BLOG

President Obama has named retired Air Force General Scott Gration to be his envoy to Sudan. Amid the furor created by the International Criminal Court's issuance of an arrest warrant for President Omar al Bashir and the subsequent Sudanese government expulsion of Non-Governmental Organizations that provide support to the two and one half million internally displaced persons in Darfur, this is welcome news. 

General Gration will provide a single focal point for the numerous foreign policy initiatives endangered in this latest round of disputes between the U.S. and Sudan, including maintaining Sudanese cooperation with U.S. intelligence in the fight against international terrorism, the full implementation of the U.S. brokered Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that ended the long civil war between North and South Sudan, and resolving the deadly war in Darfur. We suspect that like his predecessors, he will have a difficult job balancing these disparate interests.

The announcement was made at the White House this afternoon. But far away from the rarified air of the White House, far even from General Gordon's Palace in Khartoum where President Bashir holds forth, are the camps for the displaced of Darfur. The United Nations refugee agency and partner NGOs provide support and shelter to 2.5 million people in Darfur. This is a staggering number. It is roughly equal to the population of Nevada. 

Some of the camps in Darfur have populations approaching 100,000. These are cities that need services: food, water, medicine, schools, even trash collection. The people need the humanitarian shelter and support provided by the NGOs President Bashir has expelled.  They cannot simply go home; in many cases there are no homes to go to, their villages were destroyed and their lands taken.

With these orders, President Bashir has recklessly endangered the lives of the Sudanese - citizens of the country he governs, whom he has a responsibility to protect - who rely on the shelter and humanitarian aid provided in the camps. Secretary Clinton has called on President Bashir to rescind the expulsion orders, or at least to replace the NGOs with sufficient personnel and resources to address the humanitarian crisis. 

But it is unlikely that Sudan has that capacity to put forward. Despite a rapidly modernizing capital city, the rest of Sudan remains desperately poor and grossly underdeveloped. Keep in mind that Darfur is bigger than Iraq. In West Darfur there are no paved roads. The hospital in El Geneina got its first autoclave in 2004. The logistics mechanisms required to keep the displaced people sheltered and fed simply aren't available in Sudan minus the UN and the international NGOs.

Enter General Gration. He supported President Obama in the campaign, even accompanying then candidate Obama on a trip to Africa. He served as one of the President's advisors on military affairs. It is safe to assume he is close to the President and can get a direct line when necessary; this is key.  Raised as the child of missionaries in Africa, he should have a clear understanding of the difficult lives the desperately poor lead. As a retired senior military officer he should clearly understand the difficulties of balancing the often conflicting U.S. foreign policy objectives in Sudan. We welcome this appointment and wish the new envoy godspeed. We hope his, and the President's, immediate priority will be to ensure the security and survival of the Sudanese living in the camps in Darfur.  They deserve no less than our best and strongest efforts.