It's often referred to as a 'situation', but I think the word is a bit too sterile 
and evasive to describe the carnage in the Darfur region of Sudan. 'Situation' is a pretty good word to use when your waiter tells you your card's been rejected, or when your kid gets caught lifting something from the Target or when your hot water heater is on the fritz. Because when asked about it, you can always say, "we had a little 'situation', but it's OK now."
No, I really don't think the word is a good one to use to describe what's happening in Darfur.
Hard to imagine, isn't it? Watching your child starve to death or be taken to fight in a war before he's big enough to carry a gun. It's unfathomable to most of us, and yet it happens every day in the Sudan, and we've not done nearly enough to stop it. We say that we'll never allow it to happen again, but while we're fighting a civil war in a country that has done no harm to us, atrocities like Darfur continue, and the result of our inaction looks like this child and his mother.
We say 'never again', but in Darfur, 400,000 lives have been lost and 2.3 million of the six million citizens of Darfur are displaced. And as the Janjaweed continues to rape and murder, to destroy villages and torture the innocent, the Sudanese government turns a blind eye to the atrocities.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a hearing on the Darfur genocide yesterday. Here's Senator Kerry questioning U.S. envoy to the Sudan, Richard Williamson. You can view the hearing in its entirety at C-Span.
Photos courtesy Wikimedia Commons
