Where is World's Worst Humanitarian Crisis? (Hint:Not Florida)

[chlamor]

Eastern Congo now "world's worst humanitarian crisis"

afrol News, 16 March - The situation in the strife-torn eastern Congo Kinshasa (DRC) has surpassed the upheavals in Sudan's Darfur region as "the biggest, most neglected humanitarian emergency in the world today," according to the UN top humanitarian official, Jan Egeland.

Some 3 million Congolese were in acute need of assistance in a complex emergency where many parties were involved, "including, at one point, about 20 different armed actors," Mr Egeland told a press briefing as a two-day meeting of UN regional humanitarian relief officials began today in Geneva.

About 1 million people had died in the region in the past few years and there were many preventable deaths still - some 1,000 per day - despite the efforts of an active humanitarian community, he said, including 13 offices representing the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), which he heads.

In addition, sexual abuse in recent years had become probably worse there than anywhere else in the world, Mr Egeland said. Even the UN's own peacekeeping mission in eastern Congo, MONUC, faces massive charges of sexual abuse.

http://www.afrol.com/articles/15918

[deadparrot]

1. Two problems:

a) no oil, and b) they aren't in a hospice in Florida.

Move along, nothing to see here.

[chlamor]

6. Congo 4th largest producer of oil

in sub-Saharan Africa

[AuntiBush]

2. Read about that, but THERE IS NO OIL there. Sadly, sadly so.

I'm moving to Canada. Or wake me up when this nightmare is over 'cause I can't take the ultra-cons UNcompassionate sickness that's spread across our great land once called the US of A.

[seemslikeadream]

3. 4 million deaths since 1998

The body of a Hema man, executed by Lendu militia. He was bound and impaled before being shot. His ears had been bitten off in the ritual killing.
http://slate.msn.com/id/2097314

March 14, 2005
Despite 4 Million Deaths, the Congo's War Remains Largely Ignored
According to a recent Reuters poll of over 100 humanitarian professionals, media personalities, academics and activists, the civil war in the Congo is the most important crisis “forgotten” by the mainstream media.

With over four million casualties since 1998 - more than 10 times as many as killed in the Asian tsunami - John O'Shea of Ireland's GOAL relief agency has branded the Congo conflict the worst humanitarian disaster since the Holocaust.

Although the conflict officially ended in 2003, violence has continued in most parts of the country. According to one BBC report, mass rape has been a tactic employed “as a weapon of war; a means of humiliating and controlling civilian populations.”

The Reuters Alternet poll also mentions conflicts in Uganda and the Darfur region of Sudan as the second and third most “forgotten” new stories respectively.

more
http://dominionpaper.ca/international_news/2005/03/14/despite_4_.html

[chlamor]

5. Recently saw a breakdown of worldwide media coverage by the minutes

as it related to geographical regions. Africa received barely a whisper. Of course there are abundant resources throughout the continent including oil. But of course these are non people, certainly uncivilized.

Heart of Darkness in the shape of a cellphone.

Guns, Coltan, Cellphones and The Congo

[seemslikeadream]

8. DR Congo is home to 80% of the world's coltan reserves

DR Congo is home to 80% of the world's coltan reserves

A mine has collapsed in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, killing at least 30 people.
Three bodies have been recovered from the mine but as many as 36 others are still buried under the debris, a week after the collapse.

The Bibapama 2 coltan mine, 60 km south-west of Goma, is under the control of the Rally for Congolese Democracy (RCD) rebels.

Coltan is used in the manufacture of mobile phones and many Congolese have switched from farming to work in the far more lucrative coltan mines.

Journalist Jules Ngala Ngoma told BBC News Online that many of the victims were traders, selling food and other supplies to the miners.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/1761540.stm

[seemslikeadream]

4. Congo being the fourth largest producer of oil in sub-Saharan Africa

http://www.gasandoil.com/goc/news/nta10401.htm

[chlamor]

7. Guns Money and Cell Phones

The following is reposted from the publication The Industry Standard and looks into one of the economic reasons behind the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the commercial interests of major computer and cell phone related companies in the exploitation of the DRC which comes at a massive cost to civilian life. The original article at http://www.thestandard.com/article/0,1902,26784,00.html has now expired, but is preserved here.

Guns, Money and Cell Phones
By Kristi Essick
The Industry Standard Magazine
Issue Date: Jun 11 2001

The demand for cell phones and computer chips is helping fuel a bloody civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The offer turned up a few weeks ago on an Internet bulletin board called the Embassy Network. Among the postings about Dutch work visas and Italian pen pals lurked a surprisingly blunt proposal: "How much do you want to offer per kilogram? Please find me at least 100,000 U.S. dollars and I will deliver immediately."

The substance for sale wasn't cocaine or top-grade opium. It was an ore called Columbite-tantalite - coltan for short - one of the world's most sought-after materials. Refine coltan and you get a highly heat-resistant metal powder called tantalum. It sells for $100 a pound, and it's becoming increasingly vital to modern life. For the high-tech industry, tantalum is magic dust, a key component in everything from mobile phones made by Nokia (NOK) and Ericsson and computer chips from Intel (INTC) to Sony (SNE) stereos and VCRs.

http://www.globalissues.org/Geopolitics/Africa/Articles/TheStandardColtan.asp

[seemslikeadream]

9. SUFFERING AND DESPAIR: HUMANITARIAN CRISIS IN THE CONGO

Committee on International Relations
Cynthia McKinney
May 17, 2001

Last link on google page
http://www.google.com/search?q=coltan+congo+mckinney&hl=en&lr=&safe=off&start=40&sa=N

[seemslikeadream]

10. She’s the uppity kind of black.

...

Did I mention to you that (ex-)Congresswoman McKinney is black? And not just any kind of black. She’s the uppity kind of black.

What I mean by uppity is this:

After George Bush Senior left the White House, he became an advisor and lobbyist for a Canadian gold-mining company, Barrick Gold. Hey, a guy’s got to work. But there were a couple of questions about Barrick, to say the least. For example, was Barrick’s Congo gold mine funding both sides of a civil war and perpetuating that bloody conflict? Only one Congressperson demanded hearings on the matter.

You’ve guessed: Cynthia McKinney.

That was covered in the . . . well, it wasn’t covered at all in the U.S. press.

McKinney contacted me at the BBC. She asked if I’d heard of Barrick. Indeed, I had. Top human rights investigators had evidence that a mine that Barrick bought in 1999 had, in clearing their Tanzanian properties three years earlier, bulldozed mine shafts . . . burying about 50 miners alive.

I certainly knew Barrick: They’d sued the Guardian for daring to run a story I’d written about the allegations of the killings. Barrick never sued an American paper for daring to run the story, because no American paper dared.

The primary source for my story, an internationally famous lawyer named Tundu Lissu, was charged by the Tanzanian police with sedition, and arrested, for calling for an investigation. McKinney has been trying to save his life with an international campaign aimed at Barrick.


That was another of her mistakes.

more
http://www.gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=229&row=1

[chlamor]

12. Cynthia McKinney Rocks

She is one of the few in all of the US politburo who does so all the time all day long on every issue. Maxine- another uppity black woman.

[G_j]

14. Cynthia, WAY ahead again..

great post

[chlamor]

11. A friend sent a copy

read the damn thing and then came across the copy of C. McKinney and Wayne Madsen concerning the real deal behind Rwanda genocide not the easy version in the liberal media, read the damn thing. Arming everybody to fuel civil wars and take their stuff. And then writng their history and ignoring the source and existence of their story and their suffering.

Airbrushing history, our universities are too good at that. Your posts as always magnifique

:hi:

Beware The Bodysnatchers-U(United) S(Schiavians) of A(Amnesia)

[seemslikeadream]

13. Genocide and Covert Operations in Africa 1993-1999

Genocide and Covert Operations in Africa 1993-1999 (African Studies, 50)
by Wayne Madsen (Editor)

Genocide and Covert Operations in Africa: 1993-1999
Background
The Ba-n'daw Report
Covert American Support for the Combatants
American Military Support for the Second Invasion of the Congo
Profiting from the Destabilization of Central Africa
Summary
NOTES
Background
(c) Wayne Madsen

Prepared Testimony and Statement for the Record of

Wayne Madsen

Author,

“Genocide and Covert Operations in Africa 1993-1999”

Investigative Journalist

On:

Suffering and Despair: Humanitarian Crisis in the Congo

Before the

Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights

Committee on International Relations

United States House of Representatives

Washington, DC

May 17, 2001


An ominous report on the fate of refugees was made by Nicholas Stockton, the Emergencies Director of Oxfam U.K. & Ireland. He said that on November 20, 1996, he was shown U.S. aerial intelligence photographs which “confirmed, in considerable detail, the existence of 500,000 people distributed in three major and numerous minor agglomerations.” He said that three days later the U.S. military claimed it could only locate one significant mass of people, which they claimed were identified as former members of the Rwandan armed forces and the Interhamwe militia. Since they were the number one targets for the RPF forces, their identification and location by the Americans was undoubtedly passed to the Rwandan forces. They would have surely been executed.<19> Moreover, some U.S. military and diplomatic personnel in central Africa said that any deaths among the Hutu refugees merely constituted “collateral damage.”

Some of the companies involved in this new “scramble for Africa” have close links with PMCs and America’s top political leadership. For example, America Minerals Fields, Inc., a company that was heavily involved in promoting the 1996 accession to power of Kabila, was, at the time of its involvement in the Congo’s civil war, headquartered in Hope, Arkansas. Its major stockholders included long-time associates of former President Clinton going back to his days as Governor of Arkansas. America Mineral Fields also reportedly enjoys a close relationship with Lazare Kaplan International, Inc., a major international diamond brokerage whose president remains a close confidant of past and current administrations on Africa matters.<26>

When the AFDL-CZ and their Rwandan allies reached Kinshasa in 1996, it was largely due to the help of the United States. One reason why Kabila’s men advanced into the city so quickly was the technical assistance provided by the DIA and other intelligence agencies. According to informed sources in Paris, U.S. Special Forces actually accompanied ADFL-CZ forces into Kinshasa. The Americans also reportedly provided Kabila’s rebels and Rwandan troops with high definition spy satellite photographs that permitted them to order their troops to plot courses into Kinshasa that avoided encounters with Mobutu’s forces.<20> During the rebel advance toward Kinshasa, Bechtel provided Kabila, at no cost, high technology intelligence, including National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) satellite data.<21>

One of the major goals of the Rwandan-backed RCD-Goma faction, a group fighting the Kabila government in Congo, is restoration of mining concessions for Barrick Gold, Inc. of Canada. In fact, the rebel RCD government’s “mining minister” signed a separate mining deal with Barrick in early 1999.<29> Among the members of Barrick’s International Advisory Board are former President Bush and former President Clinton’s close confidant Vernon Jordan.


------------

BLOOD MONEY OUT OF AFRICA



Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney

Covert Action in Africa: A Smoking Gun in Washington, D.C.

Rayburn House Office Building
Friday, April 6, 2001
10:00am - 12:00 noon


The accounts we are about to hear today assist us in understanding just why Africa is in the state it is in today. You will hear that at the heart of Africa's suffering is the West's, and most notably the United States', desire to access Africa's diamonds, oil, natural gas, and other precious resources.

You will hear that the West, and most notably the United States, has set in motion a policy of oppression, destabilization and tempered, not by moral principle, but by a ruthless desire to enrich itself on Africa's fabulous wealth. While falsely pretending to be the friends and allies of many African countries, so desperate for help and assistance, many western nations have in reality betrayed those countries' trust--and instead, have relentlessly pursued their own selfish military and economic policies. Western countries have incited rebellion against stable African governments by encouraging and even arming opposition parties and rebel groups to begin armed insurrection.

The Western nations have even actively participated in the assassination of duly elected and legitimate African Heads of State and replaced them with corrupted and malleable officials. Western nations have even encouraged and been complicit in the unlawful invasions by African nations into neighboring counties.

Something must be done to right these wrongs.

I invite you to listen and learn first-hand of the West's activities in Africa.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Prepared Statement of Wayne Madsen

WHAT A DIFFERENCE AN ELECTION MAKES: OR DOES IT?

Wayne Madsen is an investigative journalist who has written for The Village Voice, The Progressive, CAQ, and the Intelligence Newsletter. He is the author of Genocide and Covert Activities in Africa 1993-1999 (Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen, 1999), an expose of U.S. and French intelligence activities in Africa's recent civil wars and ethnic rebellions. He served as an on-air East Africa analyst for ABC News in the aftermath of the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. Mr. Madsen has appeared on 60 Minutes, World News Tonight, Nightline, 20/20, MS-NBC, and NBC Nightly News, among others. He has been frequently quoted by the Associated Press, foreign wire services, and many national and international newspapers.

Mr. Madsen is also the author of a motion picture screen play treatment about the nuclear submarine USS Scorpion. He is a former U.S. Naval Officer and worked for the National Security Agency and U.S. Naval Telecommunications Command.

---

I wish to discuss the record of American policy in Africa over most of the past decade, particularly that involving the central African Great Lakes region. It is a policy that has rested, in my opinion, on the twin pillars of unrestrained military aid and questionable trade. The military aid programs of the United States, largely planned and administered by the U.S. Special Operations Command and the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), have been both overt and covert.

Some of the companies involved in this new "scramble for Africa" have close links with PMCs and America's top political leadership. For example, America Minerals Fields, Inc., a company that was heavily involved in promoting the 1996 accession to power of the late Congolese President Laurent-Desire Kabila, was, at the time of its involvement in the Congo's civil war, headquartered in Hope, Arkansas. Its major stockholders included long-time associates of former President Clinton going back to his days as Governor of Arkansas. America Mineral Fields also reportedly enjoys a close relationship with Lazare Kaplan International, Inc., a major international diamond brokerage whose president remains a close confidant of past and current administrations on Africa matters.

One of the major goals of the Rwandan-backed Rassemblement Congolais pour la Democratie (RCD), a group fighting the Kabila government in Congo, is restoration of mining concessions for Barrick Gold, Inc. of Canada. In fact, the rebel RCD government's "mining minister" signed a separate mining deal with Barrick in early 1999. Among the members of Barrick's International Advisory Board are former President Bush and former President Clinton's close confidant Vernon Jordan.

Currently, Barrick and tens of other mining companies are stoking the flames of the civil war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Each benefits by the de facto partition of the country into some four separate zones of political control. First the mineral exploiters from Rwanda and Uganda concentrated on pillaging gold and diamonds from the eastern Congo. Now, they have increasingly turned their attention to a valuable black sand called columbite-tantalite or "col-tan." Col-tan is a key material in computer chips and, therefore, is as considered a strategic mineral. It is my hope that the Bush administration will take pro-active measures to stem this conflict by applying increased pressure on Uganda and Rwanda to withdraw their troops from the country. However, the fact that President Bush has selected Walter Kansteiner to be Assistant Secretary of State for African, portends, in my opinion, more trouble for the Great Lakes region. A brief look at Mr. Kansteiner's curriculum vitae and statements calls into question his commitment to seeking a durable peace in the region. For example, he has envisaged the splitting up of the Great Lakes region into separate Tutsi and Hutu states through "relocation" efforts and has called the break-up of the DRC inevitable. I believe Kansteiner's previous work at the Department of Defense where he served on a Task Force on Strategic Minerals and one must certainly consider col-tan as falling into that category -- may influence his past and current thinking on the territorial integrity of the DRC. After all, 80 per cent of the world's known reserves of col-tan are found in the eastern
more
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/politics/blood_sparkle.html




Thanks chlamor for the reminder

[chlamor]

15. Where do the weapons come from?

Two years ago the US State Department asserted that an AK-47 assault rifle was selling for as little as six dollars on the black market. While the western media concentrated on telling of the havoc wreaked by arms in Africa, they didn't say where the arms were coming from. The low cost implies massive production. Somebody is making so many AK?47s that they can afford to sell them for less than a portion of chicken in an average Nairobi hotel. Part of a report by the Arms Trade Resource Centre World Policy Institute reads:

'As to the relative importance of US arms imports to Africa, data from the most recent edition of the US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency's publication, World Military Expenditure and Arms Transfers, rank the US as the second leading arms supplier to both Central Africa, (behind China and ahead of France,) and to Southern Africa (behind Russia and tied for second with France). In contrast, the most recent data from the Congressional Research Service suggests that, at best, the United States ranked sixth in arms transfers to Africa for the period 1995?1998, after China, Russia, the United Kingdom, France and Italy.'

Apart from actual weapons America also offers training to her allies through various agencies, International Military Education and Training (IMET), joint Combined Exchange Training UCET), Africa Crisis Response Initiative and the Africa Centre for Security Studies. Between 1997-98, 34 out of 53 African states participated in US training programmes. Thirteen of those states are known to have taken part in the war in the D e m o c r a t i c Republic of Congo or are at least suspected of such participation. According to the World Policy Institute, IMET expenditure on training Africans has fluctuated between $4 to $8 million throughout the 1990s. In 1998 the US provided $5.8 million in IMET training for over 400 African troops.

Joint Combined Exchange Training programmes, using special operational forces, remain exempt from Congressional oversight, and involved , some 9,100 host?nation troops worldwide in 1997. The Pentagon claims that JCET helps to 'enhance host?nation skills' and increase US 'long term influence in the participating countries,' but it is often caught off guard when the skills attained are used in counterinsurgency and human rights violations. A good example was the Rwandan invasion of Zaire in 1996 when refugee camps were attacked and civilians massacred.

http://www.missionsocieties.org.uk/MOUT/02Jan/MOUT_jan02_DEATH_DEALERS.htm

And of course they must be charged for their own demise. Not even death is free.

Training is not free. According to the Report on Status of Department of Defense Direct Loans, 30th September 1999, the Democratic Republic of the Congo owes more than $150 million in outstanding Department of Defense (DoD) loans, with Liberia, Somalia and Sudan owing another $160 million combined. These debts were contracted when those countries were being ruled by corrupt dictators. Ironically, the African countries that were the chief American clients have turned out to be the continent's worst basket cases including Sudan, Somalia, Zaire (DRC), and Liberia.

The US has for long been involved in Zaire (DRC). The Central Intelligence Agency was reportedly involved in the assassination of Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba in January 1961, and also in the climb to power of Mobutu Sese Seko. Mobutu, 'friend and ally' to America, who received more than $300 million in military hardware and 1,350 of his soldiers received IMET training at a cost of more than $100 million. (DoD's Foreign Military Sales, Foreign Military Constructions, Sales and Military Assistance Facts, 1981, 1990 and 1997 editions).

When Laurent Desiré Kabila, backed by Uganda and Rwanda, ousted Mobutu, the US offered the resumption of IMET to help the new government in 'developing an apolitical military cadre that respects human rights, the rule of law, and the concept of civilian control of the military' (Congressional Presentation for 1999 p.79). The WPI report observes, 'In the year 2000 the DRC will also be eligible to receive Excess Defense Articles (EDA) on a grant basis under Section 516 of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961.' This, says the State Department, 'will support a rebuilding and professionalising of the military following years of internal strife, and assist with maintaining internal security.'

http://www.missionsocieties.org.uk/MOUT/02Jan/MOUT_jan02_DEATH_DEALERS.htm

[seemslikeadream]

16. International arms trade $800 billion annually

International arms trade $800 billion annually - largest business in the world.


Twice the second placed - illegal sale of drugs $400 billion a year


82 armed conflicts between 1989-1999 - 79 took place within national borders - arms not needed for self defense.


Reality is most arms are used on ordinary people by forces in the government or close to it.


159 wars fought since WWII - 9 out of 10 in developing world - more than 20 million people - were civilians.


War brings starvation - Biafra, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Chad, Sudan, Liberia and Somalia.


Until there is a radical reassessment of the arms trade and its consequences, millions more will be directly or indirectly killed by this lethal business.


The bottom line is that there is a lot of money to be made in weapons, and this motivates arms manufacturing.


To add to high profit margins, all arms manufactures are heavily subsidised and protected by their governments.


Free trade agreements - nearly always exempt from military spending


Industrialised countries will always be able to subsidise their corporations through defense contracts and grants for weapons research.

-------


Researcher Islamic Institute for Human Rights


By Matt Tirman

The causes behind the conflict in the Sudan are numerous and commonly misconstrued by those of us in the West. While religion remains one of the most divisive issues in the conflict, to define this on and off again half century conflict as a war of Muslims against Christians is misleading. There are, however, powerful voices from the United States (mainly Evangelical Christians in elected office) who view the conflict as another Muslim crusade against a Christian minority. Radical voices from the Islamic community have also been a major player in helping to perpetuate the war in Sudan by providing mercenaries, money and arms to help the Islamist government defeat the rebels. The politicizing of such a deadly conflict as led to myopic policies toward Sudan by governments in Europe, the Americas and Middle East.

While dismissing religion as an impetus for the continuance of armed conflict in Sudan would be dangerous, relying on doctrinal beliefs as the only cause is equally if not more troubling. When Sudan gained independence from Britain in 1956 it was a country divided not only by an Islamic north and Christian south, but also a more prosperous politically involved north and a rural, apolitical south. The lack of educational opportunities for southerners, coupled with rigged elections throughout the country created a general mood of discontent, which led to the first of many internal conflicts. The most recent civil conflict, which began in 1983, was attributed to draconian policies imposed upon the south by the government in Khartoum, along with the continued desire to gain full autonomy from the north.



Proliferation of Small Arms

The armed conflict in Sudan has been fueled not only by ethnic hatred, gross disparities of wealth, education and health services, but also by the proliferation of small arms to the various warring factions. While a UN embargo has done much to curtail the flow of legal arms transfers, Sudan's porous borders and willing buyers have provided arms dealers and other gunrunners with an enticing open market. The Norwegian Initiative on Small Arms Transfers defines small arms, "as any weapons, such as automatic rifles, high powered pistols and others, that can be easily operated by a single person." Both the SPLA and the Sudanese government have come to rely on illegal weapons purchases from a multitude of different suppliers. Western Sudan, especially in and around Darfur have become a virtual small arms bazaar and transit point to central and western Africa. Arms move freely between the borders of Libya, Chad, CAR and most significantly Uganda. The availability of arms in Sudan has led to a steady rise in banditry along Sudan's highways and has made the lives of UN and other humanitarian workers exceedingly difficult. The buying and selling of illegal arms is not limited to opposition groups or quasi government backed militias. The Sudanese government, which has pledged to stem the flow of illegal arms into its country, is said to have ties with numerous arms dealers throughout Africa, the Middle East and the former Soviet Bloc. According to NISAT, the Islamist government in Khartoum has used illegally purchased arms to aid Islamic Fundamentalists in Egypt and to fight SPLA soldiers in the south. Neither the UN, nor any other governmental body has any idea about how many of these small arms there are throughout the world. The Ak-47, which has become every rebel leader and Che Guevara wannabe's weapon of choice, is the cheapest and most widely available assault rife. While it is nearly impossible to account for the total number of AK-47s in circulation, identifying the manufacturers of this weapon is not. China, Russia, Slovakia and the Czech Republic account for a large number of AK-47's throughout the world. This weapon, along with many like it, fall into the hands of despotic regimes, brutal rebel armies and arms dealers who are in large part responsible for capitalizing on the deaths of millions of people a year. Human Rights Watch, an American based human rights watchdog, details the numerous failures of the government in curtailing the flow of weapons into Sudan. In its 2002 situation report on Sudan, HRW calls on the government to live up to its word, and begin destroying its stockpiles of anti-personnel landmines and explosives of that nature.

Gross Violations of Human Rights

Human rights monitors from the non-governmental and public sector have documented violations of human rights perpetrated by governmental forces as well as the SPLA. In its effort to root out southern forces, the government has pursued a policy of blind intervention, which has led to the indiscriminate aerial bombing of churches, aid stations, villages and other civilian structures. With money generated from over 500 million dollars in oil sales in 2002, the government has purchased itself more advanced weaponry including attack helicopters, surface-to-surface missiles and Russian fighter jets. In turn, this weaponry is used to defend oil fields and clear peoples like the Nuer from their to pursue new oil interests. Amnesty International has been highly critical of foreign oil investors such as China National Petroleum Company and Tailsman Energy, a Canadian energy firm. These investors have provided the Bashir government with millions of dollars to pursue oil exploration in the Upper Nile and Western Nile valley, which has led to the government's scorched earth policy of removing indigenous people from the land. Rebel groups like the SPLA and the Ugandan based Lord's Resistance Army are also consistent abusers of human rights. During the height of the civil war in the 1980's the SPLA recruited children from refugee camps, used coercive means to extract information from villagers and tribal members in the south and to this day continue to hinder humanitarian efforts. The LRA, a Christian militia that some suspect is still financed by the Islamist government in Khartoum, has done much to further destabilize the situation in Equitoria. HRW and the ICG have documented numerous accounts of abuses committed by the LRA including murder, forced conscription and the deliberate targeting of Sudanese in the south.

Child Soldiers in Sudan

The number of child soldiers fighting on the side of the SPLA and the government have decreased significantly in years, however, both sides in the conflict are guilty of continuing to recruit children as young as 12 to fight their battles. The Sudanese government has signed and ratified the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict in late 2002, and the SPLA endorsed the protocol in 1995. The Watch List on Children and Armed Conflict put out a report in March 2003 detailing the status of children in Sudan. In its thirty-four page report, the Watch List examines human rights abuses perpetrated by both sides, the general health of children throughout Sudan, gender-based violence and a plethora of other information. The report notes that children in the south of Sudan, especially in Equitoria and Bah-al Gazer are particularly at risk when it comes to forced recruitment by opposition forces. Refugee camps based in the south as well as in Uganda have been prime recruitment centers for the Lord's Resistance Army, a Christian extremist group that has been fighting a decade long war against the Ugandan government. While the government of Sudan maintains a policy of universal conscription, which requires all men at age 17 to serve in the armed forces, government backed militias have not hesitated in forcing children as young as 10 into service. The most notorious of these militias is the Popular Defense Forces (PDF) who enjoys the support of the President Bashir and his military cadres.
http://www.iifhr.com/Armed%20Conflict%20Program/armsuda...