Clooney, a Darfur activist who has visited the region several times, said the pending International Criminal Court decision on whether to issue a warrant for President Omar al-Bashir presents an opportunity to engage the ruler in negotiations to help end the crisis.

The Hague, Netherlands-based court is expected to issue a decision soon. But Sudan says it does not recognize the court or its decisions.

The Darfur conflict began in 2003 with an uprising by rebel fighters complaining of discrimination and neglect by the country’s Arab-led government. In its subsequent crackdown, the government is accused of unleashing militia fighters responsible for atrocities. Up to 300,000 people have died and 2.7 million have been forced from their homes, according to the U.N.

Clooney expressed concern that a possible arrest of the president might push al-Bashir’s government to retaliate in Darfur. That would threaten the lives of Darfur’s displaced and could drive out the international peacekeeping force, Clooney said Friday in a telephone interview from neighboring Chad, where he was visiting camps of Darfur refugees.

Clooney said the court’s involvement was a vindication to the international community, activists and celebrities like himself who have been working to draw attention to the suffering in Darfur. But even with a court decision to arrest al-Bashir, he said, discussions would still be needed to find a lasting solution.

“Everybody who has talked to al-Bashir said he had said one thing and done another,” he said. “Now he’ll listen. An indictment comes in, I am not sure what the next steps are. … It’s going to be very complicated.”

Clooney has been championing the case for Darfur since 2006. A year later, he co-founded a group called Not On Our Watch with actors such as Brad Pitt, Don Cheadle and Matt Damon. The group has raised some $8 million for the cause and Clooney said his visits help bring the cameras that follow him to Darfur.

A conflict as complicated as the one in Darfur, he said, requires the world to work together to resolve it, including cooperation between the United States and China — an influential economic partner of al-Bashir’s government.

“The number one thing we can do … would be sitting down at the highest level of the Chinese government as possible … to enlist them and ask … them to take the lead on this issue … and start to focus on human rights,” Clooney said.

Clooney left Chad on Saturday for Washington, where he said he will meet with Vice President Joe Biden and possibly President Barack Obama. He said he will lobby for a full-time U.S. envoy to Sudan to “work day and night” on resolving the crisis.

Clooney said he would also urge Washington to join the International Criminal Court, something it has resisted because of concern the court could be used against U.S. troops or leaders.

“It’s going to be … very difficult for us to … empower this international court if they charge al-Bashir,” he said. “It will be very hard for us to jump up and down and say, ‘This is a great moment, this is what the world has been waiting for,’ and not be a signatory to the court.”
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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The war in Congo alone has led to more deaths than any war, anywhere, since the Holocaust. Five million people have died there in the last decade. The wars in Sudan over the last two decades — both in the south and in Darfur — have cost the lives of more than 2.5 million people. The number of those driven from their homes is in the millions. Two of Africa’s richest countries in natural resources have reduced most of their citizens to abject poverty.

Unlike Afghanistan and Iraq, Sudan and Congo garner only occasional attention and sporadic diplomatic action. When the bodies start to pile up, diplomats from around the world descend upon Khartoum and Kinshasa. But this type of emergency diplomacy has left the root causes of conflict unaddressed and has allowed them to fester.

In both wars, government soldiers, militias and rebels ruthlessly deploy rape as a weapon of war. We have met with Congolese women who have been gang-raped, had their lips cut off to prevent them from speaking, and who were then set on fire. Sudanese women tell similar stories.

Rahm Emanuel, the newly minted White House chief of staff, recently reminded us that in the midst of crisis, there is great opportunity. For Congo and Sudan, we see three big reasons for hope.

The first is China. Because of China’s nearly $9 billion investment in the oil sector in Sudan, and recent $5 billion deal for Congolese minerals, China increasingly has a vested interest in peace and stability in these two countries. President Obama could send a powerful message and take a meaningful step by sending a high-level envoy to Beijing, early in his first 100 days, to explore ways to work together to help bring peace to these African countries. With all that divides the U.S. and China, these are issues we can and should unite on.

The second reason for hope is the president-elect himself. Mr. Obama has offered the world a renewed American commitment to global citizenship. In both Congo and Sudan, as is the case in countries around the world, there is an extraordinary eagerness to see this global phenomenon engage positively in their crises. However intangible, the president-elect’s ability to inspire and lead is as real as any other point of leverage. He can make the case for peace to those controlling the flow of money and munitions into Congo and Sudan. And he can raise the cost of continuing the status quo through multilateral measures to economically and politically isolate the spoilers.

The third reason for hope may be the most potent of all. The American public, especially our younger generation, is increasingly interested in what happens outside of our borders, and particularly in Africa. While we have each participated in our own way in building an advocacy movement around Darfur, it has been the high-school and college students who have made Darfur a political issue too important to be ignored, and who are now preparing similar campaigns for Congo. It is these same young Americans who voted in large numbers for the new president. They are now ready to be led by a President Obama to build a safer world and a safer Africa.

Investing in the resolution of the conflicts in Congo and Sudan will be much cheaper than continuing to spend billions of dollars a year on humanitarian aid and observer forces. These band-aids are expensive substitutes for the real solutions that come from rolling up our sleeves and building an international coalition committed to addressing the root causes of conflict in a serious and sustained manner. President-elect Obama has a chance to help build an international coalition to end the two biggest wars in the world. He should seize it.

Source: Wall Street Journal

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