Ask Bush to Use His Jan. 28 State of the Union to Announce Peace Plan for Darfur
By karen-hirschfeld (Wednesday, Jan 16, 2008)
I want to thank everyone for all of the hard work you’ve done last semester for the Darfur Survival Campaign and tell you how excited I am to collaborate again with you this semester. Despite the very real gains we’ve made—the initial deployment of the joint African Union-United Nations force (UNAMID) and the recent passage of the Sudan Accountability and Divestment Act (SADA)—the people of Darfur are still under constant threat. UNAMID is only at a third of its promised size, attacks on civilians are ongoing and peace negotiations are nowhere on the horizon.I’d like you to join me in a very concrete, time-sensitive action: write to President Bush and tell him to use his final State of the Union Address to announce his plan for bringing about a lasting peace in Darfur. He needs to
- get tough with Sudan’s President Bashir and publicly take him to task for obstructing the deployment of the UNAMID force and
- promote inclusive peace negotiations in a neutral African country.
Tell President Bush that peace in Darfur is achievable and that fostering it could be his legacy.President Bush will deliver his final State of the Union on January 28, so the time to act is NOW. Please mobilize your campuses and have people send this letter. If people can’t get online then to send the action, have them call the White House and use these talking points (PDF). We don’t recommend postal letters because mail to the White House always gets delayed in security screening.After this time-sensitive action, we’ll launch our Justice and Accountability portion of the campaign, which aims to promote justice for victims and hold perpetrators accountable for crimes by supporting the International Criminal Court’s case. We look forward to working with you on this critical aspect of bringing peace to Darfur.
