Rally in DC on Saturday, June 4 for Sudan’s Victims of Khartoum Jihad:
Sudanese Diaspora and Peace Advocates to Stage a Demonstration in Washington DC
Date: Saturday, June 4, 2011
Location: Freedom Plaza
1:00 PM
The people of South Kordofan/Nuba Mountains, in collaboration with Darfuris, Easterners, Nubians, journalists, civil society groups as well as representatives of Sudanese political parties of Sudan in the U.S. urge you to attend the planned rally in Washington DC on June 4, 2011 to advocate for real peace in Sudan.
We call on the International Community to take serious measures against the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) in Sudan for its blatant crimes against its citizens across the country. It was Khartoum’s injustices, coercion and inequalities which led to the rebellion in South Sudan, Nuba Mountains, Blue Nile and Eastern Sudan. The United Nations has acknowledged that more than 2 million were killed and many millions more were displaced in South Sudan alone during the last war between North and South Sudan, which has been halted by the Comprehensive Peace Agreement signed in 2005. The scope of the crimes of the NCP in the Nuba Mountains and Blue Nile regions remain unknown.
Today, the same government is mercilessly carrying out brutal attacks in the western section of the country (Darfur) where the UN speaks of more than 300,000 people being killed. Millions have been displaced internally and externally, living in refugee camps where the government continuous its coercions. The government has targeted civilians by bombing and razing their cities, towns, villages and poisoning wells which are the only sources for drinking water in Darfur. The ongoing disgraceful crimes in Darfur have been qualified a “genocide” and the sitting President Omar Al- Bashir, along with cabinet members Ahmed Mohamed Harun and Ali Kusheb have been indicted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes and crimes against humanity and genocide. Nonetheless, all the perpetrators of the atrocities in Sudan remain free, unconcerned and continue their crimes loudly and blatantly in a clear defiance to the world’s rule of law.
Furthermore, the regime of Khartoum has boldly breached the internationally guaranteed CPA which many in the country and abroad view as a model for bringing justice and peace in Sudan. The ruling National Congress Party reneged on protocols of Power Sharing, Wealth Sharing and Security Arrangements. Many reports by international organizations such as Concordis International and Small Armed Survey have shown that Khartoum has accumulated more than 50,000 of its troops in the volatile state of South Kordofan which borders four Southern States plus Abyei. The Concordis estimated in its report of 2010 that Khartoum has a paramilitary force (Popular Defense Forces, PDF) of about “20,000” in the fragile state of South Kordofan alone.
In April 19, 2011, George Clooney’s Satellite Sentinel Project (SSP) reported that its analysis of Digital Globe satellite imagery showed evidence consistent with intentional burning in South Kordofan. The incident was executed by the PDF under the command of Ahmed Harun, one of the indicted men for various crimes in Sudan’s Darfur. The event were carried in town of El-fed Um-Abdalla where more than 20 people, including two women and a child, were burned to death in one of more than 300 razed homes.
On April 27, 2011, President Bashir reiterated publicly his government’s policy of war and crimes by promising to prosecute the Nuba people from “hill to hill and from cave to cave” by “artillery or by horses”. The mention of use of horse is a terrorizing reference to the Janjawid militia which is currently in operation in Darfur.
Other violations of Human Rights and Democracy are on the NCP’s agenda. Bashir has stated, also publicly, that his regime will proclaim Sudan an “an Islamic and an Arabic State” when South Sudan separates from the rest of the country in July 9 of this year. The government has continuously detained journalists and restricted freedom of press, freedom of assembly and freedom of mobilization all of which are enshrined in Sudan’s Interim Constitution. Human rights advocates and prodemocracy groups have been repressed with an iron fist. Amnesty International and various such organizations have expressed alarm that students and pro-democracy advocates have increasingly been kidnapped, raped, tortured and detained by the NCP arbitrarily. In addition, Khartoum’s tie with terrorist organizations such as Hamas is continuous. Recently, Israel has launched several aerial strikes in Sudan targeting convoys of cargos loaded with weapons intended for Palestinian terrorists Hamas.
To demand human rights and the same consideration being given to those who have just recently begun to protest in such places as Egypt, Libya, Yemen, etc., Sudanese and their various civil society organizations in the U.S. will hold a demonstration and rally to raise awareness about the danger the NCP presents to Sudanese and to the global security and to inspire popular uprising across Sudan to remove one of the most notorious regimes in the world today.
Please come to support the Sudanese in their cause of justice, freedom and peace across Sudan.
A memo will be delivered to the Obama Administration, Ban-Ki Moon, Secretary of UN, members of U.S. Congress, Representative of EU in U.S., to IGAD, and Think-Tanks.
For more information please contact:
Gafar Kangam: [email protected]; 571-331-2834 or
Ibrahim Alhag: 703-209-4592