Demagogue

The Washington Post ran this op-ed from Jack Goldsmith, a professor at Harvard Law School, former Bush administration official in the Justice and Defense departments, and author of "The Limits of International Law," arguing that the administration should support efforts to prosecute Sudanese officials in the International Criminal Court

The fears of "legitimizing" the ICC are overstated. It's too late to kill the International Criminal Court. The Security Council (including the United States) presupposed the ICC's authority when it voted in 2002 and 2003 to immunize U.N. peacekeepers from ICC prosecutions. And the institution is now up and running, preparing for cases already referred to it. For better or worse, the ICC is not going away anytime soon.

Human Rights Watch says that "international prosecutions are needed to deter ongoing atrocities in Darfur" and has released a new report: "Targeting the Fur: Mass Killings in Darfur."

A few US lawmakers met with the rebels and toured refugee camps in Chad over the weekend.

Eight villages in Western Darfur were reportedly attacked and burned to the ground. Khartoum accused the rebels of carrying out the attack, but the rebels deny involvement.

The New York Times ran this article

The sounds of terror arrived with agonizing certainty - the whisper of camel hoofs on desert sand, the clap of gunfire, the crackle of a thatched roof set aflame.

Aisha Abdullah gathered her five children on Thursday, buried her most valuable possessions - some metal bowls, a cooking pot, a few tin cups - and ran as fast as she could.

"They have destroyed everything," she said as she returned Friday to her village, Kadanaro, in southern Darfur, to survey the destruction. Her family's compound had been reduced to tidy circles of smoldering gray and black ash by marauding Arab militiamen, she said.

Even as Sudan celebrates the recent end of the 20-year conflict between the country's Muslim north and the mostly Christian south, promising peace throughout this troubled country, the ethnic violence that has devastated villages in the western region of Darfur continues unchecked while the world's eyes are elsewhere.

The Program on International Policy Attitude has released a new poll showing that 3 out of 4 Americans reportedly favor UN military intervention in Darfur

As the UN Security Council on Tuesday, January 25 hears the report of a special commission of inquiry on whether genocide has occurred in Darfur, a PIPA-Knowledge Networks poll conducted December 21-27 finds that 74% of Americans say that the UN should "step in with military force and stop the genocide in Darfur." Only 17% are opposed. Ten percent did not answer.

[edit]

These attitudes represent a bipartisan consensus. A UN military intervention is supported by 83% of Republicans and 71% of Democrats (independents: 70%). Contributing US troops is supported by 62% of Republicans and 64% of Democrats (independents 58%).

Why are more Republicans willing to support a UN intervention than Democrats?

Anyway, like every other poll, this one asked people questions to which they could not possibly provide informed answers

In the same poll, respondents were posed the question of whether genocide is occurring in Darfur ... Fifty-six percent chose the position that genocide was in fact taking place, while only 24% chose the option that it was “not really genocide” but “a civil war between the government and people in a resistant region that happen to be of a different ethnic group.” Twenty percent did not take a position.

Are we really to believe that 80% of the population is informed enough to actually have a position as to whether it is genocide or merely a civil war? Nonetheless, their apparent support of UN intervention is welcome news (of course, as soon as a few US soldiers get killed in Sudan, that'll put the end of whatever nominal support there is for any US involvement or UN intervention.)