Author name: Gregor

On the brink of a new war between South Sudan and Sudan, please consider:

Nowhere on the planet is the humanitarian crisis worse than on the border between what is left of old Sudan and the new South Sudan. Nowhere on Earth is the ruling dictatorial regime accused of more crimes against humanity, including genocide – and nowhere have the indigenous people that are being exterminated preserved a more harmonious, more primeval and symbiotically with nature living culture than in the area between the largest sand desert, the Sahara, and the largest swamp regions in the world. Nowhere do the global powers engage in a more concealed fight for control of natural resources over the backs of cheaper slaves. Nowhere have the mainstream media along with independent reporters, including UN agencies and humanitarian NGOs, more betrayed their mission. Nowhere does humanity shut its eyes to the truth stronger than in the Sudanese provinces with mainly African populations that after the declaration of independence of South Sudan on July 9th last year remained north of the non-agreed border, in what remains of Old Sudan. Nowhere does the international community forfeit more than on the sacrificial altar of 2012 in Blue Nile, the Nuba Mountains, Abyei and Darfur.

These facts and my 20 visits to the area since 1979 are the reason that, together with friends and supporters in Sudan, Europe and America, I initiated the action of connecting victims to perpetrators of violence, using the cheapest video cameras available and satellite modems to transfer recordings to the Web.

Please see our 95 min documentary film on Eyes and Ears of God – Video Surveillence of Sudan on www.YouTube/user/TomoKriznar

Since we finished film two months ago we succide to atract some attention to Nuba Mountains – but not at all to the province of Blue Nile. Please, please – can you help?

BLUE NILE

On December 3 last year, in the air – flying back to Europe, I wrotte: Most of the population of southern Blue Nile province have left their villages since war started there in September 2010. Victims are now scattered in the bush near their homes and fields, or accross the border in Upper Nile in South Sudan. There are no refugee camps for them, except in Ethiopia. Mainly women, children and the elderly constantly fear bombardmens, during the day and especially by night , from Russian-sold Antonov planes.

Sudan was once the largest and most prosperous African state. After oil was discovered in 1979, the country erupted in Africa’s longest and most cruel civil war, between 1983 and 2005, with two million dead and five million displaced. The war ended with a peace agreement in 2005 that entitled the South to hold a referendum in 2011 on whether to stay within Sudan or separate. However, the rebel enclaves of Nuba mountains and Blue Nile just across the old colonial border in the Arab-dominated North were not given this opportunity.

In December 2010, the Sudanese president Omar Hassan al Bashir announced that in case of separation of South Sudan, there will be »no tolerance of any ethnic and religious differences« and that arabisation and sharia law will be imposed. The international community already saw the fullfilment of these promises in the Nuba Mountains in June last year, and before that also in Abeyi in May. Although informed members of the international community expected a new war in all border areas, UN agencies and even most NGOs have no presence in Blue Nile or in neighboring countries ( except in Ethiopia) to help the most unfortunate people on Earth.

In November, I filmed proofs on the ground that the rare media reports about bombardments in Blue Nile and accros the border in neighbouring Upper Nile are all true, and not lies, as claimed by the Government of Sudan. Because of these bombardments, which go on day and night, people are too scared to plant for the next harvest, and there is growing danger of approaching hunger. The UN has not yet come even to investigate, but if they will hurry, they will still find peaces of bones of eleven people killed when a bomb hit the market in the vilage of Bela Tom on November 7th. This bombardment was the same sort of war crime as the ones in Kurchi, Nuba Mountains in June, but this time we activists did not succeed in making it front page news, because the events were not recorded. There was no one there to photograph, no cameras and satellite Internet conections, and no local volunteers to document and send proofs to the international community. This is what we aim to change with the newly established Slovenian humanitarian organisation H.O.P.E. which supplied cameras, laptops and satellite Internet modems, and trained 20 volunteers to do the work of absent international journalists and document further atrocities. Their photographs and videos can help this worst humanitarian crisis enter the awareness of sensitive people around the world.

Respected champions of human rights everywhere on Earth – this is my call to you. Nowhere on the planet are indigenious people more terrorised and sistematicaly exterminated from their ancient lands as in Blue Nile. The enemies of Ingassana, Udjuk, Komoganza, Bertie and many other islamised tribes still maintain the traditional slave hunter culture, accused of major crimes againsts humanity, including genocide. And yet there are no media, no NGOs or activists there with the new refugees that flow daily, completely let down by the whole international community (prof. Eric Reeves is a great exception ). Even in the greatest concentration of refugees, in Dor, near Bunch in South Sudan, where access is quite easy, the people have nothing else than trees under which they camp with their families, kids, elders. No UNHCR plastic sheets, no tents, no blankets, very litle food and only 3 water pumps, with 3 -4 hours waiting time! Yes, UNHCR is registering refugees, a big white World Food Program tent is there in Dor, but frustrated officials told me they have grains for only 3.000 people, and there are already more than 40.000. Yes, Médecins Sans Frontières is in Dor, working with patients in an empty UNHCR tent, and Samaritan Purse is starting to suport the local hospital, but dr. Atar had to operate there last week with no operating table, using only small overhead lights.

Of course, a no-fly zone must be imposed to protect civilians from bombardment. But political institutions are impotent and clinically dead, and the UN will take much too long to respond, leaving only NGOs to act and justify the reason for their existence. Please join us, or do whatever you can to help us, but please do not forget the people of Blue Nile, South Kordofan, Abyei and Darfur. Here, the whole of humanity is put on test: will interest in cheap oil from South Sudan, with its logic of fantastic profits and comfort for the few, prevail over compassion for the most innocent people on Earth?

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I wrote the above report in December last year, and nothing has since changed for the better in Blue Nile and the refugee camps across the border in South Sudan. No no-fly zone has been established, and no humanitarian corridor into Blue Nile has been negotiated by the UN. There is still no open political action by the UN or other international community bodies. No NGO has entered the region to help, and no reporters have visited Blue Nile. Refugees are still on the run from the Government of Sudan, Russian Antonovs and Chinese Migs. No starlight has penetrated »the hearth of darkness«, as it did when Nicholas Christof, John Pendergast and George Clooney visited the Nuba Mountains.

The documentary »Eyes and Ears of God – Video Surveillence of Sudan« by Maja Weiss and Tomo Križnar was released in January, and had a world premiere at the Cinema for Peace, Berlin film festival, in February. It is now being shown in cinemas, and can be seen on YouTube. The response to the film has been positive, with people reacting and contributing small donations. We, the civil initiative in the Fondation of Tomo Križnar and the humanitarian organisation HOPE will be able to deliver more cameras, computers and satellite modems into Blue Nile, Nuba Mountains, Abyei and Darfur.

I am now calling on you – still sensitive human beings – to click on my YouTube channel www.YouTube/user/TomoKriznar and see the full-length documentary or the short trailers for »Eyes and Ears of God – Video Surveillence of Sudan«. Then, please give me some coments about what you could do to stop this suffering of the most innocent indigenous people on Earth.

Thank you in advance. Tomo Križnar, Ljubljana, April 15 2012