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In the war-wrecked region of Darfur, in western Sudan, hundreds of thousands have died and close to three million have been displaced since the conflict between the government and its allied Janjaweed militias and the non-Arab population began three years ago.
The United Nations Security Council is now seriously considering a motion by the United States to send UN peacekeepers to Darfur. Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch (HRW) and other non-governmental organizations have been on the scene to provide assistance and to document the atrocities taking place.
The Center for Human Rights Documentation and Research, part of Columbia's Rare Book & Manuscript Library, is exhibiting photographs of HRW's collection of 27 drawings made by children living in refugee camps on the border between Sudan and Chad depicting their memories of the conflict. The drawings are on display on the fourth floor of the SIPA building through Friday, March 10, after which they will move downstairs to the Lehman Library.
"The government of Sudan keeps denying its involvement in the conflict," said Csaba Szilagyi, the human rights center's curator, "but these drawings show regular military troops, tanks, armored personnel carriers and Russian-made aircrafts bombing the villages. They are visual testimonies to the atrocities that have been committed -- and to the terror the children experienced."
The children drew the pictures at the encouragement of Annie Sparrow, a trained pediatrician who traveled to the border area as a HRW researcher one year ago. As she prepared for her trip, Sparrow made a last-minute decision to include crayons and paper in her supplies, which she handed to the children she met in the camps. The idea was to let them draw whatever they wanted, and many used the opportunity to sketch the horrors they had seen during the attacks on their villages and the flight to Chad. On Wednesday, March 8, at a special viewing of the exhibition organized by CHRDR, Sparrow will discuss the background of the drawings.
The pictures will be presented to the International Criminal Court as evidence of war crimes by the Sudanese government, which has long denied participation in the devastation.
On Feb. 13, Szilagyi led a panel discussion on the challenges of acquiring, preserving and publicizing information on human rights atrocities such as those witnessed in the Sudan. His co-panelists were Grace Lile of WITNESS, a group that trains human rights workers in video and documentary techniques, and Louis Bickford, a professor and human rights activist with a wealth of experience documenting human rights abuses in Latin America. |
