Subcommittee on International Human Rights

Opening remarks

Thank you, Mr. Chair and esteemed members of the committee, for inviting me to speak about the situation in Sudan. I'm honoured to be here today in my capacity as a director with the Macdonald-Laurier Institute and as an adviser to both Doctors Against Racism and Antisemitism and Secure Canada. Right now, as we gather here today, men, women and children throughout Sudan are wondering if they'll make it, if they can do it again, if they can survive another night, night 933 of what should be described as a genocide, Sudan's second in 20 years. Indeed, while there are numerous conflict zones around the world that warrant attention and action right now, the situation in Sudan is the world's biggest humanitarian crisis, a civil war that has forced 12 million people from their homes, has led to widespread famine and suffering and has killed as many as 400,000 people by some estimates. Scenes circulating online show women shielding their children while they're taunted before being killed, mothers hanging from trees with their infants, child soldiers murdering adults, and streets and fields filled with dozens of murdered people while their killers gleefully celebrate on camera.…

Opening remarks

Thank you very much. It is a great honour to be here. I came from Montreal. I want to thank the chair. It's a real privilege. I want to thank all of you who have shown concern for Sudan. Today I'm speaking to you in my capacity not only as someone of Sudanese origin but also, most importantly, as an academic and researcher who has spent over 30 years researching, writing and teaching about the war in Sudan and the many wars in the country, and in Africa more generally. I have worked in policy as a researcher at the Brookings Institution and at the Woodrow Wilson school for scholars. I was also a homeland security fellow at Stanford University. I'm giving you this résumé because I'm going to speak a little bit about the academic part of the war but also policy recommendations. First, I want to briefly explain why the war matters to Canada and the world. Second, I want to emphasize the depth of the humanitarian crisis, because I know that some of my colleagues from Sudan were not able to be here. Third and finally, if I can do it quickly enough, I want to point to the nature of the war before outlining some policy recommendations that I believe would gain and generate…

Opening remarks

Thank you, Mr. Chair. In 2009, I was part of the United Nations mission to Darfur, which gave us access to the leadership of the various sects that were involved in that conflict. The aim was to assess their willingness and capacity to engage in negotiations. We had access to a perspective that was broader and structural. Since then, I've worked with four academics from Sudan to examine the role of transitional justice in the Darfur conflict. There are strong links, as Professor Medani mentioned, between the earlier conflict and the current one. The overall objective is the same. Territorial control previously was about control of grazing rights. Currently, it's about economic control, including gold and economic corridors. They're going about that control in the same way—large-scale ethnic cleansing. We know what that looks like. Our colleagues have described how horrific that is. The overall point about the earlier conflict and the current one is that there is a large constituency behind the current conflict, as there was earlier on, meaning a population that supports and drives and gains from the military advances of the RSF in Darfur. That means that trying to resolve the…