By MONICA KELLY

mak012@latech.edu

 

Between 1938 and 1945, approximately 11 million people were killed in Adolf Hitler’s reign of terror to cleanse the Earth of races he felt were inferior. After his defeat, the United States vowed never to let such an occurrence take place again.

The year is now 2007, and Darfur, Sudan, is making a charade of this vow.

A new era of genocide has begun and over 400,000 men, women and children have already fallen victim to the mass murder spree of the Sudanese government.

According to www.lifenets.net, a Web site devoted to ending extreme poverty and genocide through online advocacy, over three million people will be crammed into concentration camps by the end of this sentence.

The Darfur conflict began in 2003 due to tensions between the mostly African farmers and the mostly Arab herders who have competed for the land. The country is Arab-dominated, but populated mostly by black Africans.

The Arab Janjaweed militia is responsible for the deliberate attempt to drive black Africans out of Darfur and have been slaughtering, raping and stealing all along the way.

“Government-sponsored troops rape, murder civilians and shoot children for sport,” the Web site stated. “Entire races have been exterminated by Sudan’s campaign of ethnic cleansing.”

Robert Davis, a junior professional aviation major, said a friend of his from high school escaped the Darfur conflict but will always live with the painful memories.

“My friend [Kerkula] told me of this one time when several refugees were being led by the rebels to a hut to be burned,” Davis said. “On the way to the hut, Kerkula’s grandmother fell and he stayed behind to help her while the rebels continued on to the hut and burned everyone else alive. He was very lucky that they left him behind.”

According to BBC News, Hawa, a woman from Darfur, is one of about 21 women who have been raped in a single camp in only two weeks. Hawa said the rebels threatened her with guns. One would grab her arms and the other would grab her legs and rape her in broad daylight.

Hawa said she was lucky they did not kill her afterwards as the rebels so often do.

The African Union has made several attempts to end the conflict and sign a peace deal, but there is little evidence to suggest this has ensued. It is up to the United States to do something.

Mary Ann Miltenberger, a senior history major, is responsible for creating a Facebook group at Tech to get information out to the student body and then nationally about the conflict.

She is trying to raise awareness and rally support to show the government their participation is needed.

“The most common ways to help are by contacting representatives to express concern and write letters to world leaders,” Miltenberger said.

Miltenberger said it is up to students to speak out, but that not many students are even aware of the current conflict.

“I think it is so easy for us as college students to become comfortable in our own lives and to be so wrapped up in them that we become oblivious to the struggle and pain happening in the world today,” Miltenberger said.

“There comes a time when we need to put aside the self-consumed distraction of student life and take responsibility for the things that are happening while we are silent.”

What students can do to help:

1. Spread the word. Visit Lifenets.net for more ways on how to be involved.

2. Contact your representatives: www.lifenets.net/contactreps.htm.

3. Start a STAND chapter: www.standhow.org/

chapter.

4. Print out the “Save Darfur” flyer and post it. [on lifenets].

5. Start your own petition by collecting signatures.

6. Join the Facebook group for more ways on how to raise awareness.