ICC arrest warant for President of Sudan Omar Bashir

[Whoaccio]

I couldn't find the thread, but I seem to recall there was a thread a few months ago along the lines of "what is wrong with Africa?" In short, this. Typical rhetoric to the effect that white people are the root evil of everything in Africa has created a situation where the worst dictators, to the point of genocide, can escape any kind of justice by framing Western intervention as "neo-colonialism," a tactic which is now being used by Bashir and Mugabe, both 21st century Pol Pots, have used to great effect.

It really upsets me that countries like Canada (or Australia, or Germany, Spain, Brazil, S. Korea, New Zealand, or Britain) never have the chutzpah to take the initiative on these kind of things. A R2P case could be made quite easily for Sudan, were western government not tied to this politically correct bullshit that it is somehow imperial to stop Sudanese Arabs from ethnically cleansing local Africans. Its really a two-for. Not only is the government in question on the African continent, it is Arab (itself an imperial force in Africa, but never mind),and hence this gets caught up in the perceived Western Islamophobia.

 

[Seymour]

I heard Medecins-Sans-Frontieres on the CBC today. They have been ejected from the country, as have many other aid agencies following the warrant for the Sudanese president. This is causing even more death and despair among the population of Sudan as the aid workers are no longer to provide health care services, or food programs to the people.

 

[kEiThZ]

I for one am glad about this situation. It will expose the uselessness of the UN. They'll put out the warrant. But there will no will to execute it. Are there any Europeans who are willing to attack Sudan to enforce the warrant? Would the Arabs tolerate the arrest of an Arab head of state? Would China tolerate the arrest of the head of state of an oil supplier who provides 10-20% of their oil? The only folks who can do anything are the Americans, possibly with the assistance of the rest of the anglosphere (brits, aussies, canucks). But then we'd be called neo-colonizers, occupiers, etc.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Except even the Americans, etc. aren't exactly in a rush to get involved either - and given the lack of overriding strategic interests in the region, it probably won't. The UN is only as strong and principled as the nations that make it up. Would ANY sovereign state, under the current arrangement, "tolerate" any kind of uninvited humanitarian intervention? No.

AoD

 

[down on the upside]

Not only is the government in question on the African continent, it is Arab (itself an imperial force in Africa, but never mind),and hence this gets caught up in the perceived Western Islamophobia.

I have a bone to pick with comments such as these, Sudanese Africans not only represent a significant part of the population, there exists a long history of Arabs and Eastern African relations existing prior to the advent of Islam and the colonization of Sudan by Albanian Egyptians in the 1800s. Calling the Bashir administration an imperial government is ridiculous. Is Bashir abusing perceived western colonialist opinion to massacre his people, definitely.

 

[Whoaccio]

Of course it is an imperial conflict. If one ethnic group, Arab-Africans in this case, is trying to forcibly assert it's dominance via genocide, rape and massive depopulation against another, the sedentary non-Arab ethnicities in this case, that is imperialism in my books. Maybe imperialism is a bad word, given all of it's connotations. But whatever you call it in Darfur you have on ethnic group forcibly trying to suppress locals. That the Arab-African militias are being supported by the Bashir government, it doesn't take too much to call the government "imperial".

 

[down on the upside]

imperialism refers to one country attempting to expand its power and control onto other countries/regions and can take the form of social, political, economic control or a combination of the above. Its a form of colonialism. Darfur has been a part of Sudan since inception, as such the current violence would be considered ethnic or a tribal conflict. You cannot ignore the shared history of Sudan's Arabs and African ethnicities or try to present the Arab's of Sudan as a foreign people.

 

[kEiThZ]

Regardless of how one wants to characterize the conflict in Sudan, I think we can all agree that the plight of the Darfurians warrants some attention by the international community, in light of the Sudanese governments complicity or wilfull inaction in solving in the inter-ethnic conflict that exists in western Sudan.