September 30, 2007
Arabs vs Africans
It is something that every serious commentator on Darfur has said again and again. Darfur is not a clash between 'Arab' militias and black 'African' villagers. It was never as simple as that. It certainly isn't as simple as that today, after more than four years of fragmenting rebel groups, broken peace deals and shifting alliances.
So why does the black/Arab line keep coming up?
Here is Saturday's Christian Science Monitor:
The climate is brutal. The situation is tense – the country is teetering on the edge of a humanitarian disaster.For Germain Lubango Kabemba, this is just another day.
The Congolese humanitarian worker leads two other foreigners and more than 30 national staff for Médecins Sans Frontières-Holland in the market town of Kerfi, Chad, which is now home to thousands of refugees who fled nearby villages after Sudan's Darfur tragedy spread into Chad months ago.
His job is to provide basic healthcare and services to a population that has been cut off from all other international aid since the rainy season began here in July. He has also become skilled in the subtle diplomacy needed to help both the area's black tribes and Arabs whose tit-for-tat raids wrought havoc in the area and caused the current dilemma.
Rob Crilly comes up with a corrective:
Nevermind the fact that everyone in Darfur is black and African, and the term Arab is often used by tribes to signal that they are nomads and aspire to some sort of “higher” social status. If the rest of that analysis was true, it was maybe only true for a month or so in 2004. Things are very different now. “Arabs” have joined the rebels and the government has its own “black, Africans”.
Posted by aheavens at September 30, 2007 8:04 PM