WASHINGTON - July 19 - In the aftermath of the pledging conference on Darfur, held yesterday in Brussels, Africa Action today released the following short statement and an updated version of its "Talking Points on How to Stop Genocide in Darfur, Sudan" (below).

"As the situation in Darfur worsens by the day, this week's pledging conference in Brussels revealed a broad international consensus on the need for a United Nations (UN) peacekeeping force to protect civilians and humanitarian operations on the ground. But the international community's failure to overcome Khartoum's objections to such a UN force, and to take new action to initiate such a force, leaves the Sudanese government to dictate the pace and the extent of the response to this crisis. The most immediate priority for the people of Darfur is protection, and yet world powers are failing to offer this protection or to articulate a plan to achieve this on an urgent basis.

"The additional pledges of money in Brussels to support the African Union (AU) operation in Darfur amount to only a portion of what the AU needs to sustain even its current mission, which is clearly inadequate to the protection needs on the ground. A UN peacekeeping force is needed to reinforce the AU operation and to stop the violence and protect civilians and humanitarian efforts in Darfur.

"Africa Action calls on the U.S. and other powers to move beyond pledges and stop-gap measures and to do everything necessary to overcome the Sudanese government's objections, and authorize and deploy a UN force for Darfur immediately."

The organization's new escalation strategy in its Campaign to Stop Genocide in Darfur is available at: http://www.africaaction.org/campaign_new/docs/PumpingUpthePowertoProtect.pdf---

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Africa Action Talking Points on How to Stop Genocide in Darfur, Sudan
Last Updated July 2006

Nothing short of international intervention will stop the genocide in Darfur. Africa Action believes that the U.S. must do everything necessary to secure a United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution authorizing a multinational intervention force, under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, to stop the genocide and protect civilians and humanitarian efforts in Darfur.

1. What is Genocide?

The international legal definition of the crime of genocide is found in Articles II and III of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide. Article II describes the two elements that constitute the crime of genocide:

(i) The mental element, meaning the "intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such", and

(ii) The physical element, which includes five types of violence described in sections [a] though [e] as follows: [a] Killing members of the group; [b] Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; [c] Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; [d] Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [e] Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

2. What is happening in Darfur is Genocide

(i) Genocidal Intent: The intent of the Sudanese government to destroy, in whole or in part, three African ethnic communities (the Fur, Zaghawa and Massaleit), is clear from at least four categories of evidence: [a] Documentary evidence; [b] Legal inference based upon the systematic perpetration of culpable acts directed against specific targeted groups; [c] Testimony of witnesses who are survivors of the genocide; and [d] Government efforts to eliminate all traces of mass graves.

[a] Documentary evidence: Sudanese Government documents obtained and released by Human Rights Watch make clear government intent through its actions of arming, equipping and transporting Arab militias to destroy, in part, targeted groups. In violation of UN Security Council Resolutions, the government has withheld other documents requested by the UN, such as flight logs for aircraft (planes and helicopter gunships) used by the government in Darfur, as well as the minutes of meetings of government security officials on Darfur. Such documents would likely provide further documentary evidence of genocidal intent. According to The New York Times on February 23, 2005, African Union observers have also uncovered a document that indicates a policy of genocide on the part of the government.

[b] International legal precedent (from the International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia) holds that genocidal intent can be inferred from the context of the perpetration of culpable acts when they are systematically directed against a group. For more than three years, the government of Sudan has established a pattern of atrocities including mass killings, mass rapes, bombings, burning and pillaging villages, and destruction of water wells and crops, systematically directed against the targeted groups.

[c] The testimony of survivors of genocide in Darfur consistently reports that the perpetrators of the atrocities frequently and clearly stated their intent to destroy these groups as part of a broader government-inspired effort. Attackers' statements, such as "we will kill all the black," are documented in an International Criminal Court report from June 2006.

[d] According to witnesses and documentary evidence, the government of Sudan has sought to erase all trace of large mass graves of executed civilians in Darfur. It has prevented researchers from obtaining forensic evidence from such sites.

(ii) Genocidal Actions: In Darfur during the past three years, the physical acts of violence that have been systematically directed against the targeted groups have included all five categories of violence listed in the Genocide Convention. These acts have resulted in the deaths of more than 450,000 people*:

The following letters correspond to the five categories of genocidal violence listed under the legal definition of genocide at the beginning of this document:

[a] more than 200,000 people have been killed by government forces and militias from 2003 to the present time, and the killing continues;

[b] bodily and mental harm has been inflicted upon thousands of women and young girls raped by soldiers and militias.

[c] at least an additional 200,000 lives have been lost through the deliberate destruction of homes, crops and water resources and the physical displacement of more than two million people which have resulted in conditions of famine and disease epidemics;

[d] the killing of pregnant women; and

[e] the use of rape as a weapon of genocide as many perpetrators have stated that their intent is to change the ethnic identity of the child conceived by rape.

3. The Humanitarian Crisis