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Photo: Reuters
Hungry Sudanese children
Photo: Reuters
Photo: Reuters
Darfur refugees
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UN rights council stops short of condemning Sudan

UN Human Rights Council, under pressure to act against Sudan atrocities, refrains from criticizing Sudanese government Wednesday, compromises on sending investigators to report on slaying of civilians, rapes, destruction, mass flight

Meeting in emergency session, the 47 nation council unanimously passed a resolution expressing "concern regarding the seriousness of the human rights and humanitarian situation in Darfur," and calling for a team of five "highly qualified persons" plus the UN's expert on rights in Sudan to look into the atrocities.

 

The resolution stopped short of mentioning any role of the Sudanese government or the militias it is accused of supporting in attacks on civilians. The government rejects accusations it supports the militias, who are accused of some of the worst atrocities.

 

Luis Alfonso de Alba, the Mexican diplomat who chairs the council and will put together the team, told reporters: "I can guarantee a good and balanced composition." He said they would be impartial, "Highly qualified personalities."

 

"The decision ... sends a united message that the ongoing violence and killing in Darfur is unacceptable and must stop," U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a statement.

 

Amnesty slams UN  

Amnesty International condemned the resolution's timidity in failing to recognize the complicity of the Sudanese government in the serious and systematic human rights violations taking place in Darfur.

 

"The assessment mission established by the Human Rights Council must put an end to the shameless lies and denial of responsibility of the government of Sudan for the situation in Darfur," The London-based rights campaigner said in a statement.

 

Top UN officials and aid agencies on Tuesday were leading a wide assault of strongly worded statements expressing frustration over how hard it has been to help people suffering from nearly four years of bloodshed.


UN Human Rights Council emergency session (Photo: AP)

 

Jewish students call for action

A mission of Jewish students attended the meeting in Geneva and called upon the international community to act immediately to save the people of Darfur

 

Daniel Translateur, Chairman of the World Union of Jewish Students (WUJS) and head of the delegation of Jewish students to the UN, said: "We, as Jews, cannot stand aside and watch a people be submitted to the same genocide as we have suffered."

 

"We, the youth of the Jewish world, who live with the memory of the trauma of the Holocaust, feel that we have a moral, historical and personal commitment to involve ourselves in the attempt to stop the mass murders of the people of Darfur," he added.

 

"The lesson the Jewish people learned from the Holocaust is that we cannot stand aside and watch genocide being carried out on another people. We will always remember the lessons of our ancestors: 'To save one life is as if you have saved the world', and 'Those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it'," Translateur said.

 

Accusations

The Sudanese government is widely accused of unleashing the Janjaweed militia to help its forces counter ethnic African groups who rebelled in 2003.

 

More than 200,000 people have been killed and some 2.5 million people have fled their homes in the violence, according to UN Estimates.

 

The lack of blame for the Sudanese government was in stark contrast to the council's resolutions on Israel which have condemned the Jewish state for many practices, including "the systematic targeting and killings of civilians" in Lebanon and "attacks on human life, property, critical infrastructure and environment."

 

The council, which replaced the widely discredited Human Rights Commission in June, has used its six previous sessions to pass eight resolutions denouncing Israeli treatment of Arabs.

 

No other government has been accused of rights violations.

 

Resolutions by the rights council are nonbinding, but increase political pressure on criticized countries.

 


פרסום ראשון: 12.13.06, 22:23
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