Genocide In Darfur

GENOCIDE IN DARFUR -- (House of Representatives - September 20, 2006)

Ms. MOORE of Wisconsin. Mr. Speaker, I would like 5 minutes to address the body.

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Without objection, the gentlewoman from Wisconsin is recognized for 5 minutes.

There was no objection.

Ms. MOORE of Wisconsin. Mr. Speaker, I, like other Members of this body, am very reluctant to use inflammatory rhetoric, and it is very, very inflammatory to label what is going on in Darfur as genocide. It is inflammatory, it is accusatory, it indicts the government. And, moreover, Mr. Speaker it pricks our humanity, because if we were to not deny that it were genocide, there is no way that we could just sit back and do nothing. If we deny that it is genocide, it is just easy to walk away and say that what is going on there is somebody else's business.

Well, the international legal definition of the crime of genocide is found in Article 2 of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide. It describes the two elements that constitutes genocide as, one, a mental element attempting to destroy in whole or in part a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group; and, two, a physical element, which includes five types of violence, Mr. Speaker: killing of members of the group, causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group, deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; and forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Now, if you look at what is happening in Darfur, if you pull off the blinders, you will find that more than 400,000 people have been killed by the government forces and militias from 2003 to the present time, and the killing continues.

Bodily and mental harm certainly has occurred as young women and girls are raped by soldiers and militias. Such physical and mental harm will continue to affect these women and families for generations to come.

Hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost to the deliberate destruction of homes, crops, water resources; physical displacement of over 2 million people, resulting in conditions of famine, disease, epidemics in both inaccessible areas and in camps for displaced people; the killing of pregnant women; the use of rape as a weapon of genocide, as many perpetrators have been arrogant enough to state that their intent is to change the ethnic identity of the child conceived by rape.

2004, July, this House and the Senate declared that the atrocities in Darfur constitute genocide. 2004, September, then-Secretary of State Colin Powell announced that the killing, raping, and other atrocities occurring in Darfur was genocide. But 2 years and much empty talk later, the violence continues, Mr. Speaker.

The U.N. and humanitarian organizations continue to report a continuing deteriorating situation. Twenty-six thousand Sudan Armed Forces are headed to the Darfur region for a major offensive against people. Humanitarian groups have remained concerned that their ability to continue to provide aid to over 2 million displaced victims are insecure as the violence continues.

The time for debating this genocide or declaring it genocide is over. It is time to do something now.

There are only two options, Mr. Speaker, as I leave to go back to my seat. One would be to extend the African Union peacekeeping force mandate; or, two, to send in the U.N. peacekeepers in Sudan, even though the Sudanese Government refuses to accept them.

Of course, Mr. Speaker, there is one other option: To continue to do nothing. For evil to triumph, it is only necessary that good men do nothing.

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