Mozlink Editorial: July 23rd. 2007: In recent years, the awful ongoing situations that have been allowed to develop in many parts of the world but especially the protracted problems of Palestine, Zimbabwe and Sudan have left me thinking many times, of the brutal suffering that the ordinary citizens of these countries have had to endure.Darfur in recent years is the latest part of Sudan to experience the wrath of the Arab Islamic government in Kartoum. Hardly had the conflict with the Sudanese Christians in the South been resolved, when African Muslims of Darfur agitated for greater power and benefits for their region and thus began the latest conflict (2002), that Colin Powell called a genocide in 2004. A small African peace keeping force has been in Darfur during the past year but has been able to do little to curb the excesses of both sides. Negotiations are under way to form a joint African UN force that hopefully will be more effective, but past Kartoum government intransigence could well destroy another genuine effort to come to the assistance of the suffering.
In Zimbabwe, we are again confronted with unbelievable suffering. Having no food, not being able to feed your family, no work, no rights, the list goes on and on, not to mention the scourge of HIV/AIDS that is slowly eating away at the healthiest of the nation. The former garden of Africa has slowly disintegrated into chaos, all because of the lust for power of one man, Robert Mugabe. Mr. Mugabe was the rebel leader in the fight for independence (1980) against Ian Smith's colonial government. Mugabe showed his ruthlessness in the first years of independence, when he is accused of organising a genocide against the Ndebele people in order to guarantee the supremacy of his own Shona people. In recent weeks as the world looks helplessly on, we hear of shortages, torture, persecution and mass emigration to Sth. Africa, as the country approaches economic collapse.
Palestine is rarely out of the news, the latest is the situation in Gaza where the radical Hammas islamic party has taken control from Fatah, with civil war threatening. Palestinian in conflict with Palestinian may suit the present foreign policy of Israel and the US. But let us not forget that with the establishment of the Israeli state in 1948, thousands upon thousands of Palestinians were removed from their homes and lands, dispossessed to live in refugee camps. This is the root of the problem that has been insurmountable until now. Did we not also use the word "insurmountable" in reference to Northern Ireland just a few short years ago?
How long more do we citizens of the world have to be abused and degraded with news of these conflicts? We have been abused so much, that it often no longer registers that human beings like you and me, my brothers and sisters, are fighting for life each day, on the edge of extinction just to live and survive, enduring rape, pillaging, assault etc. "For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.' (Matt:25:35,36) What has to be done to bring the conscience of the world to address these outstanding human problems? Surely in an age of instant communication, with journeys being planned to Mars and beyond, we can take the time, give the money and whatever it takes, to at least resolve these conflicts that bring shame on the word "human". Are we not "civilized" enough to come up with new international structures that lead us beyond narrow interpretations of nationalism, sovereignty and independence, to structures that do not allow us to stand idly by and become immune to the inhumanity inflicted on so many?
This abuse can no longer be tolerated.
Mozlink
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