Crisis in Darfur: an update by the Holocaust museum’s mapping initiative

Since 2007 the Holocaust Museum has been mapping the crisis with Michael Graham as the initiative’s coordinator. The mapping works by leveraging Google Earth’s large user base. The team has mapped and followed the crisis by creating layers of data on top of Google Earth and showing the location of destroyed villages, damaged villages and refugee camps that have been created as a result. In some instances the is photo evidence of the villages “before and after” the attack. These photos become powerful evidence of what has been happening in Sudan since 2003 and the maps show the actual locations of villages that were, in some cases, wiped out by the attacks.

There are also testimonies compiled by Graham’s team from survivors by Amnesty International and also mapped to the location of the villages. These testimonies tell of how Janjawid have overran villages, used rape as a weapon of war and killed men, women and children in merciless ways.  Here is a sample:

“I was living with my family in Tawila and going to school when one day the Janjawid entered the town and attacked the school. We tried to leave the school but we heard noises of bombing in the town and started running in all directions. All the girls were scared. The Janjawid entered the school and caught some girls and raped them in the class rooms. I was raped by four men inside the school. When they left they told us they would take care of all of us black people and clean Darfur for good.”
–one of the survivors of the Tawila attack

The amount of evil perpetrated there is a shocking reminder of the world we live in and a wake up call to non-stop intercession for the refugees of this conflict.  Let’s pray that God may open up the doors for more aid organizations to enter and work freely with refugees and that with his power the amount of evil there may subside. Let’s also give to those who are already working on-site and publicly decrying this genocide.

Please click here to go to the Holocaust Museum’s site and hear the entire audio update or read the transcript.  Next week, I will post a map of the crisis. If you want to know more, the link to the Amnesty International Report is below. Please visit SaveDarfur.org to contribute your time, your voice and your financial resources. Let’s persevere in prayer and in deed for Darfur!

Spanish speakers can see my previous post on Sudan here.

[Holocaust Memorial Museum] [Amnesty International: Darfur Report] [Save Darfur]

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