Republic of Sudan: Human Rights

Lord Cope of Berkeley Excerpts

Monday 14th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cope of Berkeley (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, is remarkable for her vigour and tenacity in standing up for so many of the most oppressed people in the world. I congratulate her on it. Some years ago, it was my duty to withdraw the Conservative Whip from her. Some might take that as a hostile act, but she never seems to mind.

My interest in this debate stems from a small charity called Kids for Kids, of which I am a patron. It is a highly focused UK charity, which works only in Darfur to help people to stay in their villages rather than be forced to flee into the vast camps as refugees. Its first programmes, which still continue, were about lending goats to starving families, hence the name. I hear about Darfur in particular through this charity. It has a big enough task because Darfur is the size of Spain.

To be driven from one’s home and livelihood is to be deprived of a most basic human right. The camps do amazing work, but nobody wants to leave their homes and land in order to be dependent day by day and year by year on food handouts. Over the years, drought and sheer poverty have been powerful drivers, creating refugees as well as waves of sickening violence, particularly from militias. NGOs such as Kids for Kids can and do help to fight drought with wells; they can fight poverty and malnutrition with goats, donkeys and agricultural advice; but NGOs cannot fight violence. That has to be done with politics. The international agencies have worked to bring about agreement and find solutions, but have not succeeded and the situation keeps getting worse.

This year so far, another 250,000 Darfur people have become refugees. Some say it is more like 500,000—the figures are not clear. They are added to the 2 million to 3 million Darfuri residents already displaced and in camps as refugees, many for some years. That is out of a total population of 7.5 million in Darfur in 2008. The Abuja agreement of 2005 and the Darfur peace agreement of 2006 have not brought peace. The Doha Document for Peace in Darfur, signed in 2011, might still provide a basis for a settlement, but it simply has not worked so far or been implemented properly.

The Sudanese Government have to take primary responsibility, but the UN and other states like ourselves have, as the noble Baroness made clear, an important role to play and we must recognise that we have not yet been effective. Can the Minister tell us what progress has been made since the Security Council resolution was adopted in April? Can the UN-African Union Mission in Darfur be given new vigour and impetus to make a difference to this appalling situation?

After more than a decade of violence, the whole area seems to be getting stuck in a permanent state of violence, with millions of permanent refugees. It is getting like Palestine, which we were discussing a few minutes ago, where UNRWA does its best for millions of refugees from half a century ago but who are still refugees, where UN resolutions are flouted with impunity and where violence is seen as the only way forward.

Violence is no solution in Palestine or, for that matter, in Darfur. Agreement must be found by negotiation. The bitterness does not deteriorate over time; it festers and feeds on itself. It leads to appalling inhumanities and the crushing of all human rights. As the noble Baroness indicated, it exaggerates religious and tribal differences to lethal degrees over a short time. Peace efforts must be redoubled in Darfur and the whole of Sudan to bring about more inclusive government and more equal treatment.