Bush And Darfur
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in Foreign Policy, The World
ORLANDO, Fla., Feb. 17 — President Bush on Friday called for doubling the number of international troops in the war-ravaged Darfur region of Sudan and a bigger role for NATO in the peacekeeping effort.Bush has concluded that peace talks will not halt the violence that has left tens of thousands dead and more than 2 million homeless in Darfur and that a more muscular military response is required, administration officials said.
After private talks with world leaders, including U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, Bush decided to call for an additional 7,000 or more troops to be placed under U.N. command, along with the 7,000 African Union troops already there, because such an expansion would be the quickest way to intervene in the bloody conflict, the officials said. But many details of the policy shift need to be worked out, including how many U.S. troops would be part of the beefed-up international peacekeeping effort. Lt. Cmdr. Joe Carpenter, a Pentagon spokesman, said it is “premature to speculate” on potential increases in U.S. troops.
However, given the administration’s very pessimistic view on the UN’s effectivness, does this mean anything at all? Cynical? Sure, but that’s what we’re dealing with right now in this region. Worldwide pessimism Truly, how many people have to die before we make a serious march towards curing the situation in this region?
Let’s hope this policy can make a difference…
Some other perspectives here and here.
This entry was posted on Sunday, February 19th, 2006 and is filed under Foreign Policy, The World. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
