Getting Darfur Wrong

The Darfur genocide has the perverse distinction of being the longest and most fully chronicled genocide of the last century. Our contemporaneous knowledge of what happened and what is happening comes from dozens of comprehensive human rights reports dating from 2003 and earlier, accounts from international humanitarian organizations, and detailed research by policy and advocacy groups such at the International Crisis Group and Refugees International. And there is extraordinary congruence in the accounts. Although some, such as Human Rights Watch, have found it difficult to come to consensus on the question of "genocidal intent," there is broad agreement about the ethnically targeted nature of the crimes and the role of the Khartoum regime in orchestrating the deaths of hundreds of thousands and the displacement of some three million Darfuris, overwhelmingly from the non Arab, African tribal populations of the region.