The Darfur conflict is the first mass genocide in the 21 century. Starting in 2003, a government funded group of Arabs known as the Janjaweed which translates to devils on horseback, started going through the Darfuring villages and burning, stealing, raping, and murdering the native villagers. This is still going on today and 480,000 people have been killed so far.
Darfur is a region in Sudan that has about 7 million people. The larger part of the population in Darfur is non-Arab and the Sudan Liberation Movement and the Justice and Equality Movement started attacking against the Sudanese government for oppressing the non-Arab population in Sudan. After they started attacking the government, the Janjaweed came in a started fighting back. In 2005, the Sudanese government, Justice and Equality Movement, Abdel Wahid Mohamed al-Nur’s faction of the Sudan Liberation Movement and the Minni Minawi sat down together and wrote up a peace treaty but it was denied but a smaller group of the Justice and Equality Movement. In 2008, the UN stepped in and partnered with African-Nations to try and stop the genocide. They had to send in 9,000 troops into Darfur to try and push out the Janjaweed but they were overpowered and didn’t really try anything else after that. In 2009, an arrest warrant was put out on President Omar al-Bashir for crimes against humanity and for genocide but they were stopped by increasing protests and extreme violence around the matter so they had to back down. In July 2011, the Doha document for peace in Darfur was signed by all those involved basically saying that they are working toward resolving the issues in Darfur but sense than nothing has changed. |