Our statement to the US Mission to the UN yesterday, May 22, 2008:

DarfurMetro, an organization of SaveDarfur chapters in the New York/New Jersey/Connecticut Metropolitan region, released the following statement today.

Now is a time of renewed violence in Darfur. In the wake of the failed coup in Khartoum, Darfuris in the capital have been targeted on the basis of ethnicity, killing particularly members of the African tribes of Darfur. There have been murders and disappearances, particularly of young men. Our Darfuri friends have been sending us lists of people, particularly educated, professional Darfuris (civilians not involved in the rebel attack), who have been killed or disappeared. There have been reports of people being killed because of the color of their skin. There have also been renewed attacks on Darfuri villages in the past few weeks. It is extremely important that we take action at this time. The US will hold the presidency of the Security Council during June. We ask that the UN end the impunity of the government of Sudan and the ongoing atrocities by deploying UN troops and by imposing multilateral sanctions on high officials of the Sudanese regime.

Although many individuals in the Government of Sudan bear responsibility for the massive violations of human rights in Darfur and the recent violence in Khartoum, the following three men bear perhaps the most responsibility for the brutal reign of terror in Sudan. We ask that, in the course of the coming month, as President of the Security Council, you impose multilateral sanctions (asset freezes and travel bans) on these men:

1. Salah Abdalla (known as Salah Gosh). The head of the National Security Apparatus and, as such, one of the main architects of the genocide in Darfur. His agents are reported to operate throughout the IDP camps, conducting arrests and kidnapping of any Darfuri who is suspected of being a rebel sympathizer, often in the absence of any proof. Many Darfuri tribal leaders have vanished from the camps and never returned, others have returned as broken men as a result of severe torture. Reliable sources report that he has trained Janjaweed officers directly in how to conduct interrogations under torture of Darfuris from African tribes and he has been reported to be directly involved in the murder of Darfuri civilians on the basis of ethnicity in the past 10 days in Khartoum and its suburbs.
2. Dr. Nafi Ali Nafi ( PHD). Al-Bashir's Assistant and ruling party General Secretary. He was in charge of the regime's overall security for its first seven years and is one of the most important advocates of targeting civilians with atrocities as a method of counter-insurgency. It has been reported that he designed and implemented the so-called "Ghost Houses", places of torture used only at night when screams of the victims could be heard from far distances but which by day time stand empty and silent. He is instrumental in recruiting Janjaweed Arab tribes from neighboring countries (Chad, Central Africa, Cameroon) and is reported to have given the lands and burnt villages of the African tribes to these newcomers. His goal and his actions have been to transform the demographic composition of Darfur through ethnically targeted violence.
3. Abdulrahim Mohamed Hussein. The Defense Minister. He is reported to be the executer of the genocide in Darfur. He has built training camps for the Janjaweed forces, supplied them with arms, and provided them with air support and land cover. There are multiple and reliable reports that he assigned high ranking officers in the military and intelligence to lead and direct the Janjaweed on their raids of African villages, as documented by numerous human rights organizations.

In light of the recent upsurge of violence in Sudan, we feel it is imperative that UN forces be deployed as quickly as possible with the strongest possible mandate for civilian protection, that those previously indicted by the ICC be turned over immediately, and that sanctions be leveled on those Sudanese leaders most directly responsible for the violence.

Sharon Silber, on behalf of DarfurMetro May 22, 2008