Presentation July 6, Darfur Panel Elliot Fratkin
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- Brief history
- Conclusion
- Darfur: The Root Causes of Civil Wars in Sudan
- Darfur: Recommended Humanitarian Organizations and Relief Agencies
- Recommended reading
| Presentation July 6, Darfur Panel
Elliot Fratkin I want to thank the organizers of this program for bringing together a community discussion of events in Darfur. I wish to make 2 points that I hope will contribute to this discussion: 1. Darfur is a genuine, serious human rights catastrophe, where in the past two years between 200-400,000 people have died, many from disease but also many who have been killed, raped, and looted. Up to two million people are internally or internationally displaced. Estimates of deaths in the conflict have ranged from 50,000 (World Health Organization, September 2004) to 450,000 (Dr. Eric Reeves, 28 April 2006). Most NGOs use 400,000 as established figure. The situations demands intervention, in my view by the United Nations to broker a peace accord and provide peacekeepers to prevent further killings. Secondly we need to support the many humanitarian organizations providing food, medicine, and security to region’s’ victims, some of which I list in the handout. 2. The second point I wish make is to emphasize the internal dynamics of this crisis. Darfur is one of several conflicts in Sudan, which also include the 21 year civil war in the south with the SPLA, the Nuba Mountains in the center of the country, and the Blue Nile and eastern regions of the country by populations opposed to the autocratic rule of the Khartoum government. Each of these conflicts has their origins in desires of people for local autonomy, control of their resources, and national representation and each have been violently suppressed by the Khartoum government. As a professor and research of African Studies for 30 years, I get disturbed when Africans are described as pawns of external manipulations, or as essentialized “victims” or “villains” in our press and other media. This does NOT mean that outside forces – the United States, China, Al Qaida – do not have interests in the region. Of course they do, so do neighboring countries of Libya, Eritrea, Egypt, Kenya. Uganda, Chad. African people, like people everywhere, try to exert control over their lives, which in many parts of Africa is difficult in the current climate of war, drought, HIV Aids, and debt crisis. I want to emphasize African agency, and to describe briefly the chain of events that have led up to and contributed to the crisis in Darfur. My talk is entitled The Root Causes of Sudan Civil Wars, which I borrow from Douglas Johnson’s excellent book of the same name. When one looks at Sudan’s history and politics, you find many civil wars occurring in the past 30 years, but many tracing their causes back to the 19th century. While the western media has characterized the fighting as based on race or religion – the Arab Muslim north against the Black Animist or Christian south, they have a harder time understanding the Darfur killings, or the wars on Blue Nile, Nuba Mountains, or among the Beni Amer in eastern Sudan, where all these populations are Muslim and race, as my colleague Enoch Page may expand on, is culturally constructed. Brief history For as long as history has been reported, northern Nile River states have raided southern Sudan for slaves. In Arabic Sudan means “black” or “land of the blacks”. When Egypt adopted Islam in the 7th century AD, they had trade agreements with Christian Nuba which included the payment of slaves and ivory. Sennar, establish along the Blue Nile in the 16th century, raided Ethiopian foothills for slaves, and the Darfur Sultanate, establish in the 17th century, raided what is now Bahr al-Ghazal for slaves and ivory, a situation which lasted well into the 20th century. Islam was introduced to the Sudanic Kingdoms, including Darfur, in 14th century, along with Arabic language and adoption of Sharia law. However Sudan did not develop an indigenous ulama, the official body of experts who defined orthodoxy, until quite recently and there was a great deal of variation in how Islam was practiced. The Islamic states that emerged drew most of their armies from slaves acquired in the south, particularly Nilotic speaking Dinka, Shilluk, and Nuer peoples. In the 19th century, Sudan fell under Egypt during the Ottoman period. Muhammad Ali, an Albanian solder emerged as Egypt’s ruler after the Napoleonic wars. He invaded and annexed Sudan in 1820, introducing Turco-Egyptian rule which lasted until 1883. This was a period of the most intensive slave raiding, when men taken for agricultural labor along the cotton export areas of the Nile, and women were forced into bondage as domestic servants and concubines. In 1883, the Turco-Egyptian regime was overthrown by the Mahdist state (1883-1898), based the charismatic religious figure of Muhammad Ahmad, the Mahdi or ‘savior’, and by his successor Khalifa Abdallahi, whose autocratic government was again based largely on a standing army of slave riflemen from the South and the West. The state, based in Omdurman (present day Khartoum) plundered the south but did not attempt to convert them to Islam, At the end of the century, Sudan and other East African countries suffered terrible famine combined with smallpox between 1888-1892. This weakened stated paved the way for British- Egyptian conquest in 1898. Their overthrow of the Mahdists was achieved with forces from the south and Christian Nuba, as well as Muslim groups including the Beni Amer near Kassala. The British ruled from 1899-1956, called the Anglo-Egyptian Condominium. They reinstalled tribal leaders in the west, south, and east to weaken the former Mahdist loyalists, and ruled through indirect rule of local administrators. There was periodic resistance to British –Egyptian rule in the south, but in the main the south continued to supply soldiers for the national army, a situation that continued through both world wars. The British officially distinguish an ‘African’ south from ‘Arab’ north, and supported local rulers and law. However, the south was terribly undeveloped, with virtually no schools except those created by western Christian missionaries. In 1946 at the close of WWII, England decided suddenly to grand independent to the Sudan as a whole. Schools were established in the south, but mainly in agricultural rather than pastoral areas developing a local settled elite of Zande, Mundari, and Lotuko people of Equatoria, Jur of Al Ghazal, and Fur of Darfur, versus unrepresented pastoralist groups of Dinka, Nuer of Upper Nile and Bahr al Ghazal provinces. Darfur was left largely neglected, as too far and not worth much administration. Sudan’s civil war, the first in post-colonial Africa, erupted immediately after independence in 1956. An army coup in Egypt led by Nasser, overthrew their monarchy, and renounced claims to Sudan, although it tried to persuade Sudan to agree to union with Egypt. Sudan nationalists were drawn mainly from educated Arabs in Khartoum forming the NUP (National Unionist Party), and also the Muslim party Umma, led by the Mahdi’s posthumous son Sayyid Abd al-Rahman Al-Mahdi who strongly desired to keep southern Sudan in their borders, but without granting any political autonomy to the region. The south had formed their own party, the Liberal Party, which campaigned unsuccessfully for a federated but autonomous South, but lost to the NUP majority. As mutiny broke out by southern Sudan soldiers in Torit, and though repressed by Khartoum, led to a prolonged civil war between 1956-1972. The south did not press for separation, but for regional autonomy, an issue that John Garang of the later SPLA consistently put forward. But the north feared autonomy would lead to separation, threatened control of the Nile River, and loss of important resources. In 1958 the Umma party handed over power to the Military, who quickly moved to suppress the rebellion in the south. In 1965 a constituent assembly formed in Khartoum, which explicitly rejected self determination or regional autonomy for the south. In 1969, a coalition of army officers, socialists and communists staged a coup bringing Colonel Jaafar Nimairi to power. Communists attempted a coup in 1971, which was repressed by Nimairi, who had to deal with strength of Islamic parties including Umma and National Islamic Front. In 1972 Ethiopia under Haile Selassie negotiated a truce between North and South Sudan, leading to Addis Ababa Agreement which brought peace to Sudan between 1972-1983. But both Khartoum and south are unhappy with the truce, the South wanted its own army and regional government, and the North increasingly coming under Islamic rule. Sudan joined the Arab world following 1973 Israeli war, and Hassan al-Turabi (the cleric who inspired Osama bin Laden, became increasingly powerful. Christian missionaries become more active in south, and in 1970s large oil deposits discovered in southern provinces of Upper Nile and Jonglei. (Possibly 10 billion barrels) Chevron and Total main concessions, southerners wanted refineries built in south, Nimairi and Muslims demanded they be built in north. (Also conflict over Jonglei canal, water diversion for cotton fields.), expanding mechanized farming and dislocating farmers, and leading to black migration north. In 1983 the (SPLA) Sudan Peoples Liberation Army/Movement was formed with John Garang, a Dinka orphan who had fought in the first war, but was encouraged to go to college, attending Grinnell College in the US and acquiring a PhD in agricultural economics from the University of Dar Es Salaam. The war breaks out when SPLA attacks oil refineries, and by 1985 the SPLA attacked outposts in the Bahr el Ghazal, Jonglei and Kordofan, as well as in Blue Nile and Nuba Mountains. In response, the government unleashed Baqqara murrahalin (militias) against Nuba, not the first time the government used armed pastoralists to attack farmers. SPLA attacked Mundari people in Equatoria, for supporting the government. In Khartoum, the Islamicists were calling for a fundamentalist state, and Nimairi arrested Turabi and 100 Muslim Brothers to stem their power. The Muslims call for intifada against Nimairi and overthrow him in April 1985. Sadiq al Mahdi assumes power. Islamicists gain power, During the 1980s, the SPLA allied to Mengistu in Ethiopia, who had overthrown Haile Selassie in 1974 and established a Soviet client state. The SPLA periodically attacked Mengistu’s enemies, including the Oromo Liberation Front which was fight alongside Eritreans and Tigrayans to topple Mengistu. In addition, Garang fought Uganda (Musevini), sheltered the Lord Resistance Army. In Darfur, Fur – Zaghawa conflicts in Darfur escalates, with Chad backing different factions. SPLA’s strength grows with Soviet weapons, and they take areas in south, as well as Nuba. Bu 1989 the Sadiq presidency wants negotiations with SPLA, Turabi’s NIF walk out of government and SPLA enter a ceasefire with the government. But in June 1989 Sadiq al Mahdi's government is overthrown by Brigadier Umar al-Bashir, backed by Turabi and the National Islamic Front. They impose Sharia Islamic code throughout country including hadud punishments of flogging, stoning, and amputation, referred to legislature. By 1991, the Ethiopian rebel armies of OLF, EPLF, and TPLF gain ascendancy and Mengistu is overthrown. Garang loses his main supporter, and weakened, factional fighting breaks out within the SPLA, with a Nuer faction splitting, and splitting again. In 1992 a Fatwa is issued by ulama (religious leaders) defines civil war as jihad against unbelievers and apostates; SPLA defeated in Darfur, and reconciliation talks in Nairobi between SPLA factions fail. Sudan army victories grow, take important cities including Juba, further splits in SPLA. In 1993, the US declares Sudan a country sponsoring terrorism, and begins supporting the SPLA. In 1994 a Peace is brokered between Garang and Machar by Kenya, Eritrea, Uganda, Ethiopia and US, call for self determination for south and Nuba. Meanwhile, the Sudan government increases its military build up against Zaghawa in Darfur, and renew bombing in the Nuba Mountains. 1995-96 SPLA grows in strength, $20 million in arms from US channeled through Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Uganda, while oil revenues help the Khartoum government. The Canadian company Arakis buys into Sudan oil, forms Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Company, consortium owned by Chinese, Malaysian Petronas, and Sudan. Arakis later (1998) sells shares to Talisman Energy. Sadiq al Mahdi flees to Eritrea, chased away by Turabi’s NIF. 1997 Further victories for SPLA, Garang becomes overall commander (again) of SPLA, while Riek Machar’s faction signs peace agreement with Khartoum. Machar appointed regional president of Southern States Coordination Council, and fights SPLA factions. 1998 – Fighting stalemates, SPLA has major battles in Wau; the Government retakes Wau, killing hundreds of Dinka students. A Plane crash kills first vice president Al Zubair Muhammad Salih, replaced by NIF Foreign Minister; NIF assumes leadership of many government posts. Following the bombings by Al Qaida of two US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the US launched a cruise missile against Al-Shifa pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum on the 20 August, 1998. Famine grows in Bahr al-Ghazal, WFP claim 350,000 in urgent need of food. Arab tribesmen attack 45 villages in western Darfur killing 100 civilians, 4000 people displaced, and attacks against Beni Amer in Kassala. Masalit villages 1999 Bashir dissolves parliament, recognizes only NIF (now known as National Congress), more factional fighting within SPLA. Bashir puts own representative in charge of Western Darfur state, 50-100,000 flee, 40,000 to Chad, 76 villages burned, Govt begins offensive against Nuba Mtns. Arab militias on horseback (janjaweed) attack villages in Bahr al Ghazal where relief supplies distributed. Turabi seeks truce with Sadiq al Mahdi. IMF reinstates Sudan following partial repayment of loans beginning with oil export (600,000 barrels exported from Port Sudan, earn $ 2.2 million. US passes Sudan Peace Act authorizing deliveries of food aid to SPLA, bars foreign firms investing in Sudan from being listed on NY^& stock exchange. SPLA attack oil lines. 2000 Sudan signs peace accord with Eritrea, and Sudan normalizes with Ethiopia, Egypt resumes ties. 2001 SPLA and Turabi Popular National Congress Party sign memorandum of understanding in Geneva, to work for democratic system. US appoint John Danforth as special envoy, Sudan begins cooperating with CIA and FBI to track down Al Qaida members following 9/11, 2002 Nairobi declaration between Riek Machar and John Garang reunites two factions. Ceasefire agreement for Nuba Mountains, but SPLA begins offensive in western Bar al Ghazal. , EU resumes aid to Khartoum. Sudan rejects Danforth’s oil sharing plan with south and fighting intensifies. Nevertheless, Bashir and Garang meet for first time in Kampala, pledge support for peach process. DARFUR In 2003, the Sudan government and SPLA agree to ceasefire with monitoring, Amnesty Intl reports on deteriorating situation in Darfur (Feb 12), Darfur Liberation Army renames itself Sudan Liberation Movement. Army, Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) in Darfur escalate fighting, attack police post, government attacks by air, janjaweed Arab militias and regular army destroy hundreds of villages and displace 800,000 people to Chad. The SLM is generally associated with the Fur and Masalit, while the JEM is associated with the Zaghawa of the northern half of Darfur. 2004 Government and SPLM reach agreement on wealth sharing, African Bloc of UN Human Rights Commission vote down strong criticism of atrocities in Darfur and adopt a compromise resolution, cease fire agreement between Darfur rebels, while Darfur refugees reach one million. Sudan continues aerial bombardment and janjaweed attacks in Darfur against civilian Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa populations. July 2004, Annan and United States Secretary of State Colin Powell visited Sudan and the Darfur region, and urged the Sudanese government to stop supporting the Janjaweed militias. The U.S. Congress declared the actions of the Sudanese government and their proxy militias officially as a "genocide". African Union begins sending tropops, iniatially from Rwanda and Nigeria. This leads to speculation of an anticipated international involvement, such as United Nations peacekeeping forces being deployed to Darfur, and possible International Police involvement. September 13, 2004, WHO published a Darfur mortality survey, which was the first reliable indicator about deaths in Darfur. It reported that 6,000–10,000 people were dying each month in Darfur. Many were related to diarrhoea, but the most significant cause of death was violent death for those aged 15–49. The Darfur mortality rates were significantly higher than the emergency threshold, and were from 3 to 6 times higher than the normal African death rates. On September 18, 2004, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 1564, pressuring the Sudanese government to ‘act urgently to improve the situation’ by threatening the possibility of oil sanctions if they refuse to accept the expansion of African Union peacekeepers. In the wake of this resolution, the peacekeeper force was to be expanded to 4,500 troops. The United Nations pledged $100 million dollars to support the force, about half of the $221 million cost to keep them deployed for a year. The European Union mobilised the remainder, an additional EUR 80 million to support the deployment and operations of the 3144-African Union observer mission. 2005 Naivahsa Peace conference ends the 21-year civil war between SPLA and Khartoum, and produces an agreement where state revenues — oil money in particular — would be shared between the government and the southern rebel groups. In March 2005, the UN's Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland estimated that 10,000 were dying each month excluding deaths due to ethnic violence. An estimated 2 million people had at that time been displaced from their homes, mostly seeking refuge in camps in Darfur's major towns. Two hundred thousand had fled to neighboring Chad May 2005, Medecins Sans Frontieres doctor Paul Foreman was arrested by Sudanese authorities over the publication of a report detailing hundreds of rapes in Darfur Senegal, Gambia, Kenya and South Africa joing AU forces, Canda sends military vehicles. Murdrs, rapes, and displacements begin to drop. July 30 2005 Garang dies in helicopter crash returning from talks with Ugandan President Museveni February 2006 U.S offers a motion to send UN peacekeepers to Darfur. The Security Council agreed to begin the planning process and called for a 12,000 to 20,000 troop presence in Darfur with the 7,000 African Union troops already there being incorporated into the UN mission. May 5, 2006, the government of Sudan signs an peace accord with the Darfur’s Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) brokered by US and AU, but rejected by two other, smaller groups, the Justice and Equality Movement and a rival faction of the SLA June 19, 2006, President al-Bashir declares he would prevent a UN peacekeeping force from entering Sudan. At the July 2006 African Union summit held in Banjul, Gambia, it was decided that AU peacekeepers would remain in Darfur until the end of 2006 at the request of the United Nations. The request to allow UN peacekeepers into the area was refused by Omar Hassan al-Bashir. Conclusion – What should we as caring people do? Immediately we have to aid the targeted communities with humanitarian assistance. To this degree, I agree with Eric Reeves campaign to raise money for the NGOs dealing with the refugees, including Medicins San Frontier, Save the Children, Oxfam. I also am a strong believer in placing a neutral force to stop the killings I know that The United Nations cannot enter sovereign nations without their permission, but I also know that even a small presence as in Congo where 2 million people have died in the last 10 years can make a very important difference. It is very easy to sit in the comfort of an air conditioned room and talk about US imperialism in the abstract, but you would be amazed what a small peace keeping presence can do. We lived in Eritrea where UN soldiers from India, Slovakia, kept the peace between Ethiopia and Eritrea in their deadly fratricidal war. The UN needs to take charge, demand negotiations. Call for cease fire. I know they can go in to a country in the case of genocide which may be a vehicle some would like to see. But the US has officially called it Genocide and has done nothing. So this is just semantics.
Human Rights Watch urges the international community to take immediate steps to protect civilians and ensure humanitarian access to all areas of Darfur. The United Nations Security Council and the African Union (A.U.) must put intense pressure on the government of Sudan to immediately remove all obstacles to humanitarian operations, cease attacks on civilians, and facilitate both the current African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) and any future U.N. mission in Darfur. All individuals responsible for attacks on civilians, including on humanitarian convoys, should also be placed under U.N. sanctions. Darfur: The Root Causes of Civil Wars in Sudan Elliot Fratkin, Department of Anthropology, Smith College efratkin@smith.edu Chronology of Events 1983 Sudan Peoples Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA) formed with John Garang emerging as leader. In next few years SPLA attacks oil refineries and outposts in the Bahr el Ghazal, Jonglei and Kordofan, Blue Nile and Nuba Mountains. In Khartoum, the Islamicists call for a fundamentalist Islamic state; Nimairi arrests Turabi to stem his power. April 1985 National Islamic Front (NIF) calls for intifada and overthrow Nimairi; Sadiq al Mahdi assumes power. During the 1980s, the SPLA allied to Mengistu in Ethiopia and uses Ethiopia for base and weapons. In Darfur, Fur – Zaghawa conflicts in Darfur escalates, with Chad backing different factions. By 1989 the Sadiq presidency wants negotiations and ceasefire with SPLA, Turabi’s NIF walks out of government. June 1989 Sadiq al Mahdi's government is overthrown by Brigadier Umar al-Bashir, backed by Turabi and the National Islamic Front. 1991, the Ethiopian rebel armies of OLF, EPLF, TPLF gain ascendancy and Mengistu is overthrown, weakening SPLA. Factional fighting breaks out within the SPLA, with a Nuer faction splitting, and splitting again. In 1992 a Fatwa is issued by ulama (religious leaders) defines civil war as jihad against unbelievers and apostates; SPLA defeated in Darfur, and reconciliation talks in Nairobi between SPLA factions fail. Sudan army victories grow; take important cities including Juba, further splits in SPLA. 1993, the US declares Sudan a country sponsoring terrorism, and begin supporting the SPLA. In 1994 a peace is brokered between Garang and Machar by Kenya, Eritrea, Uganda, Ethiopia and US, call for self determination for south and Nuba. The Sudan government increases its military build up against Zaghawa in Darfur, and renew bombing in the Nuba Mountains. 1995-96 SPLA grows in strength, $20 million in arms from US channeled through Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Uganda, while oil revenues help the Khartoum government. The Canadian company Arakis buys into Sudan oil, forms Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Company, consortium owned by Chinese, Malaysian Petronas, and Sudan. Sadiq al Mahdi forced to flee to Eritrea by Turabi’s NIF. 1997 Further victories for SPLA, Garang becomes overall commander of SPLA; Riek Machar’s faction signs peace agreement with Khartoum. Machar appointed regional president of Southern States Coordination Council, and fights SPLA factions. 1998 – Fighting stalemates, SPLA has major battles in Wau; the Government retakes Wau, killing hundreds of Dinka students. Plane crash kills first vice president Al Zubair Muhammad Salih, replaced by NIF Foreign Minister; NIF assumes leadership of many government posts. Following the bombings by Al Qaida of two US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the US launched a cruise missile against Al-Shifa pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum on the 20 August, 1998. 1998. Famine grows in Bahr al-Ghazal, WFP claim 350,000 in urgent need of food. Arab tribesmen attack 45 villages in western Darfur killing 100 civilians, 4000 people displaced, and attacks against Beni Amer in Kassala. Masalit villages 1999. Bashir dissolves parliament, recognizes only NIF (now known as National Congress), more factional fighting within SPLA. Bashir puts own representative in charge of Western Darfur state, 50-100,000 flee, 40,000 to Chad, 76 villages burned, Govt begins offensive against Nuba Mtns. Arab militias on horseback (janjaweed) attack villages in Bahr al Ghazal where relief supplies distributed. Turabi seeks truce with Sadiq al Mahdi. IMF reinstates Sudan following partial repayment of loans beginning with oil export (600,000 barrels exported from Port Sudan, earn $ 2.2 million. US passes Sudan Peace Act authorizing deliveries of food aid to SPLA, bars foreign firms investing in Sudan from being listed on NY^& stock exchange. SPLA attack oil lines. 2000 Sudan signs peace accord with Eritrea, and Sudan normalizes relations with Ethiopia, Egypt. 2001 SPLA and Turabi Popular National Congress Party sign memorandum of understanding in Geneva, to work for democratic system. US appoint John Danforth as special envoy; Sudan begins cooperating with CIA and FBI to track down Al Qaida members following 9/11. 2002 Nairobi declaration between Riek Machar and John Garang reunites two factions. Ceasefire agreement for Nuba Mountains, but SPLA begins offensive in western Bar al Ghazal. EU resumes aid to Khartoum. Sudan rejects Danforth’s oil sharing plan with south and fighting intensifies. Nevertheless, Bashir and Garang meet for first time in Kampala, pledge support for peach process. In 2003, the Sudan government and SPLA agree to ceasefire, reach agreement on wealth sharing 2005 Naivasha (Kenya) Peace conference ends the 21-year civil war between SPLA and Khartoum, and produces an agreement where state revenues — oil money in particular — would be shared between the government and the southern rebel groups. July 30 2005 John Garang dies in helicopter crash returning from talks with Ugandan President Museveni, leaving peace agreement and succession in SPLA in doubt. DARFUR 2003 Darfur Liberation Army renames itself Sudan Liberation Movement. Army, Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) in Darfur escalate fighting, attack police posts, government responds with air attacks while janjaweed militias and regular army destroy hundreds of villages and displace 800,000 people to Chad. Amnesty Intl reports on deteriorating situation in Darfur (Feb 12). 2004. African Bloc of UN Human Rights Commission vote down strong criticism of atrocities in Darfur, cease fire agreement between competing Darfur rebels; Darfur refugees reach one million. In July, Kofi Annan and Colin Powell visit Sudan and the Darfur region, and urge the Sudanese government to stop supporting the Janjaweed militias. The U.S. Congress declared the actions of the Sudanese government and their proxy militias officially as a ‘genocide’. This leads to speculation of an anticipated international involvement, such as United Nations peacekeeping forces being deployed to Darfur, and possible International Police involvement. African Union begins sending tropops, iniatially from Rwanda and Nigeria. September 13, 2004, WHO published a Darfur mortality survey, which reported that 6,000–10,000 people were dying each month in Darfur. Many were related to diarrhoea, but the most significant cause of death was violent death for those aged 15–49. The Darfur mortality rates were s 3 to 6 times higher than the normal African death rates. September 18, 2004, the United Nations Security Council passes Resolution 1564, pressuring the Sudanese government to ‘act urgently to improve the situation’ by threatening the possibility of oil sanctions if they refuse to accept the expansion of African Union peacekeepers. The United Nations pledges $100 million dollars to support the force, about half of the $221 million cost to keep them deployed for a year. The European Union mobilises an additional EUR 80 million to support the deployment and operations of the 3144-African Union observer mission. March 2005, the UN's Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland estimates that 10,000 Darfurians were dying each month excluding deaths due to ethnic violence. An estimated 2 million people had been displaced from their homes, mostly seeking refuge in camps in Darfur's major towns. Two hundred thousand had fled to neighboring Chad May 2005, Medecins Sans Frontieres doctor Paul Foreman arrested by Sudanese authorities over the publication of a report detailing hundreds of rapes in Darfur Senegal, Gambia, Kenya and South Africa joing AU forces, Canda sends military vehicles. Murdrs, rapes, and displacements begin to drop. February 2006 U.S offers a motion to send UN peacekeepers to Darfur. The Security Council agreed to begin the planning process and called for a 12,000 to 20,000 troop presence in Darfur with the 7,000 African Union troops already there being incorporated into the UN mission. May 5, 2006, the government of Sudan signs an peace accord with the Darfur’s Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) brokered by US and AU, but rejected by two other, smaller groups, the Justice and Equality Movement and a rival faction of the SLA June 19, 2006, President al-Bashir declares he would prevent a UN peacekeeping force from entering Sudan. At the July 2006 African Union summit held in Banjul, Gambia, it was decided that AU peacekeepers would remain in Darfur until the end of 2006 at the request of the United Nations. The request to allow UN peacekeepers into the area was refused by Omar Hassan al-Bashir. Darfur: Recommended Humanitarian Organizations and Relief Agencies Action Contre la Faim (ACF) Africare American Jewish World Service CARE International Catholic Relief Services Chad-Darfur Emergency UNHCR Christian Children's Fund Church World Service Doctors without Borders USA European Community Humanitarian Office Human Rights Watch Inter-Church Committee for Refugees InterAction International Catholic Migration Commission International Committee of the Red Cross International Crisis Group International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies International Medical Corps International Orthodox Christian Charities International Rescue Committee Lutheran World Relief Mennonite Central Committee Mercy Corps International Oxfam America Save the Children United Nations Children's Fund United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East U.S. Catholic Conference Migration and Refugee Services U.S. Committee for Refugees World Food Program World Health Organization World Vision Recommended reading Douglas L. Johnson 2003. The Root Causes of Sudan’s Civil Wars. 2004. London: James Currey Publishers. Gérard Prunier 2005. Darfur: The Ambiguous Genocide. Ithaca NY: Cornell University Press. Julie Flint and Alex de Waal 2005, Darfur: A Short History of a Long War, Zed Books Eric Reeves’ writings, found at http://www.sudanreeves.org 
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