VidaKashizadeh

It is great that some celebrities have understood the much broader role they can play in today’s world and lead the direction of the public gaze from their own beautiful faces to the more ignored ugly features dominating this world.

If there was ever any potentially meaningful purpose to the desperate 20^th century phenomenon of celebrity at all, then this must be it.

It is important that the UN, being the only legitimate authority to act globally, grows muscles at last -on its otherwise skeletal structure - and acts timely and in an effective manner.

However learning more about the real causes leading to the present situation in Sudan will make a greater difference in the way this conflict could be resolved.

In his article on Open Democracy website Gérard Prunier points out the important aspects that dominate the Sudanese society. These social issues obviously will need to be taken into consideration when dealing with the Sudanese government.

This is a time that UN authorities could also take on a new role, as well as their traditional role of ensuring presence in Darfur.

This could mean for instance acting also as a mediator between the various conflicting forces in Sudan, of which none have been dominant enough in building a stronger government.
The role of a mediator could prove particularly important, as building democracy in general is a process needing time and the common will. And accordingly there is also a lack of experience amongst the Sudanese in building coalitions.

The Sudanese government being aware of its weakness is trying to create an artificial unity inside the country against the outside forces, which in this case happens to be UN. If this outside forces were to be USA or/and UK the Sudan’s government reaction would have looked globally justified. But UN ?

This particular irrationality in response however should not really surprise us, as it is the main characteristic of fascistic minds.

Darfur being geographically as large as France, the Sudanese response to the UN intentions also proves to be more the response of an occupying regime interested in confiscating a land without its people (the Hitlerian Raum) than of a government keen in stopping genocide within its own territory.

This alone should allow the consideration, that an independent referendum in Darfur may eventually be needed, so that the people can decide whether they want to be governed by an uninterested – if not hostile - government in Khartoum after all.

Meanwhile it is up to the other Sudanese to prove that they deserve to have Darfur as part of their country, by treating its people equally as citizens of Sudan. If they cannot commit themselves to do so, then they will need to go through a process of divorce even if it proves painful.

All countries’ borders have changed throughout the history, but it is the value of human lives, dignity and the individual rights that must be respected universally. And if this did not apply for all in the past, then certainly it must from this century on.