More good news out of Sudan

Shadow WarChief · Post by **Shadow WarChief** » 2004-07-20 12:11am

Amnesty condemns Sudan rapes

Monday, July 19, 2004 Posted: 7:48 PM EDT (2348 GMT)
A Sudanese refugee rests outside his shelter in Bahai, Chad.
VIDEO

The mass rapes are crimes against humanity, Amnesty International says.

BEIRUT, Lebanon (Reuters) -- Arab militias in Sudan are gang-raping and abducting girls as young as eight and women as old as 80, systematically killing, torturing, or using them as sex slaves, an Amnesty International report said on Monday.

Militias known as Janjaweed, which rights groups say are backed by the government, have been fighting rebels in Sudan's western Darfur region since last year, triggering one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.

"When we tried to escape they shot more children," one woman identified only as A. told Amnesty researchers.

"They raped women, I saw many cases of Janjaweed raping women and girls. They are happy when they rape. They sing when they rape and they tell us that we are just slaves and that they can do with us how they wish."

As many as 30,000 people have been killed in Darfur and more than a million displaced, their homes bombed by government planes, their crops stolen.

In a report called "Rape as a Weapon of War," Amnesty outlines sexual violence against women it says is happening on a massive scale. It says Khartoum is actively violating its legal obligations to protect civilians.

"Soldiers of the Sudan government army are present during attacks by the Janjaweed and when rapes are committed, but the Sudan government has done nothing so far to stop them," Amnesty researcher Benedicte Goderiaux told a news conference.

Darfur's rebels accuse the government of arming the Arab Janjaweed to loot and burn African villages in a campaign of ethnic cleansing. Khartoum denies the charge.

The Sudan embassy in Beirut said in a statement that the Amnesty report was aimed at defaming the government, distorting Arab culture and driving a wedge between Sudan's ethnic groups.

Sexual slavery

The Amnesty report, launched in Beirut and Nairobi, details gang rapes, public rapes, killings of those who resist rape, abductions for sexual slavery, and cases where women and girls have had their legs broken to stop them running away.

It is based on hundreds of testimonies collected from refugees in camps in Chad. Although the sample of victims was limited, Amnesty said it pointed to widespread abuse.

The London-based group said rebels fighting the Janjaweed may also have raped civilians, but facts were limited.

One woman was five months pregnant when the Janjaweed abducted her and eight others during an attack in July.

"After six days some of the girls were released. But the others, as young as eight years old, were kept there," she said.

"Five to six men would rape us in rounds, one after the other for hours during six days every night. My husband could not forgive me after this, he disowned me."

Efforts to end the crisis through negotiations are in tatters after rebels stormed out of peace talks last week. They said they would only meet government delegates when Khartoum fulfilled promises including disarming the Janjaweed.

Amnesty called for an end to the conflict, better protection of civilians, Janjaweed disarmament, trials for those carrying out the attacks and an international commission of inquiry to examine war crimes in Darfur.

A separate conflict in Sudan between the government and southern rebels has killed around two million people in the past two decades. Peace negotiations have brought it close to an end.

BlkbrryTheGreat · Post by **BlkbrryTheGreat** » 2004-07-20 12:12am

Africa: the biggest most miserable shithole on the entire planet.

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2004-07-20 12:29am

And it's fun, fun, fun 'til... someone powerful enough to do something starts caring enough to kick the crap out of the Sudanese.

Jadeite · Post by **Jadeite** » 2004-07-20 12:51am

This is why Africa would be better off under the heels of Europe.

Stormbringer · Post by **Stormbringer** » 2004-07-20 12:56am

Jadeite wrote:This is why Africa would be better off under the heels of Europe.

Indeed. I can't help but conclude that the world in general benefitted more from colonialism than the PC brigade cares to admit.

BlkbrryTheGreat · Post by **BlkbrryTheGreat** » 2004-07-20 12:56am

Jadeite wrote:This is why Africa would be better off under the heels of Europe.

Your not the only one who has said that.... (I have too, as a matter of fact).

Dark Hellion · Post by **Dark Hellion** » 2004-07-20 01:56am

Europe has already messed up once in africa. Lets give it to someone fun, like the Aussies. Then we'll have two continents of beer drinking, kangaroo wrestling maniacs.

J/K, you know I love you guys down under. And gals too.

Stuart Mackey · Post by **Stuart Mackey** » 2004-07-20 03:07am

Dark Hellion wrote:Europe has already messed up once in africa. Lets give it to someone fun, like the Aussies. Then we'll have two continents of beer drinking, kangaroo wrestling maniacs.

J/K, you know I love you guys down under. And gals too.

Foolish Hellion! do you not know that Aussies let loose in Africa would let loose decades of petty theft, organised crime, rampant police corruption and incest!

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2004-07-20 03:44am

Sounds like an improvement, you'll start tomorrow.

Mr Flibble · Post by **Mr Flibble** » 2004-07-20 03:50am

Howedar wrote:Sounds like an improvement, you'll start tomorrow.

Nah give it to Germany, they have always been itching for a continent to control.

Australia already has one continent, we're happy with that.
Plus I can imagine Howard would find a way to make africa even worse than it is now.

sketerpot · Post by **sketerpot** » 2004-07-20 08:14pm

Mr Flibble wrote:
Howedar wrote:Sounds like an improvement, you'll start tomorrow.
Nah give it to Germany, they have always been itching for a continent to control.

Australia already has one continent, we're happy with that.
Plus I can imagine Howard would find a way to make africa even worse than it is now.

I'd say that Africa contains enough shitholes to give everybody a piece of the pie. The US is having a hell of a time just keeping Afghanistan and Iraq under occupation, so I'd say the smaller powers should divvy things up. The Brits get to brag about their empire once more, the Germans get lebenstraum, the French get to compare their colony with ours, and Portugal can get a little fame other than being near Spain. Everybody wins.

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2004-07-20 08:19pm

Thank god Sudan is on the UN Human Rights Commission.

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2004-07-20 09:21pm

Joe wrote:Thank god Sudan is on the UN Human Rights Commission.

Oh, yeah. I forgot about how much a joke that commission is. Now, I think, we know for sure.

Xenophobe3691 · Post by **Xenophobe3691** » 2004-07-20 10:00pm

sketerpot wrote:
I'd say that Africa contains enough shitholes to give everybody a piece of the pie. The US is having a hell of a time just keeping Afghanistan and Iraq under occupation, so I'd say the smaller powers should divvy things up. The Brits get to brag about their empire once more, the Germans get lebenstraum, the French get to compare their colony with ours, and Portugal can get a little fame other than being near Spain. Everybody wins.

What about The Netherlands or Belgium? I'm sure the Dutch Colony'll produce so much weed all of Africa'll be high just off of the smell, and the Belgians can get their human rights record right this time

Mutant Headcrab · Post by **Mutant Headcrab** » 2004-07-20 10:34pm

The more I read stuff like this, the more I wonder about what will happen first:

1)The African population will wipe most of itself out

2)AIDS will wipe out most of the African population

3)A little bit of both

Mayabird · Post by **Mayabird** » 2004-07-21 12:06am

If it makes anyone feel better (it won't), a few Janjaweed militiamen are being sentenced to having a hand and foot amputated and six years in prison. Sure, that'll teach 'em.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/3907547.stm

Falkenhayn · Post by **Falkenhayn** » 2004-07-21 12:27am

Mayabird wrote:If it makes anyone feel better (it won't), a few Janjaweed militiamen are being sentenced to having a hand and foot amputated and six years in prison. Sure, that'll teach 'em.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/3907547.stm

Nah. Now if you said all of the Janjaweed were being made to eat their own testicles fried in lard before being neckshot, that would help.

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2004-07-21 01:10am

Mayabird wrote:If it makes anyone feel better (it won't), a few Janjaweed militiamen are being sentenced to having a hand and foot amputated and six years in prison. Sure, that'll teach 'em.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/3907547.stm

I'll believe it when I see it, since the government there is supposedly helping these clowns.

Jadeite · Post by **Jadeite** » 2004-07-21 01:25am

The guy in that news article picture is holding his gun like a retard. Probably the only reason the militia are making such a mess of things is because the people they attack can't fight back and/or are just as inept as the militia.

Axis Kast · Post by **Axis Kast** » 2004-07-22 12:22am

It’s a rather large step to saying that all of the African continent would have been better off under colonial rule to this day. One should not underestimate how significant a boon many Africans themselves consider self-determination – or even just rule by one of their own, corrupt or otherwise. It is still extremely debatable, for example, whether Namibia and South Africa would be better off under white rule than the current majority governments, for all their mistakes over the past decade. The same could be said of the Belgian Congo, where mismanagement was so over-the-top that the problems of today are probably not far removed. Perhaps if Tshombe had never been forced from Katanga, one province might still be standing on two legs thanks to the contribution of mining firms, but even that is debatable. No argument on Zimbabwe/Rhodesia, though. Nobody’s worse than Mugabe.