The movie "Hotel Rwanda" is now available on DVD. I strongly recommend it to everyone.
This powerful film is set in Rwanda during the 1994 genocide, which claimed the lives of over 800,000 people, and is based on a true story. Actor Don Cheadle was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor for his portrayal of a Hutu man who saved the lives of over 1,000 Tutsis by giving them refuge in the four-star hotel that he managed.
I think it is impossible to watch the movie and not be moved. Sadly, however, when the Rwandan genocide was taking place 11 years ago, it seemed that most Americans were too preoccupied with the OJ Simpson trial to pay much attention to the news from Africa. The OJ trial featured a sports hero villain, a beautiful blonde victim, and the victim's male friend. Sex sells, and the OJ trial had a lot more entertainment value going for it than did the slaughter of a bunch of nameless black people in some third-world country that most Americans would probably have trouble finding on a map.
Even our leaders looked away. The U.S. government's failure to take action during the Rwandan genocide may have been the biggest failure of the Clinton administration, in terms of the loss of human life. But we were not alone. The rest of the world closed its eyes to the horror as well.
Today, a similar crisis is taking place in the Darfur region, in western Sudan. Over 200,000 people are believed to have lost their lives at the hands of the government-supported Janjawid militia since the conflict erupted in February 2003. In addition, over 1.6 million civilians have been displaced.
The Sudanese government is restricting access for humanitarian aid agencies, and so numerous people are in danger of starvation and illness. The authorities are demolishing homes in settlements for displaced people and calling it "urban renewal".
The Janjawid are using rape as a weapon of war. Countless Sudanese women and girls have been abducted, branded, and forced to service the Janjawid and government officials as sex slaves. As a result, many of these women and girls have contracted HIV from their rapists, along with emotional scars that will never heal.
Weapons continue to flow into Sudan from Russia, China, France, and Saudi Arabia, contributing to the ongoing violence. And thousands of innocent civilians continue to die each month.
The world community must not drop the ball this time as it did 11 years ago with Rwanda.
Today, there is a single peacekeeping force - the UN-supported African Union (AU) Mission in Darfur - on the ground. However, the AU mission, in its current form, cannot adequately address the crisis.
On a hopeful note, the U.S. Congress is considering action to support the AU mission.
In the Senate, the Darfur Accountability Act (S.495), which was introduced by Senators Jon Corzine (D-NJ) and Sam Brownback (R-KS), would provide increased resources to Sudan to help ensure that the perpetrators of the abuses in Darfur be brought to justice, support efforts to protect the Sudanese people from this violence, and help to stop the flow of weapons to Sudan.
At the same time, in the House of Representatives, Congressman Donald Payne (D-NJ) recently introduced the Darfur Genocide Accountability Act (H.R. 1424), with goals similar to the Senate version.
I urge all of our Senators and Representatives to support this legislation. By doing so, they will be sending a message to the world that we will no longer turn our backs on the gross human rights violations taking place in Darfur.
As the world's only superpower and as a champion of freedom, the U.S. owes that much to the citizens of Darfur.
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