Sudan Accountability and Divestment Act of 2007

Floor Speech

SUDAN ACCOUNTABILITY AND DIVESTMENT ACT OF 2007 -- (Senate - December 12, 2007)

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Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I have regularly come to the Senate floor to speak about the genocide in Darfur.

For 4 long years, the world has watched this tragedy the killing of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians, the torching of entire villages, rape, torture, and untold human suffering.

More than 3 years have passed since the UN Commission of Inquiry concluded that:

crimes against humanity and war crimes have been committed in Darfur and may be no less serious and heinous than genocide.

Many of us on both sides of the aisle and in the international community have repeatedly called for greater U.S. and global action to stem the humanitarian crisis in Darfur.

President Bush, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon have all called for greater action.

Just this week, a group calling itself the Elders including several Nobel Peace Prize Winners and former heads of state spoke forcefully for action in Darfur.

Despite these efforts, the Sudanese government has continued to show its contempt for its own people and the demands of the global community.

The message was loud and clear earlier this year when the UN Security Council voted to deploy a 26,000 member peacekeeping force to Darfur. This hybrid UN-African Union force will help stem the violence and create an atmosphere in which peace talks can move toward a long-term political agreement.

With the peacekeepers set to begin deployment on January 1, we are once again witnessing the same old pattern from Khartoum. The Sudanese government is now denying deployment of non-African peacekeepers, despite their acceptance of this new force only a few months ago.

We have waited long enough for this murderous government to take action, to stop slaughtering its own people, to stop thumbing its nose at the international community.

That is why I commend the Senate for its action today to encourage cooperation by the Sudanese government.

Earlier this year, I introduced 2 bills that would have increased economic pressure on the Sudanese regime. Each bill supported state and local divestment efforts, allowing each of us to do our part to end the madness in Darfur by selling investments that help prop up the Sudanese regime.

I am pleased that Senator Dodd, as chairman of the Banking Committee, has adopted ideas from these bills into the Sudan Accountability and Divestment Act of 2007. I thank him, as well as Ranking Member Shelby and others who have worked on this bill especially Senators CORNYN and BROWNBACK, who joined me as lead sponsors of the legislation I had introduced.

I urge my colleagues to support this critically-important legislation, and I look forward to working with the House to send it to the President for his signature as soon as possible.

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