Editor’s Introduction

Upon its inception in 2006, Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal 1:1 published a special issue entitled “Genocide in Darfur.” At that time, the crisis in Darfur had already been the focus of international attention for some three years. That special issue provided an overview of the crisis, the crimes perpetrated against black African women and girls of Darfur by government of Sudan (GoS) troops and the Janjaweed, the legal implications of the US determination that the atrocities in Darfur constituted genocide, a comparative analysis of the atrocities perpetrated in Rwanda in 1994 and Darfur in the early 2000s, and a critical analysis of the US government’s Atrocities Documentation Project whose data were used by the US government to make its determination of genocide.

Today, the Darfur crisis is about to enter its seventh year. Rebel groups and GoS troops continue to engage in battle, but just as often rebel groups fight among themselves. Periodic attacks continue to be carried out by the GoS against civilians, which have resulted in the continuance of spasmodic but still relatively massive refugee flows. It is now estimated that over 2.5 million black Africans are internally displaced in Darfur and some 275,000 to 300,000 are refugees in Chad. Girls and women continue to be raped, but not just by Janjaweed and GoS forces but also by members of various rebel groups (in other words, by black African males).

The African Union, which finally came to the realization that it did not have the requisite mandate, manpower, firepower, and resources to handle the mission in Darfur, acquiesced to international pressure and, in conjunction with the United Nations, formed the hybrid United Nations–African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID). Unfortunately, UNAMID is now suffering many of the same handicaps faced by its predecessor.

As time has crept by, the GoS has played cat to the international community’s mouse. Indicative of this is how the GoS treats and mistreats those agencies providing humanitarian aid, periodically declaring certain groups and individuals personae non gratae and kicking them out of Darfur, thus leaving the internally displaced persons (IDPs) to desperately fend for themselves in an already harsh and forbidding climate and situation. Another classic illustration of the cat and mouse game the GoS plays is the fact that it has, more than once, breached the agreement that it would no longer off-load military personnel or material in Darfur. Not only has it breached the agreement but, in the process of doing so, it has also stooped to whitewashing planes and affixing UN insignias to them before flying them into Darfur.

It is little wonder that the situation in Darfur has been described by various actors, including UNAMID personnel, as chaotic and “a conflict of all against all.”

Yet, it is also true that the international community’s various threats and actions have, in various ways though to an extremely limited extent, pushed the GoS into being somewhat more pliable vis-à-vis certain Darfur-related issues. For example, the GoS allowed the UNAMID force onto Sudanese territory. But, even then, the GoS used brinkmanship and, in the end, significantly limited the ultimate effectiveness of the new force.

It is also true that the number of killings that peaked between 2004 and 2005 has fallen precipitously in the years since. Still, the GoS and the Janjaweed continue to kill black Africans civilians, and many continue to die from unattended injuries, dehydration, malnutrition, and disease.

The exact number of black Africans who have been killed and who have perished due to other causes continues to be a matter of great, and in some ways, maddening debate. By late 2004, various scholars and groups proffered estimates ranging from 180,000 to 400,000. In 2005, though, US Deputy Secretary of State Robert B. Zoellick asserted that the US State Department’s estimate of deaths in Darfur was 60,000 to 160,000. While roundly lambasted by many for sorely underestimating the number of Darfurian deaths, he was praised by others for presenting a more “sensible” number. Since then, the numbers cited have ranged from the low...