Chapter III - Southern Sudan

Southern Sudan has not fared well under Arab rule. Originally under Egyptian and British control, Sudan was handed over to an Arab dictator to "liberate" it from colonial rule. But coming under Arab rule was not the purest of liberations for the black Christians and animists of southern Sudan.

Independence of Sudan meant genocide, slavery, and Arabisation for the black tribes of the south. And only a few years ago did the long civil war lead to autonomy and possible independence for Sudan's Christian regions.

Between 1955 and 1971 more than a million Africans were slaughtered by the Arab regime. And two million more were lost in what the government called a "holy war" since 1983. The Bush government finally brokered a peace deal in 2005 that ended the terrible war. (And George Bush enjoys considerable fame among Christian East-Africans.)

In the words of Simon Deng, Christian and former slave from southern Sudan:

It is also fitting, if only in the most blackly comic way, that this conference coincides with the meeting of the 61st Session of the UN Commission on Human Rights, a body whose purpose is to uphold the rights and dignity of all people, and yet it has among its members some of the most inhumane regimes on earth, among them the genocidal slave jihadists of Khartoum.

I thank you for giving me this opportunity to address you, and not only or primarily on my own behalf, but far more importantly on behalf of my people, the Southern Sudanese victims of Islamization, Arabization and enslavement at the hands of the tiny Arab minority in my country. Through my presence here you have given voice to millions of voiceless victims; you have made the invisible visible; you have helped me break the silence that has surrounded the destruction of my people.

...

The scale of our losses has been enormous in the two genocides perpetrated by the Islamists - two, not one. Starting in 1955, the year before independence was granted by the British, up until 1973, 1.5 million Southern Sudanese Christians were slaughtered by the Arab/Muslim dominated government in Khartoum. From 1983 until just 3 months ago when a peace treaty was brokered by the United States, we Southern Sudanese lost 2 million more to what Khartoum calls a holy war against the infidels. Yes, I am an infidel according to their definition. I think many of you are as well. We black "infidels" in the South, Christians and other non-Muslims, refused to be ruled by Islam, and we refused to be Arabized.

Our only offense was our determination to remain faithful to our religion and to honor our African cultures. For these "crimes" The National Islamic Front regime has committed genocide against us. Not only has that genocide produced the largest body-count of murdered innocents since the Nazis and the work of Joseph Stalin's followers, but it has also produced the largest population of refugees anywhere on earth since the Second World War.

...

I was a slave. I am not ashamed to say it. When I was nine year's old, my village was raided by Arab troops in the pay of Khartoum. As we ran into the bush to escape I watched as childhood friends were shot dead and the old and the weak who were unable to run were burned alive in their huts. I was abducted and given to an Arab family as a "gift." A "gift," ladies and gentlemen. When you look at me, do you see a gift? Do I look like an object or a commodity? I am a human being, a person created in the image of God, a simple truth the jihadists did not and can not recognize.

...

When millions of African blacks were being slaughtered and hundreds of thousands of Southern Sudanese children were and are being enslaved, the world was indifferent. Perhaps worst of all - the UN turned its back.

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As a child in Southern Sudan, I witnessed my people being slaughtered with my own eyes; I witnessed young girls and women being raped. As you surely know, the rape of black women in Sudan counts for nothing because the Arab regime of Khartoum sends its soldiers in the field to rape and murder because black African infidels are not judged to be entitled to human rights as defined by the international instruments.

...

The failure of the United Nations to guarantee the basic rights of the slaves of Sudan and other black African "infidels" is shameful beyond my ability to express.

http://www.iheu.org/node/1539

The situation in the Sudan is not a joke and no talk about the importance of "Arab unity" is going to change anything. I don't even know the names of the black tribes who live there. Mr Deng is a Shiluk. I also know of the Dinka tribe or nation. And I know that most of those tribes speak Nilo-Saharan languages, like the Fur and Massalith in western Sudan. But beyond that I don't know much about their culture.

There is all this talk, especially in the US, about black culture and the importance of studying African culture and heritage, and when it comes down to it, we all don't know anything about it.

When millions of African blacks were being slaughtered and hundreds of thousands of Southern Sudanese children were and are being enslaved, the world was indifferent. Perhaps worst of all - the UN turned its back.

This is the sad reality we live in. The UN doesn't care unless the victim is an Arab and it won't be long and won't require much bad luck and the world will lose an entire family of cultures.

If you know any black Christians in the US, ask them what they intend to do for their fellow black Christians in Africa, what they will do to help them; and whether they appreciated George Bush's (successful) attempt to save them. Ask Barack Obama what he will do to help.

the UN Commission on Human Rights

And somehow we will have to teach the UN Commission on Human Rights that black people ALSO have those rights. (I assume we can forget about teaching them that even Jews have them. And the commission will likely never condemn attacks against Jewish kindergardens in Israel, but that is a minor point compared to this issue here.)