Darfur death toll warning
MPs are warning that the death toll from Sudan’s Darfur crisis could be as high as 300,000.
The House of Commons International Development Committee says the official figures were a gross underestimate.
It claims the World Health Organisation’s estimate of 70,000 deaths was wildly inaccurate as it included only violent deaths that took place in camps.
This means that only those who made it to camps were counted in fatality statistics.
The committee also says the international response to the crisis, which it claims was “no less serious and heinous than genocide”, had been “scandalously ineffective”.
Although the Sudanese government was held mostly responsible for the conflict, the MPs say the UN Security Council and other countries had ignored early warnings, responded slowly and placed too much importance on the north-south peace process in Sudan.
Committee chairman Tony Baldry says: “Crises such as Darfur require the world to respond collectively and effectively. Passing the buck will not do. After the genocide in Rwanda, the world said ‘never again’. President Bush said ‘not on my watch’. These words should mean something.
“The international community must now fulfill its responsibility to protect the people of Darfur. Attacked by the government which is meant to protect them, the people of Darfur, whom we have collectively and demonstrably failed, deserve no less. We demand that there is action now.”
The committee recommends that the situation should be referred to the international criminal court and that there should be sanctions and an extension of the arms ban.
