British lawmakers said yesterday that the death toll in Darfur has been underestimated and is likely to be around 300,000, calling attacks against civilians in the western region of Sudan "no less serious" than genocide.
A report by the House of Commons' International Development Committee said a WHO estimate that 70,000 people had died from indirect effects of disease and hunger in the Darfur region was "a gross underestimate." The British report, published yesterday, says the total figure is likely to be "somewhere around 300,000." The International Development Committee said the WHO figure only counted those who died in camps for displaced people between March and mid-October 2004 and did not include people who died before reaching camps, or in inaccessible areas of Darfur.
The committee's report said the crimes committed in Darfur were "no less serious and heinous than genocide." It accused the international community of a "scandalously ineffective response" to the situation in Darfur, and said governments across the world were guilty of failing to deal with the crisis.
The report said early warnings about the emerging crisis were ignored, humanitarian agencies were slow to respond and the UN suffered from an "avoidable leadership vacuum" in Sudan at a critical time.
It also criticized the UN Security Council as driven by member states' interests in oil and exporting arms.
Baldry said the world's failure to protect the people of Darfur from the atrocities committed against them was a scandal.
"Crises such as Darfur require the world to respond collectively and effectively. Passing the buck will not do," Baldry said.
Indonesia yesterday began enforcing its newly ratified penal code, replacing a Dutch-era criminal law that had governed the country for more than 80 years and marking a major shift in its legal landscape. Since proclaiming independence in 1945, the Southeast Asian country had continued to operate under a colonial framework widely criticized as outdated and misaligned with Indonesia’s social values. Efforts to revise the code stalled for decades as lawmakers debated how to balance human rights, religious norms and local traditions in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation. The 345-page Indonesian Penal Code, known as the KUHP, was passed in 2022. It
US President Donald Trump on Friday said Washington was “locked and loaded” to respond if Iran killed protesters, prompting Tehran to warn that intervention would destabilize the region. Protesters and security forces on Thursday clashed in several Iranian cities, with six people reported killed, the first deaths since the unrest escalated. Shopkeepers in Tehran on Sunday last week went on strike over high prices and economic stagnation, actions that have since spread into a protest movement that has swept into other parts of the country. If Iran “violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of America will come to
‘DISRESPECTFUL’: Katie Miller, the wife of Trump’s most influential adviser, drew ire by posting an image of Greenland in the colors of the US flag, captioning it ‘SOON’ US President Donald Trump on Sunday doubled down on his claim that Greenland should become part of the US, despite calls by the Danish prime minister to stop “threatening” the territory. Washington’s military intervention in Venezuela has reignited fears for Greenland, which Trump has repeatedly said he wants to annex, given its strategic location in the arctic. While aboard Air Force One en route to Washington, Trump reiterated the goal. “We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security, and Denmark is not going to be able to do it,” he said in response to a reporter’s question. “We’ll worry about Greenland in
Auschwitz survivor Eva Schloss, the stepsister of teenage diarist Anne Frank and a tireless educator about the horrors of the Holocaust, has died. She was 96. The Anne Frank Trust UK, of which Schloss was honorary president, said she died on Saturday in London, where she lived. Britain’s King Charles III said he was “privileged and proud” to have known Schloss, who cofounded the charitable trust to help young people challenge prejudice. “The horrors that she endured as a young woman are impossible to comprehend and yet she devoted the rest of her life to overcoming hatred and prejudice, promoting kindness, courage, understanding
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