Darfur’s peace process is held back by pressure for a political revolution
Sunday, November 25, 2007
A UN/AU “hybrid” force is set to enter Darfur in early 2008, giving civilians the protection they have been demanding for years. On my last trip to Darfur, I visited several villages that were bombed by the Sudanese air force this year and others that had been attacked and looted by the janjaweed militias. If the 26,000 troop force actually does enter Darfur, civilians will surely be safer than they have been over the past several years.
But there are a lot of problems that international peacekeeping will bring. A popularly supported rebel movement is fighting for equal distribution of wealth and equal political participation but the UN and AU seem more interested in making a quick deal in order to bring about a much needed end to the violence. Darfuris still have high hopes for removing the junta from power and ushering in a new government, one with less centralized power, but international peacekeeping is likely to get in the way of this.
Read a piece that I wrote for the San Francisco Chronicle on some of the issues around intervention in Darfur here.
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