Bush seems to be
moving towards serious support for a UN peacekeeping force in Darfur.
Save Darfur Coalition
hopes he is for real this time… exactly.
John Bolton, US ambassador to the UN, is taking the opportunity to
score some points off Annan, even though the US only days ago (when Annan was in Washington) was
the one dragging its feet on
the matter, and Annan was
trying to put the pressure on.
I’ve noticed an upsurge in concern about the Darfur situation over the last three months. It’s due to the
tireless work of people like Eric Reeves,
Ingrid Jones, Sudan Tribune,
and Nicholas Kristof,
and many many others. PubSub search for the word Darfur returns about a hundred matches
per day, and it used to be less than forty.
In my opinion the situation has just passed a tipping point – it has sufficient momentum in the public
mind that Bush, for example, can’t afford to ignore it without looking completely heartless, so he’s
switched from making token gestures to promising real support. I always thought the US would intervene
in the end, but what’s different is that for the first time I’m beginning to hope the intervention won’t come
too late.
Update December 2006
My hopes proved to have been misplaced.