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OneWorld.net's take: The largest humanitarian operation in the world has so far failed to bring peace and stability to Sudan, but a new commitment and new approach from the Obama administration can bring peace to Darfur and the rest of the country, says Africa Action.

• Children in South Sudan. © Tim McKulka/UN Mission in SudanAccording to his Web site, "Obama believes the United States needs to lead the world in ending this genocide, including by imposing much tougher sanctions that target Sudan's oil revenue, implementing and helping to enforce a no-fly zone, and engaging in more intense, effective diplomacy to develop a political roadmap to peace. The international community must, over the Sudanese regime’s protests, deploy a large, capable UN-led and UN-funded force with a robust enforcement mandate to stop the killings." Click here to read an analysis of the president-elect's position on the conflict in Darfur and U.S. relations with Sudan by Citizens for Global Solutions' Megan Wagner.

• Thirty countries -- including Britain and the United States -- have directly or indirectly exported arms to Sudan in possible violation of the UN arms embargo on Darfur, says a report released last month by international watchdog Human Rights First.

• Five years after the world was alerted to the crisis in Darfur, the situation remains urgent: hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost and people are still living in extreme poverty and fear. Use your creativity to help refocus attention on solutions to the crisis in Darfur and inspire others to action: enter Citizens for Global Solutions' fourth annual Multimedia Contest. 

• In June, both U.S. presidential candidates signed a pledge promising "unstinting resolve" to end genocide in Darfur. You can join Africa Action's "Just L.E.A.D" campaign, which not only calls for new leadership from the U.S. government but also "challenges all of us to meet our collective responsibility as ordinary individuals to LEARN. EDUCATE. and ACT. DAILY.

Africa Action Talking Points on a Post-Bush U.S.-Sudan Policy

From: Africa Action

October 29, 2008

Forty thousand people displaced in the past two months. Hundreds of thousands dead. While the massacres of 2003-2004 are no longer commonplace, over 4.5 million people today are affected by the conflict in Darfur. The Sudanese government deliberately restricts humanitarian access to these populations. Military aircraft continue to periodically bomb rebel controlled areas where civilians reside. Over the past year, government forces have tried multiple times to forcibly evict civilians from some of Darfur’s biggest camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs). Civilians, particularly women, work hard to live with dignity in the sprawling urban communities that IDP camps have become, but a climate of lawlessness, violence (including rape) and impunity for human rights abusers persists.

Darfur has not burned for five years because of a lack of global attention. On the contrary, the international community has mounted the world’s largest humanitarian aid operation there. Over 13,000 humanitarian workers and one hundred relief agencies operate in the region, providing lifesaving support for civilians, but unable to address the root causes of conflict and poverty.

The United Nations Security Council has twice authorized UN-led peacekeeping missions for Darfur, and even with less than half of its 26,000 personnel in place as of October 2008, the hybrid African Union-UN force known as UNAMID is the world’s biggest peace operation. Yet these forces have been unable to effectively fulfill their mandate of protection.

The massive and well-intentioned international response to the genocide in Darfur has been tragically ineffective for two main reasons. First, because of lack of political will, the international community has failed to follow through on its promises and back up its commitments with real action. Second, the U.S. and other external actors have approached Sudan’s conflicts in isolation from one another. U.S. and European diplomats worked tirelessly to help broker the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that ended Sudan’s decades-long North-South civil war, while ignoring massive atrocities unfolding in Darfur. As grassroots activists forced policymakers to focus their attention on Darfur, the international community essentially forgot about the CPA, and tensions between the North and South have escalated over the past year and pushed the treaty to the brink of collapse.

A new administration in 2009 offers an opportunity for a new and more effective U.S.-Sudan policy. This Africa Action resource outlines a plan of action for the next president to break from the failures of the past and achieve peace, human security and justice for the people of Darfur and all Sudan.

The next U.S. president must stop undermining his own diplomacy by pursuing a parallel track of counterterrorism intelligence sharing with Khartoum.

As outlined in Africa Action’s April 2008 report "The Ties that Bind Bush and Bashir," U.S.-Sudan relations under the Bush administration have been thoroughly bipolar. On one hand, President George Bush has condemned the violence in Darfur as “genocide” and in January 2008 appointed a tough negotiator, Ambassador Rich Williamson, to pressure the government of Sudan to honor its commitments to the CPA and change its policies in Darfur. On the other, U.S. intelligence operatives maintain a cozy relationship with the brutal Sudanese state security agency to share information related to the global “war on terror.” This insulates President Omer Al-Bashir’s regime from U.S. diplomatic pressure.

In 2009, the new administration should end this hypocrisy and make human rights, not the so-called “war on terror,” the unambiguous top priority in U.S.-Sudan relations. Bilateral and U.S.-led multilateral diplomatic pressure has little credible effect when Sudanese officials know that despite whatever State Department officials say, U.S. intelligence agencies will continue to coddle them. John Prendergast of the Enough Project has aptly described the task faced by U.S. diplomats as “Sisyphean,” as negotiators struggle to build leverage against Khartoum but are undercut by senior national security officials eager to maintain friendly intelligence sharing relations with the regime. This two-faced policy is outrageous, unacceptable, and should be reformed.

Rather than treating each of Sudan’s conflicts in isolation, the U.S. must pursue an all-Sudan strategy where both Darfur and the CPA are top priorities.

A return to war between North and South Sudan would be a humanitarian disaster in and of itself and would doom hopes of peace and security for Darfur. The CPA stipulates that Sudan hold national elections by July 2009. Serious challenges emerged while conducting the national census in 2008 that will affect the fair representation of the citizens of Darfur and South Sudan in these polls. Adherence to the timeline laid out in the CPA is of particular importance to Southerners because of the 2011 referendum on whether South Sudan will remain part of the country or secede as an independent nation.

The U.S should do what it can in the short timeframe before polls occur to promote elections that are as free and fair as possible while vigorously preparing for contingencies around different likely contested election scenarios. U.S. development assistance should prioritize widespread social and economic development programs such as healthcare, education and food security across Southern Sudan, rather than military assistance. Violence and instability are less likely to erupt around flawed or contested elections if Southerners feel they are experiencing “peace dividends” – tangible economic and social benefits linked to the CPA. The chance of full inclusion of Darfuris in the election is slim. Jumpstarting political negotiations between Darfuri rebels, the government and civil society leaders is the best thing the U.S. can do to help Darfuris gain an expanded voice in their governance structures.

In addition to the UNAMID force in Darfur, the U.S. should focus on improving the effectiveness of the separate UN peacekeeping operation in Southern Sudan known as UNMIS. UNMIS failed miserably in protecting civilians along the border region of Abyei when violence displaced some 50,000 people there in May 2008. The U.S. should work diplomatically and logistically to secure and implement a more robust mandate for UNMIS that will allow it to enforce demilitarized zones in the sensitive North-South border areas of Abyei, the Nuba Mountains and Blue Nile.

While Darfur and the CPA should be the top U.S. priorities in Sudan, the next administration must also do a better job of anticipating conflicts in other marginalized regions, such as the Northern state where communities have been forcibly displaced to accommodate hydroelectric dam construction. The international community should also put pressure on the Sudanese government to better implement the 2006 Eastern Sudan Peace Agreement.

Real diplomatic resources must be devoted to the pursuit of peace.

A full-time U.S. Presidential envoy should be appointed and equipped with a full team of dedicated junior and senior staff, including personnel based in Sudan. This team should persistently pursue round the clock diplomatic efforts to ensure both CPA implementation and to bolster a peace process for Darfur.

In the case of Darfur, U.S. diplomatic efforts should support the efforts of AU-UN Lead Mediator Djibril Bassole. In part, a new peace process should be modeled on the successful approach that yielded the Comprehensive Peace Agreement of 2005, but negotiators must also realize that these conflicts have different dynamics. The inclusion of Darfuri civil society and women’s voices in political negotiations must be a top priority.

U.S. diplomacy needs to be better coordinated with the international community, including European allies, Arab and African states, and other countries that hold key leverage over Sudan such as China. Economic pressure such as sanctions won’t be effective in changing Khartoum’s behavior unless it is coordinated. The decline in U.S. international standing due to other foreign policy decisions over the past eight years has weakened U.S. ability to build effective multilateral coalitions. The new administration should seize the political space presented by the end of the Bush presidency to reenage with the full range of international actors in pursuit of peace for Darfur.

The U.S. must do everything in its power to salvage success for UNAMID.

On October 7, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said that the UN aims to reach 65% deployment of the 26,000 person UNAMID peacekeeping force by the end of 2008, and 80% deployment for March 2009. Going beyond these benchmarks to get the full force on the ground as quickly as possible in 2009 and sustaining an effective presence for as long as necessary will require stronger U.S. leadership in the international community.

While it is true that some responsibility for the force’s glacial deployment rests with the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations, it is unfair for the UN’s most powerful member state to pass the blame to UN bureaucracy without doing more to solve the problem itself. The U.S. should continue to engage with the “Friends of UNAMID” working group to match troop contributing countries (TCCs) with appropriate training and logistical support from donors. These support efforts should see TCCs through every stage of the deployment process.

The U.S. needs to ask our allies in the international community to do more to provide the helicopters and other vehicles and equipment that UNAMID lacks. U.S. financial support for UNAMID so far has been robust – President Bush authorized $100 million for the force. The next president must ensure that this commitment continues and is matched with diplomatic pressure on the government of Sudan to stop obstructing the mission’s deployment and free operation. Even in a time of increasing economic uncertainty at home, U.S. funding for UNAMID should not come at the expense of support for other peacekeeping missions in Africa and worldwide – or other foreign assistance programs.

Keeping the promise to protect

Congress has shown a deep interest in Sudan, including passing the landmark Sudan Accountability and Divestment Act. However, it takes strong executive leadership to exercise the diplomacy and international pressure that the U.S. must use to effectively help bring peace to Darfur. As a candidate, the next president has pledged to pursue peace and security for the people of Sudan with "unstinting resolve." From Day One in 2009 through the rest of his presidency, the American people must hold him to this task.

Click here to read more about the conflict in Darfur and policy recommendations regarding U.S.-Sudanese relations from Africa Action.