Radio Afia, a half-hour radio show broadcast three times daily in Darfur, Sudan, and eastern Chad, started with a noble mission: To provide Darfuri citizens mired in war or displaced by violence with objective news and information about the crisis—the kind they weren’t getting from the Sudanese government. But poor execution has left the promise of that mission unfulfilled, according to a report by Sheri Fink for ProPublica.

Started with funding from the U.S. State Department, Radio Afia’s critics blame its failings on cultural ignorance and a soft approach to coverage of the Sudanese government. The program is broadcast in standard Arabic, which critics say most of the intended audience not only can’t understand, but find “offensive because it [is] associated with the people who were killing them,” according to Fink. Radio Afia has also come under scrutiny for the firing of one of its outspoken newscasters, who reportedly battled with his bosses over what he saw as their lax coverage of the government. 

If true, the shortcomings of Radio Afia identified by its critics are disappointing considering the continued scarcity of free information in Sudan, which the project was intended to combat. According to a recent report by Human Rights Watch, government censorship of media and tight control of free speech is escalating. “Free and fair elections require a free and open media,” said Georgette Gagnon of Human Rights Watch in a press release about the report. “Khartoum's repressive practices and abuse of those who criticize it put such elections at great risk.” And as violence in Darfur intensifies, writes Fink, "[g]etting news to Darfuri civilians is more important than ever.” 

Sources: ProPublica, Human Rights Watch 

Image by hdptcar, licensed under Creative Commons.

Yesterday at the United Nations, France’s Nicolas Sarkozy held out the carrot of immunity for Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir if he implements “radical and immediate change in Sudanese policies.” Britain is reportedly in agreement with staying the International Criminal Court’s war crimes investigation. (China, Russia, the Arab League, and the African Union were already on board with the immunity deal.)

And so the organ of blind international justice is being reduced to just another political bargaining chip in a disastrously long conflict that’s proven immune to such wheeling and dealing. Just as bad, the approach could be completely misguided by removing what might prove to be one of the few effective pressure tactics on Sudan to date. An interesting piece in Britain’s new Standpoint magazine argues that ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo’s much-maligned campaign for war crime charges against al-Bashir may actually be rattling Khartoum toward change.

Here’s Justin Marozzi, who spent the summer as a communications adviser for the joint U.N.-African Union force in Darfur, writing for Standpoint:

Many commentators fear [Moreno-Ocampo’s] decision will wreck any chances of peace, failing to note that there is no peace process to spoil. With his back to the wall, there is no accounting what Bashir might do, they argue, ignoring the fact that he has had carte blanche to do what he likes in Darfur since 2003. In fact, although it is early days, the fallout from the ICC’s landmark move towards the indictment of Bashir looks positive. A friend with access to the highest levels of the regime reports unprecedented conversations at the presidential palace.

“The government’s in meltdown,” he reports. “They just didn’t think it would ever happen. They can’t believe it. The four or five people who run Sudan are now saying to Bashir, look where your policies have got us. They’re telling him, you can go to your rallies and demonstrations, you can shake your fist and rattle your walking stick, but you shut the hell up.” ... 

Now a national cross-party committee has been created to address the Darfur issue and end the conflict. Bashir has suddenly rediscovered an interest in Darfur, promising security, schools, roads and water. Window-dressing while the ICC judges ponder Moreno Ocampo’s evidence? Quite possibly, but these are suddenly interesting times. “There’s going to be a real push now for peace,” my palace mole reports. “Bashir’s got nothing to lose.”

Far from emboldening the Sudanese president and destroying a peace process that doesn’t exist, in other words, the ICC’s potential indictment may have been the best news for Darfur in years. Sudan watchers wonder whether Khartoum will finally ditch the president, who came to power in a 1989 coup, noting that the regime dropped the Islamic ideologue Hassan al-Turabi in the late Nineties in a bid to end its international isolation. Turabi, they note, was a far more important figure to the ruling National Congress Party then than Bashir is today.

Late last month, the Institute for War & Peace Reporting noted “rumblings of dissent” in Sudanese media and among fringe political circles in the wake of Moreno-Ocampo’s announcement to seek an arrest warrant for al-Bashir. Marozzi, however, goes further, placing dissent in the mouths of those with influence. Removing this key instigator of dissent—the threat of prosecution—could very well restore the status quo, which translates to more death and disaster for the people of Darfur.

Side note: If you’re interested in reading one of the best pieces written on Darfur in recent memory—yes, the genocide has tragically gone on long enough to justify that statement—check out this piece from Richard Just in the New Republic. A snippet:

No genocide has ever been so thoroughly documented while it was taking place. There were certainly no independent film-makers in Auschwitz in 1942, and the best-known Holocaust memoirs did not achieve a wide audience until years after the war. The world more or less looked the other way as genocide unfolded in Cambodia during the 1970s, and the slaughter in Rwanda happened so quickly—a mere hundred days—that by the time the public grasped the extent of the horror, the killing was done. But here is Darfur, whose torments are known to all. The sheer volume of historical, anthropological, and narrative detail available to the public about the genocide is staggering. In the case of the genocide in Darfur, ignorance has never been possible. But the genocide continues. We document what we do not stop. The truth does not set anybody free.

Image of displaced mother and child in North Darfur from USAID.

Last century ended with a series of shameful failures by UN peacekeepers to save lives in Somalia, Rwanda, and Sierra Leone. In the beginning of the 21st century, we face another round of tenuous peacekeeping assignments in Africa: in Sudan’s Darfur, Chad, the Central African Republic, and, again, Somalia. 

For many, the allocation of forces from the African Union, European Union, and United Nations to these volatile spots is cause for relief. François Grignon and Daniela Kroslack, the director and deputy director respectively of the International Crisis Group’s Africa program, however, see reason for concern. 

Writing in Current History’s April issue on Africa (subscription only), the two warn that the world has come to regard peacekeeping missions as Band-Aids—forces that emptily assuage human rights concerns with a show of military muscle that is in fact impotent in the face of danger. Unlike many others, Grignon and Kroslack aren’t taking aim at peacekeeping regulations that limit engagement. Rather, the teeth they say are missing from peacekeeping missions are diplomatic, not fire-power, related. 

“The military component of a peacekeeping mission is only as effective as the mission’s political masters make it,” they write. Without “viable peace agreements to implement,” peacekeepers are simply biding their time amidst social collapse. 

Intensive political negotiations, diplomatic pressure, and commitments to address the root causes of conflicts are what’s most needed and—not surprisingly—what’s most difficult. 

Despite peacekeeping missions’ shortcomings, though, Grignon and Kroslack do point to some unexpected successes: 

Recent peacekeeping operations have indeed achieved notable successes in Africa. Yet, paradoxically, their success has not been in the area of civilian protection. The UN Mission in Congo (Monuc) efficiently supported the peace process in the DRC [the Democratic Republic of Congo] and deserves considerable credit for the successful organization of Congo’s 2005 constitutional referendum and 2006 general elections. 

It seems that the bureaucrats and soldiers might be more effective if they switched places. It’s time to marshal our diplomatic forces for the fight and train armed peacekeepers in the tedious work of democracy building.

Image of African Union peacekeepers in Darfur by Patrick-André Perron, licensed under Creative Commons.

A map of Africa made from piles of French fries, a gory puddle of red ketchup splattered where Sudan is. A head swaddled in hundreds of iPod headphones, the flesh buckling. Thought-provoking, sure. But could these pictures save Darfur?

This art-essay in the December issue of the Walrus made by Fabrica, the creative team behind the Utne Independent Press Award-nominated Colors, is an artful stab at highlighting the brutal realties of life in Sudan. While the pieces might seem twee when compared to the genocide, the art sticks with you. Will it solve the Sudanese humanitarian crisis? Probably not. But it might help to keep the tragedy on our minds for just a little bit longer—maybe inspire one more person to write a letter to a representative or join the campaign to end the genocide—and that’s doing something. —Brendan Mackie