Where There’s No Debate About Genocide — and No Response, Either
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John Ashworth
Sep 14, 2025, 1:26:04 AMSep 14
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Where There’s No Debate About Genocide — and No Response, Either
Aug. 30, 2025
NYT
By Nicholas Kristof
As debate boils over allegations of genocide in Gaza, there’s another
place where all sides in the United States seem to agree a genocide is
underway — yet largely ignore it.
That’s Sudan, probably the site of the world’s worst humanitarian
crisis today. Famine was officially declared there last year; the
United Nations reports that some 25 million Sudanese face extreme
hunger and at least 12 million have had to flee their homes because of
civil war. Tom Perriello, who was the U.S. special envoy for Sudan
until this year, tells me that he believes that the death toll by now
has exceeded 400,000.
In January the Biden administration declared the killing in Sudan to
be a genocide. In April the Trump administration also characterized
the slaughter as a genocide, and the State Department confirmed to me
that it views the situation in Sudan as a genocide.
So there is bipartisan agreement in the United States that Sudan is
suffering both genocide and famine — and also, apparently, a
bipartisan consensus to do little about it. The Biden administration
was too passive, and now so too is the Trump administration. President
Trump is actually slashing assistance this year to Sudan, increasing
the number of children who will starve.
Whatever you think of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza — and I’ve been
unsparing in my criticism of Israel’s actions and America’s complicity
in the bombing and starvation there — we should recognize our
collective failure to address this other crisis with an even higher
death toll. Neither should be seen as a distraction from the other; we
have the moral bandwidth to be appalled by the enormous suffering in
Sudan and in Gaza alike.
This failure is global. Arab and African countries have done more to
aggravate the suffering in Sudan than to ease it. The U.N. in 2005
declared a “responsibility to protect” civilians suffering atrocities,
but that lofty language seems a substitute for action rather than a
spur to it.
Survivors describe ethnic cleansing of almost unimaginable savagery.
On the Sudan-Chad border last year, a woman named Maryam Suleiman told
me that in her village an Arab militia lined up all the men and boys
over the age of 10 and massacred them and then raped the women and
girls. The lighter-skinned gunmen targeted her Black African ethnic
group, she said, quoting a militia leader as saying, “We don’t want to
see any Black people.”
The racist massacres are an echo of the Darfur genocide of two decades
ago in western Sudan. One difference is that this time there is far
less interest and a complete failure of political will to respond.
It is “a Gaza — which is horrible enough — writ still larger,” said
Anthony Lake, who was national security adviser to President Bill
Clinton and later led UNICEF. “And largely off camera.”
Two decades ago, the U.N. secretary general at the time, Kofi Annan,
visited Darfur (and helped smuggle me in) and pushed to ease the
crisis with negotiations and peacekeepers. The current U.N. secretary
general, António Guterres, said in February that the world must not
turn its back on Sudan, but I sometimes think that’s what he himself
has done.
The killing and starvation in Sudan are results of a two-year struggle
between two warring generals. One faction is the Sudanese Armed
Forces, and the other is a militia called the Rapid Support Forces.
Both have behaved brutally, starving civilians and impeding
humanitarian efforts to aid the hungry.
“We’re being blocked from reaching the hungry — and attacked for
trying,” said Cindy McCain, the executive director of the U.N. World
Food Program, which had three of its trucks carrying food aid
destroyed this month by drone strikes.
Aid workers say that while both sides have committed war crimes, the
Rapid Support Forces are responsible for the worst atrocities, such as
the burning of entire villages and the slaughter and rape of
civilians.
Outsiders perpetuate the war by arming both sides. The United Arab
Emirates, in particular, despite denials, appears to be the main
supporter of the Rapid Support Forces, underwriting its campaign of
atrocities.
The Biden administration refused to hold the Emirates accountable, and
now the Trump administration is doing the same, but Congress has
provided more leadership. Some members are pushing for a ban on arms
transfers to the Emirates while it continues to enable mass murder and
rape. That’s a useful pressure point: The Emirates is a remarkable
nation that cares about its reputation, and public pressure previously
led it to pull out of the disastrous war in Yemen.
What could Trump do? It would help if he called on the Emirates to cut
off the Rapid Support Forces or at least end the atrocities. He could
appoint a special envoy for Sudan. And he could ramp up American
support for grass-roots Sudanese assistance programs, such as the
emergency response rooms that run communal kitchens.
World leaders will gather at the U.N. in September to repeat
platitudes about making the world a better place. One test of their
sincerity is what they will do for the major Sudanese city of El
Fasher, besieged by the Rapid Support Forces and facing starvation.
Sudan watchers fear that if El Fasher falls, the Rapid Support Forces
will engage in mass killings and rapes, as they have elsewhere.
“Here in El Fasher, we are starving,” Avaaz Sudan Dispatch, a
newsletter that follows Sudan, quoted a civilian in the city as
saying. “The responsibility is not just on those holding the guns.
It’s on the world. The Arab countries. The African Union. Europe. The
so-called international community. All of them.”
“We know they can help,” the civilian continued. “We know they have
the power to airdrop food. They have planes. They have supplies. But
they are choosing not to.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/30/opinion/sudan-genocide-famine.html
END
______________________
John Ashworth
ashwor...@gmail.com
+254 725 926 297 (Kenya mobile, WhatsApp and Signal)
PO Box 403 - 00206, Kiserian, Kenya
Aug. 30, 2025
NYT
By Nicholas Kristof
As debate boils over allegations of genocide in Gaza, there’s another
place where all sides in the United States seem to agree a genocide is
underway — yet largely ignore it.
That’s Sudan, probably the site of the world’s worst humanitarian
crisis today. Famine was officially declared there last year; the
United Nations reports that some 25 million Sudanese face extreme
hunger and at least 12 million have had to flee their homes because of
civil war. Tom Perriello, who was the U.S. special envoy for Sudan
until this year, tells me that he believes that the death toll by now
has exceeded 400,000.
In January the Biden administration declared the killing in Sudan to
be a genocide. In April the Trump administration also characterized
the slaughter as a genocide, and the State Department confirmed to me
that it views the situation in Sudan as a genocide.
So there is bipartisan agreement in the United States that Sudan is
suffering both genocide and famine — and also, apparently, a
bipartisan consensus to do little about it. The Biden administration
was too passive, and now so too is the Trump administration. President
Trump is actually slashing assistance this year to Sudan, increasing
the number of children who will starve.
Whatever you think of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza — and I’ve been
unsparing in my criticism of Israel’s actions and America’s complicity
in the bombing and starvation there — we should recognize our
collective failure to address this other crisis with an even higher
death toll. Neither should be seen as a distraction from the other; we
have the moral bandwidth to be appalled by the enormous suffering in
Sudan and in Gaza alike.
This failure is global. Arab and African countries have done more to
aggravate the suffering in Sudan than to ease it. The U.N. in 2005
declared a “responsibility to protect” civilians suffering atrocities,
but that lofty language seems a substitute for action rather than a
spur to it.
Survivors describe ethnic cleansing of almost unimaginable savagery.
On the Sudan-Chad border last year, a woman named Maryam Suleiman told
me that in her village an Arab militia lined up all the men and boys
over the age of 10 and massacred them and then raped the women and
girls. The lighter-skinned gunmen targeted her Black African ethnic
group, she said, quoting a militia leader as saying, “We don’t want to
see any Black people.”
The racist massacres are an echo of the Darfur genocide of two decades
ago in western Sudan. One difference is that this time there is far
less interest and a complete failure of political will to respond.
It is “a Gaza — which is horrible enough — writ still larger,” said
Anthony Lake, who was national security adviser to President Bill
Clinton and later led UNICEF. “And largely off camera.”
Two decades ago, the U.N. secretary general at the time, Kofi Annan,
visited Darfur (and helped smuggle me in) and pushed to ease the
crisis with negotiations and peacekeepers. The current U.N. secretary
general, António Guterres, said in February that the world must not
turn its back on Sudan, but I sometimes think that’s what he himself
has done.
The killing and starvation in Sudan are results of a two-year struggle
between two warring generals. One faction is the Sudanese Armed
Forces, and the other is a militia called the Rapid Support Forces.
Both have behaved brutally, starving civilians and impeding
humanitarian efforts to aid the hungry.
“We’re being blocked from reaching the hungry — and attacked for
trying,” said Cindy McCain, the executive director of the U.N. World
Food Program, which had three of its trucks carrying food aid
destroyed this month by drone strikes.
Aid workers say that while both sides have committed war crimes, the
Rapid Support Forces are responsible for the worst atrocities, such as
the burning of entire villages and the slaughter and rape of
civilians.
Outsiders perpetuate the war by arming both sides. The United Arab
Emirates, in particular, despite denials, appears to be the main
supporter of the Rapid Support Forces, underwriting its campaign of
atrocities.
The Biden administration refused to hold the Emirates accountable, and
now the Trump administration is doing the same, but Congress has
provided more leadership. Some members are pushing for a ban on arms
transfers to the Emirates while it continues to enable mass murder and
rape. That’s a useful pressure point: The Emirates is a remarkable
nation that cares about its reputation, and public pressure previously
led it to pull out of the disastrous war in Yemen.
What could Trump do? It would help if he called on the Emirates to cut
off the Rapid Support Forces or at least end the atrocities. He could
appoint a special envoy for Sudan. And he could ramp up American
support for grass-roots Sudanese assistance programs, such as the
emergency response rooms that run communal kitchens.
World leaders will gather at the U.N. in September to repeat
platitudes about making the world a better place. One test of their
sincerity is what they will do for the major Sudanese city of El
Fasher, besieged by the Rapid Support Forces and facing starvation.
Sudan watchers fear that if El Fasher falls, the Rapid Support Forces
will engage in mass killings and rapes, as they have elsewhere.
“Here in El Fasher, we are starving,” Avaaz Sudan Dispatch, a
newsletter that follows Sudan, quoted a civilian in the city as
saying. “The responsibility is not just on those holding the guns.
It’s on the world. The Arab countries. The African Union. Europe. The
so-called international community. All of them.”
“We know they can help,” the civilian continued. “We know they have
the power to airdrop food. They have planes. They have supplies. But
they are choosing not to.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/30/opinion/sudan-genocide-famine.html
END
______________________
John Ashworth
ashwor...@gmail.com
+254 725 926 297 (Kenya mobile, WhatsApp and Signal)
PO Box 403 - 00206, Kiserian, Kenya
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