Sudanese Suffer as Militias Hide in Plain Sight
Sudan's government lined up 50 prisoners at the main jail here recently and offered them as evidence to the world that it was cracking down on the militias that have stained so much of the desert sand of Darfur, the country's western region, with blood. But when the men spoke and when their court files were reviewed, it quickly became clear that many of them were not members of the militias, which have displaced a million villagers in the last year and a half and killed tens of thousands in what the United States Congress calls a genocide. Among the group were petty criminals who had already been in jail as long as four years. One man's charge was drinking wine in a country that forbids it. [more]