Since I’d joined DanChurchAid (DCA) in 2003, Darfur was a place close to my heart. My very first task at DCA was to write the a proposal for funds to provide water, sanitation and hygiene for a large community of families who fled their homes after attacks by the Janjaweed, bands of raiding Arab tribesmen,. In 2006 I had visited the project to do an evaluation of the continuing operation.
Even then, Darfur was still a very dangerous place. Outside the town of Garsila we rode through one scorched village after another, their roofs burned black and the empty, half demolished mud huts bearing mute testimony to the suffering that the residents had seen.
But I was shocked to find that now, in August 2009, things had only grown worse.
Protected?
“What about the UN peacekeepers?” I ask the displaced people when they tell me about their security fears. “Can’t they protect you?” The young men in the camp just laugh. “They can’t even protect themselves.” The 6,000 or so African Union soldiers were expanded in both number and mandate, to a force of 26,000 wearing the blue helmets of UN peacekeepers and received a mandate under Chapter 7 of the UN charter, which authorizes them to use force to protect themselves or the displaced camp dwellers. But that’s only in theory.
Chapter 7 didn’t stop the slaughter in Kalma outside of Nyala camp last year. When the Sudanese army showed up at the camp to quell a riot of unsatisfied displaced people, the UNAMID (Joint UN and African Union operation in Darfur) peacekeepers retired to their base outside of the camp, while the army shot 49 persons many of them women and children.
More recently, a Nigerian peacekeeping battalion was completely overrun at Haskanita camp near El Dhein by what was reportedly a small band of armed Arabs. When asked why they didn’t put up a stiffer fight, one Nigerian peacekeeper who had walked the 40 or so kilometers to the nearest town reportedly said on arrival, ‘I didn’t come hear to die.’ I understand why the displaced are a bit skeptical of the UNAMID force’s ability to protect them, even with their greater numbers.
Risking Death for a Bit of Firewood
One of the successes of the former African Union force hailed by both local and nationals were their firewood patrols. After displaced women complained that a trip to the bush to gather firewood meant risking rape by local militants, the African Union forces began to organize armed escorts for the women to ensure their safety. This was seen as one of the best examples of the relatively new concept of ‘protection’ of civilians in armed conflict.
Whatever safety they may once have offered, however, has disappeared. When I ask the women in the camps about the firewood patrols, they say they’ve ceased to function. ‘The nearest firewood is three days away,’ they say. ‘It’s too far for women to go, only men with donkey carts. And every time they go, they risk having their carts stolen. If they resist, they’re killed.’
‘But surely security can’t be your biggest fear here in the camp,’ I ask them. ‘It seems peaceful here. And the Janjaweed wouldn’t risk coming into this camp, right on the edge of town, would they?’ But the three water pump attendants I’m chatting with just shake their heads in dismay. ‘They can come at any time. Yesterday some men with guns came into another camp nearby and shot in the air, terrorizing the residents. If we go just outside the camp to try small farming, the Arabs can come at any time and harass us.’
They also remind me of the Norwegian Church Aid water attendant who was killed inside the camp last year. I remembered him well; he was shot in the back just a few months after I met him in 2006.
When we finish our conversation we rejoin our female colleagues who’d been having a conversation with the women at the women’s center. There, the answer was the same. When asked about their biggest problem, the women’s answer was immediate and unanimous: security.
Better or Worse?
But the picture is not as clear as it might first seem. As we ask further, we learn that in fact while security on the roads is worse, security in the villages is actually better than it was last year. Whilst very few feel safe enough to return to their villages, many are going back now, during the rainy season, just to cultivate their fields, and return to the camp. In fact, whilst the road is growing less secure and the number of car jackings increase, more Darfurians are cultivating their fields this year than last year. There is still a widely held fear that the raiders will return at harvest time, either to raid the harvest or simply to destroy it, as has happened before.
What appears to have happened is that whilst the security situation for humanitarian agencies has grown worse, for the displaced in Darfur it has grown slightly better. Whilst the threat of raiding still persists for them, the organized ethnic cleansing of 2004 – 5 has given way to a breakdown in authority amongst the Janjaweed. The armed groups now target toward aid groups and foreign forces and towards the capture of vehicles in particular. Their motive is profit.
Meanwhile, the Sudanese government which had orchestrated the expulsion of the Fur from their homeland now seeks their return. Since 2007 the Sudanese government has been seeking in earnest to return or relocate the camp dwellers to villages, sometimes with force. These moves have been condemned by UN Emergency Relief John Holmes as in violation with international law. It appears that the government fears the volatile concentrations of displaced people in large settlements and has accused the rebel movements of seeking refuge their. But their forced return has either been without the promise of security, guarantees of humanitarian assistance, or the resolution of land problems with the Arab tribes, or it has been to villages other than those of the IDPs origin, effectively completing the campaign of ethnic cleansing.
Handing Out Band Aids in a War Zone
Throughout my career I’ve been drawn to humanitarian emergency work because I find the immediate results satisfying. Whereas the long, slow haul of development work might not see positive change in the course of a single project, if ever, emergency work gives the immediate reward of knowing that I’ve helped make a difference, and sometimes save lives.
But in a place like Khamsa Dagaig camp, in Zallingei, Darfur, the shortcomings of humanitarian relief are all too clear. This is what we call a ‘protracted crisis;’ we don’t expect the displaced peple to be able to return to their destroyed villages any time soon. In the meantime we can reduce their suffering and keep their children healthy, providing health care, water and sanitation, education, and the bare essentials for human life. But we are to address their number one concern. We simply cannot keep them safe.