people of Darfur. Employing militiamen as death squads, using rape as a weapon, disrupting food and water supplies, preventing access to medical care—even going so far as to paint military aircraft in UN colors to bomb civilians who thought they were receiving aid—and yet he enjoys impunity. All of the rhetoric directed against him has been empty—and he knows it.
If the international community gives Bashir a carrot every time he holds his own people hostage, then the misery in Darfur will continue, unabated, until another despot takes his place—and we can be assured that his successor will continue the cycle.
If the international community is serious about Darfur, then they must get serious with Bashir—he can no longer be allowed to dictate terms to the rest of the world. The aid workers must be allowed unconditional return, the obstruction of the UNAMID deployment must cease, and attacks on civilians in Darfur must not be allowed to continue. The punishments for continuing to violate these very basic terms must be laid out in specific, concrete terms and they must be followed through on by the international community. Now is the time to break the cycle, we must not allow Bashir to buy impunity with the lives of the people of Darfur—again.
The opinions expressed here are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the position of the Save Darfur Coalition.
