Deaths In Congo Low On Priority List For Presidential Candidates

There are many reasons that people look inward as a nation.  We got our ass kicked in Iraq, and face a recession at home.  Yes, there are tight times to come and naturally many will become more skeptical of any more international ‘meddling’.  But we must not limit our duty and potential as a player on the world stage to do good and great things.  Acting with timidity in our foreign policy as a result of the consequences of what President Bush has done to our nation would be wrong.  If we allow that to happen then he has indeed played a very destructive role in our history. 

The idea of making our foreign policy more reflective of human needs around the globe was one that I spoke of a great deal during the 2004 American presidential election.  At that time I used Darfur as the international focal point where the Democratic nominee could have demonstrated how U.S. policy could not only impact a region, but change world views and perceptions about America’s past failures on the world stage. 

I had hoped that John Kerry, the Democratic nominee, would have used Darfur to showcase how American foreign policy could intervene for good, as opposed to the dreadful war President Bush had started in Iraq.  As we now enter the 2008 election both Darfur and the Iraq War are continuing.  Clearly the current administration in Washington is unable or unwilling to stop the carnage in either region.  But even more outrageous is the lack of forethought and initiative from any of the presidential contenders this year to talk about the plight that grips large areas of Africa. 

Darfur is still a miserable place with death and carnage a daily way of life.  We had the chance to demonstrate with forceful resolve that the President of Sudan needed to act in accordance with international demands.  Instead the Sudanese leader, al-Bashir is no more concerned with the desires of ending the reasons for the bloodshed now then he was four years ago.  He has tinkered on the edges of policy, and given some lip service for an end to the bloodshed and rapes, but the larger themes for a workable policy go unmet.

The horror in Congo is yet another example of the complete failure by the largest superpower in the world to effect changes.  It is as if we no longer harbor any noble ideas about what role America should play on the world stage.   The effects of the war that gripped Congo are ones that will require even more money and brainpower from the world to insure stability.  But the topic is not on the agenda for the presidential candidates who have spent hundreds of millions of dollars for only a small number of delegates to date.  Should we be angry or sad?   What does it take to become a topic in an election year?

The news this week from Congo that the candidates avoided was only the latest such presentation of a very long and deadly tale.  The New York Times wrote it, in part, this way.

…45,000 people continue to die every month, about the same pace as in 2004, when the international push to rebuild the country had scarcely begun. Almost all the deaths come from hunger and disease, signs that the country is still grappling with the aftermath of a war that gutted its infrastructure, forced millions to flee and flattened its economy.

In all, more than 5.4 million people have died in Congo since the war began in 1998, according to the most recent survey’s estimate, the latest in a series completed by the International Rescue Committee, an American aid organization. Nearly half of the dead were children younger than 5 years old.

“The Congo is still enduring a crisis of huge proportions,” Dr. Brennan said. “Protracted elevations of mortality more than four years after the end of the war demonstrates that recovery from this kind of crisis is itself a protracted process. The international engagement has to be sustained and committed for years to come.”

Less than half a percentage point of the deaths were caused by violence, illustrating how the aftermath of war can be more deadly than combat itself. Much of the emergency aid is focused on the eastern part of the country, where militia battles with Congolese troops have chased nearly half a million people from their homes in the last year. A peace agreement to end that conflict was reached Monday.

But the increased mortality in areas outside of the volatile east is particularly worrying because it points to longer-term problems that endure long after the bullets have stopped flying.

Technorati Tags: NewYorkTimes, Darfur, Congo, Election08, PresidentBush, ForeignPolicy, JohnKerry