Spielberg's Boycott

Steven Spielberg has pulled out of his role as an artistic advisor to this summer's Beijing Olympics, in protest at China's involvement in Darfur. The film director accuses the Chinese government of not doing enough to put pressure on its ally Sudan, to sort out the terrible human suffering there. The Sudanese government is widely blamed for backing a militia that has slaughtered hundreds of thousands of people in its western province of Darfur.

China hasn't done much about Darfur over the last few years, because it relies on Sudan for oil. However, there's plenty western countries could be doing to put more pressure on Sudan too, so it'd be wrong to lay the blame for the continuing crisis solely at Beijing's door. But Mr Spielberg's decision will certainly bother China. The regime in Beijing is putting so much effort into making the Olympics a success, to show off their country, that any criticism will really hit the Chinese government where it hurts.

Things would start to look worse for China if top athletes, or major corporate sponsors, joined Mr Spielberg's boycott. That still seems pretty unlikely. This was an easy decision for Mr Spielberg to make - after all he's not short of a bob or two anyway, and had never actually signed a contract committing him to this Olympics job. It's much harder to imagine athletes who have trained for years to go to the Olympics giving that up for political reasons. That's proved by the experience of the 1980 Moscow Games, when Britain ummed and aahed about whether to join America's boycott in protest at the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, then backed down because of angry athletes.

So, Mr Spielberg's decision is probably not going to change anything, apart from making himself feel better. It's still fair enough for him to make his boycott though, as you can't expect people to go against their own conscience. But the greater cause of making China behave better both in its own country and around the world would be better served by letting the Olympics go ahead with everyone there, and the focus of the world on Beijing. Dragging China blinking into the light would be the best way of forcing change, not just in Darfur, but in Tibet and elsewhere too.

A Pawn

A teacher from Liverpool is facing a court in Sudan, after being charged with blasphemy for letting schoolchildren name a teddy bear Muhammad. Lurid reports in the British press, many with a thinly-veiled racist tone ('look at these savages - they're black and Muslim!' seems to be the context) suggest she could end up being given 40 lashes.

That won't happen though. This luckless lady now finds herself as a pawn in the latest round of the diplomatic chess match between Sudan and the western world over Darfur. The Sudanese continue to resist letting any kind of meaningful international peacekeeping force into its lawless western province, where government-backed militia have slaughtered hundreds of thousands of civilians in recent years, making millions more homeless, on the pretext of fighting assorted groups of rebels.

The case of Gillian Gibbons has everything to do with this. As British officials try to get her out of jail, you can bet the price of her freedom will be some kind of concession over Darfur - something that will ease the international pressure on Sudan. The British government must act to soothe the screaming newspaper headlines back home. It's certain we won't, once the Gibbons case is fish-and-chip paper, see similar headlines about Darfur, as Sudan is allowed to continue terrorising its people.

It's Only Words

Sudan is describing the UN agreement on a peacekeeping force for Darfur as a "practical" solution. After lots of talking, and lots of watering down under pressure from Sudan's trading partner China, the UN Security Council finally passed a resolution agreeing a joint African Union/UN force of around 26,000 personnel. They're going to have the power to use force to defend civilians and aid workers - but there's no threat of sanctions if Sudan doesn't go along with things.

And that's the key point here. Although Gordon Brown, whose interest in this issue is admirable, is warning the Sudanese the clunking fist of tough sanctions remains an option, it's not written anywhere in the resolution. No wonder Khartoum seems pretty pleased.

Working on the assumption that anything Sudan welcomes is not likely to be good for the people of Darfur, this resolution is nowhere near strong enough. We've heard promises of a bolstered international force for Darfur before, and nothing's ever come of it. This latest plan, as grand as it might seem, remains just a plan until those first boots hit the ground. Don't be surprised if it doesn't happen.

An Ugly Compromise

At the UN, Britain and France have circulated a watered-down draft of a resolution to authorise a joint African Union-UN peacekeeping force for Darfur. The watering down involves dropping the threat of sanctions against Sudan, if it doesn't let the troops in. It's because other African countries weren't happy with that.

Sudan claims the new draft is still "very ugly" but the only thing ugly about it, is the extent to which the major western countries have backed down. The rest of the world's been pressing Sudan to accept a proper peacekeeping force in Darfur for yonks, and despite various agreements and promises, still nothing. Besides, with hundreds of thousands dead and millions left homeless, the idea that there's actually any peace to keep is pretty laughable. The big western powers should fund and equip a much more powerful African Union force, and send it in regardless of what Sudan says.

No Strings Attached

The UN's making some hopeful noises about the Darfur crisis, after Sudan said it would accept a combined UN/African Union peacekeeping force of around 20,000 personnel. After months of negotiations, it's even claimed the Sudanese aren't insisting on any conditions, such as insisting all the troops come from African countries.

We've got to hope this time the agreement is actually for real, but until those boots are actually on the ground, there's no reason to expect Sudan's not just playing more games. It's time for the UN and major world leaders to set a deadline for the peacekeepers to be deployed, and if that's missed, for genuinely tough sanctions against the Sudanese government. We've heard this sort of thing from Sudan too many times before over the last four years of this crisis, to do anything less.

Accused

China and Russia are being accused by Amnesty International of supplying arms to Sudan, that are then used in Darfur. The report says the weapons end up with the government-backed militia, the Janjaweed, who have been fighting rebels and slaughtering innocent civilians for four years. Sudan denies it, while China and Russia aren't commenting, but Amnesty's photographic evidence is certainly compelling.

China and Sudan have been close allies for a while; China uses Sudanese oil to help its fast-growing economy, and in return pretty much ignores what Sudan does in Darfur. The main reason why so little's been done about Darfur at the UN over the years is because the Chinese don't want to upset the Sudanese by agreeing to something they won't like, such as lots of international troops to go and protect the civilians. Even though agreement has been reached for a small UN force, there's still no sign of it actually materialising. China could lean on Sudan and make sure the peacekeepers get to Darfur, but chooses not to. If things are going to improve for the people left in Darfur, Russia and particularly China have got to stop sending arms, and start putting pressure on the Sudanese government to accept what the rest of the world knows is needed.

An Escalation

Oh dear. It looks as though the armies of Chad and Sudan have fought directly for the first time, in a remote bit of Sudan's western province of Darfur. The two governments have been accusing each other for quite a while of backing rebel forces in the other's country, and it seems this inevitable escalation has finally happened. Some people already refer to what's going on as the Central African War, and that seems a more accurate description as each month goes by.

The main immediate hope that things might get better is embodied by the not-always-particularly-effective UN. They've been trying to get into Darfur for ages to try to deal with the enormous humanitarian disaster, but the Sudanese government won't let them, because it's they who've pretty much caused it all. The African Union does have some people on the ground, but not enough, although it does claim it's close to finally getting Sudan to let those UN troops (somewhat laughably billed as 'peacekeepers') in to join them.

China is Sudan's biggest economic supporter, and has frustrated efforts at the UN to sort things out more quickly. But the focus on Beijing's attitude only hides the fact the eventual solution here will be an African solution. The African Union is clearly not strong enough on its own yet to do much to bring it about, so it's up to South Africa's Thabo Mbeki and others to apply more of a squeeze on Sudan, before fighting between Chad and Sudan starts to happen every day.

No-Fly Zone

The Guardian reports that Tony Blair is pushing for a no-fly zone to be introduced in Darfur. The PM would want it enforced, if necessary, by bombing Sudanese airfields. The idea seems to be based on what the French did in the Ivory Coast back in 2004, when they destroyed the Ivorian air force in retaliation for the deaths of nine French peacekeepers.

This looks like a bit of theatre from Blair. There's no appetite in the military to actually get involved in Darfur, not with what's already going on in Afghanistan and Iraq. Sudan's allies in China would probably prevent anything like this getting through the UN anyway. But with the Sudanese government still stalling on letting UN troops into Darfur, Blair probably reasons the mere mention of military action might be enough to force them to change their tune. It probably won't work, but it's worth a try.

Losing Patience

The pressure's growing on Sudan to let an international peacekeeping force into its Darfur province, which has been devastated by mass slaughter over the last four years. The US, Britain and others are talking about extending sanctions and other measures including a no-fly zone, if Sudan continues to refuse to let the UN troops in.

Although Sudan will probably try to delay things a bit longer, it looks like the force will finally get on the ground sooner rather than later. The arrival of the troops won't guarantee the violence will finish, but it should mean the end of large-scale systematic killing. That should also prevent the fighting from spreading further into neighbouring Chad and the Central African Republic. But all of that will be just a preamble to the really important stuff - peace talks.

Last year's attempt at an agreement failed because not all the various factions in Darfur were on board. Once the UN's allowed in to make things a bit more stable though, discussions with a genuine chance of success should be possible. If the US, Britain and others are going to beat the Sudanese government with the stick of sanctions, they need to offer all sides the carrot of talks too. Otherwise not only will there be no chance of a deal, there'll be no chance of stopping the killing either.

French Lesson

The talks over the Darfur crisis - or Central African war if you prefer - seem to have gone ok. Sudan, Chad and the Central African Republic have agreed not to support the assortment of rebels attacking each other's countries. And the UN's given a timely warning of the spread of militia violence into the bits of eastern Chad flooded with Darfur refugees. Hopefully everyone will finally agree to let a UN-led force in to support the current weak deployment from the African Union. Equally hopefully, that would limit the spread of the violence. We've heard all this sort of thing before, but there's reason to be very cautiously optimistic, which is something.

The French can probably feel pretty pleased with themselves having knocked heads together at the summit in Cannes. But this interview with Rwanda's President Kagame offers a lesson in how the French style of diplomacy has failed in Africa in the recent past. As the leader of a Tutsi rebel army it was Kagame who led his people to victory in the 1994 civil war, but not before up to a million Tutsi and moderate Hutu civilians had been slaughtered by Hutu militia. Kagame hates the French for their arms shipments to the Hutus before the genocide began, and their continual attempts to blame him for kicking off the whole thing by assassinating the presidents of both Rwanda and Burundi. They won't let that allegation drop, so he's finally turning his back on them to join the Commonwealth.

One subtext of the French involvement in Rwanda before 1994, and in the Darfur crisis now, is an effort by Paris to retain its influence over French-speaking Africa. That led them to arm and support some of the world's most evil men in Rwanda, who went on to carry out a terrible genocide. If France is to play the honest broker now, it must leave such selfish ambitions aside.

A Mess

Continuing his farewell tour before he finally buggers off into political retirement, President Chirac is hosting a Franco-African summit in Cannes. Among the guests is the foreign minister of Chad, who doesn't seem too optimistic of any progress on the question of his country's on-off-sort-of-war with Sudan next door. While the mass slaughter in Sudan's Darfur province has been pretty widely publicised (though not nearly widely enough - and next-to-sod-all has been done about it) over the last few years, the potential for the killing to extend elsewhere is something everyone in the West needs to keep much closer tabs on.

It goes like this. Darfur is the big bit in the west of Sudan that borders Chad. A Muslim militia force backed by the Sudanese government has been fighting black African anti-government rebels there. That's led to the deaths of a UN-estimated 400,000 civilians since 2003. Millions more have become refugees, many heading to Chad. And so the violence has followed, with Chad accusing Sudan of trying to invade to topple its government. Sudan claims Chad is supporting those rebels back in Darfur. In recent months, the fighting has absorbed the similar civil war in the Central African Republic, which as you'll guess by the name also neighbours this whole area.

The French know it's pretty much up to them to take the lead in preventing things getting even worse. The UN is predictably powerless, and, despite its plans to put more of its military in Africa, there's no appetite in the US for it to get involved. There's no strong regional power, so the French as the former colonial masters of Chad and the CAR are the best option. It's a pattern established by their own involvement in the civil war in the Ivory Coast, and the British operation in its former colony of Sierra Leone.

If the talks get nowhere, which is just about certain, France ought to deploy smallish forces to shore up the governments in Chad and the CAR. Although that won't stop the killing in Darfur, it would make the conflict much less likely to take a stronger grip in those countries. But with an election looming in France there's no way that'll happen for the time being, if at all. Hoping for the best hasn't proved an effective strategy so far. It still looks like the only strategy the West is prepared to follow.