Medecins Sans Frontieres withdraws from Muhajiriya, Darfur

The horror in Darfur continues amid the ever growing human suffering.

Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) announced today that they have withdrawn all their staff from the town of Mahajiriya in Southern Darfur due to heightened attacks from Sudanese government troops. It was reported that dozens of innocent civilians were murdered over the weekend in these planned attacks.

The evacuation of the MSF staff means that thousands of innocent civilians have been left without medical or food aid. With the region around Mahajiriya being so dangerous, it is not possible for the people that have been left behind to travel safely to other towns to seek refuge and therefore they are left to face the onslaught from the Janjaweed that are backed up by the Sudanese troops.

It has also been reported that Sudanese government troops are on the verge of carrying out similar attacks on the towns of Kornoy, Um Baru, Kutum and Tine in northern Darfur. Observers on the ground report that a strong build up of troops is occurring close to these towns and that attacks are imminent.

These current attacks by the Sudanese government and their sponsored militia, the Janjaweed, have thrown the Tripoli peace talks that are scheduled to take place later this month, into chaos. The Sudanese Liberation Front, one of the main rebel groups, has refused to participate in any talks with the government unless the attacks on innocent civilians and the remaining NGOs stop.

Both the US and UK governments have announced that they will seek to impose sanctions against those groups that refuse to participate in the Tripoli peace talks. This announcement appears to be quite ridiculous based on the fact that all the rebel groups have been calling for a more direct and firm approach to be taken by the international community against the Sudanese government to force them to stop the attacks and to withdraw all troops from their current locations.

With the withdrawal of MSF from Muhajiriya and with the imminent attack on other towns, more NGOs will feel the need to withdraw for their own security and this will lead to a further increase in deaths and the further destruction of hope for peace, which continues to evaporate on a daily basis.

The news from Darfur is not good and most importantly, the likely success of the Tripoli peace talks has diminished and hope for an early deployment of the UN-AU hybrid force has declined.

What this news tells us today is that no workable peace accord will be signed later this month, based on the continuous and horrendous acts currently being committed by the Sudanese government and the Janjaweed in Darfur.

The Senegalese government announced on Oct 8th that it would soon withdraw its troops from the current AU peacekeeping force deployed in Darfur. This is based on the murder of three of its troops last week by the Sudanese government. The withdrawal of the Senegalese troops, which is an important member of the African Union, will be a severe setback to the formation and deployment of the hybrid force.

Unless the UN, the EU and the US take a stand against the Sudanese government and its outside influencers, there will be no deployment of a UN-AU hybrid force in Darfur and if this happens, other NGOs will follow the same path that MSF has taken and most will ultimately find that the security situation in Darfur is too dangerous for a continued presence in Darfur, hence the 4 million innocent civilians in dire need of aid will quickly transfer to the ever increasing death category.

Join the International Alliance For Human Rights, together with Hope For Humanity in supporting the upcoming Voices of Hope Concert for Darfur. For more information please call David Nolan at 212.695.7022, ext. 315 or email him at dnolan@iafhr.org.