Genocide Intervention Network's notes
Today, December 1st, is the first day of Genocide Intervention Network’s week-long National Canvass to Prevent Genocide. This week, people across the country will be talking to their neighbors, organizing community events, and doing everything they can to raise the public awareness and support needed to build the movement to prevent genocide.
Pledges can be signed online at http://www.ipledge2protect
Starting today, Genocide Intervention Network has a new home. We have bid a fond goodbye to our former landlords at the Center for American Progress and have now taken up residence a few blocks away. Our new address is:
Genocide Intervention Network
1200 18th St NW, Suite 320
Washington, DC 20036
We also have a new phone phone and fax number. To reach us, please call 202.559.7405 or fax 202.559.7410.
Thanks to CAP for hosting us the past few years. We look forward to many more exciting years of anti-genocide activism at our new home.
Over the weekend, more than 1,000 anti-genocide activists were in attendance at the 2009 Pledge2Protect Conference at the Washington Hyatt. This morning, over 800 of these committed activists, including members of STAND and Carl Wilkens Fellows are at the Capitol to urge members of Congress to support the recommendations made in the Genocide Prevention Taskforce report.
The United Nations peacekeeping mission in the DR Congo, MONUC, announced on Monday that it will be suspending its logistical and operational support to the government forces implicated in the killing of 62 civilians earlier this year.
Today, The New Republic published an editorial calling for the resignation of President Obama's Special Envoy to Sudan, Major General Scott Gration. The editorial contends that the Special Envoy has an overly-optimistic or utopian approach to conflict resolution that may embolden the Sudanese government to continue its campaign of rape, displacement, and murder in Darfur or worse, expand its campaign back into South Sudan.
Over at the Enough Project, 2009 Carl Wilkens Fellow Sheila Davis has an excellent piece relating to her work with a Sudanese refugee named Hope. Davis recounts the harrowing glimpses into the violence Hope has experienced escaping to Chad and later the United States. As a Carl Wilkens Fellow, Davis has sought to bring an awareness for human rights the nursing community to inform its work with refugees like Hope as well as other patients. You can read the full piece here.
When the Obama administration last week released its policy for the coming years for Sudan, the blogosphere was lit up with opinions on whether the policy represented an important step forward in ending the genocide in Darfur or could compromise progress. GI-NET had included some responses in a previous blog entry. Here are some additional responses:
It has been a day since the White House released its policy for engagement and peace in Sudan and responses are beginning to come in from the activist community as well as the blogosphere.
This morning the White House released its long-awaited Sudan policy to a cautiously positive reception from the major anti-genocide organizations. Genocide Intervention Network's own Executive Director Sam Bell recorded this message earlier today with a response to the policy itself as well as a call to action for activists. Please view the video and share it via Twitter, Facebook, and other social networking sites using the following shortcut link: http://bit.ly/DtfX6
This morning, President Obama and his foreign policy team finally released their revised policy guidelines for Sudan at the State Department. After months of waiting, GI-NET and our partner organizations welcome the release of the Sudan strategy.