I describe the situation in Sudan as one of "genocide by attrition." Generally, when we think of genocide, we focus on the numbers of individuals killed directly by state and other murderers, through execution, gassing, burning, and other forms of annihilation. Genocide by attrition occurs after a group is singled out for political and civil discrimination. It is separated from the larger society, and its right to life is threatened through concentration and forced displacement, together with systematic deprivation of food, water, and sanitary and medical facilities. These measures, along with the frequent imposition of overcrowded living quarters, lead to death through disease and starvation.

These actions violate Article II of the UN Genocide Convention, specifically:

b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.

It is also important to note that using hunger as a weapon against defenseless civilians is explicitly prohibited in the 1977 Additional Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions.

I consider the Warsaw Ghetto (1939-1943), Cambodia (1975-1979), and Sudan (1983-1993) to be prime examples of genocide by attrition, and have written about these situations at some length.¹ (Although the data I analyzed for Sudan end in 1993, other scholars, relief agencies, and human rights groups have current documentation that strongly supports a finding of genocide by attrition). In all of these instances, targeted populations officially fall outside "the universe of obligation," as defined by the government or powers that be.

In the Warsaw ghetto, one of every five Jews died prior to deportation from starvation, typhus, tuberculosis, and other diseases which failed to be diagnosed. These deaths are directly attributable to German policy, which:

• Allotted Jews rations whose caloric content was less than ten percent of the level needed to sustain life. From December 1940-April 1941, the Germans refused to provide any food at all to the Ghetto. "We sentence the Jews in the ghetto to death by hunger or we shoot them," a prominent SS doctor stated at a 1941 meeting of government health care professionals.²
  
  
• Imposed cramped, overcrowded living quarters, which encouraged illness and contagion;
  
  
• Denied heating fuel and sanitation.

All of these measures contributed to the toll of Jews dying in the Warsaw ghetto.

In Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge explicitly decreed which groups had the right to live, and which groups had to be destroyed. Between 1975 and 1979, 1.5 million to 2 million Cambodians were killed by the KR: it is believed that 25 percent of those deaths were due to starvation and 25 percent were due to disease, brought about by genocidal policies of forced deprivation and mass displacement.

Sudan’s Politics of Famine Against the Dinka

Turning now to Sudan, the North has systematically denied food to populations in the South, in what has to be called a "politics of famine."

Let us first consider the Dinka. Between May 1983 and May 1993, at least one in five southerners, primarily Dinka, (1.5 million) died primarily by starvation and its effects. This coincided with the Nimeiri government’s drive to Islamize the country and its imposition of Islamic religious law even on non-Moslems. These policies were further radicalized in 1989, with the coup by the National Islamic Front, which also "disappeared" opponents in what they termed "ghost houses." The NIF armed militias made up of Arab Bagarra, historical enemies of the Dinka, systematically looted the land and cattle upon which the Dinka depended for survival.

Sudan as a whole had sufficient food in the early 1980s (it was a strong exporter of sorghum to Europe and Saudi Arabia, and also received wheat from the United States); but the government methodically withheld distribution to the South. By 1983, drought was causing food shortages in the South, but it was not inevitable that these should lead to famine. The North obstructed food deliveries from relief agencies and foreign donors by denying use of the railway and other government transport, including airfields. The government and its agents stole supplies and re-sold them on the black market. They harassed, attacked, and expelled foreign aid workers. On December 21, 1989, NIF government forces shot down an MSF-France [Médecins sans Frontières] plane, killing everyone onboard. This caused some aid groups to leave Sudan, and major donors to end or sharply decrease their contributions.

There has been massive forced displacement among the Dinka, with a predictable toll from hunger and disease. The government reaction to outbreaks of meningitis and other contagious diseases in the displaced-person camps was to herd the Dinka more closely together. Fresh drinking water and medical attention have been denied.

Deprived of their land, cattle, and other assets, Dinka became increasingly vulnerable to abduction into slavery. Children in particular were snatched by the raiding militias backed by the North. My colleagues J. Millard Burr and Robert Collins calculated in their important 1995 book that at least 75,000 Dinka children had been sold into slavery in the North.³ Beginning in 1992, Southern children who had fled with their families to Khartoum were in danger of being kidnapped, herded into camps, and forcibly converted to Islam. This violates Article 2(e) of the Genocide Convention, which prohibits "forcibly transferring children of the group to another group."

The Nuba: Targeted for Extinction

There have been genocide warnings on behalf of the Nuba for a number of years now—from human rights groups and relief agencies, scholars, and some members of the U.S. Congress. Upon seizing power in 1989, the NIF government dispatched Bagarra militias to raid, loot, and burn Nuba villages, causing widespread displacement, hunger, and disease. In 1992, the Governor of Kordofan unleashed a jihad against the Nuba; soon after, the pro-government Imans issued a fatwa, which imposed Islam on all non-Muslims and called for the round-up and isolation of Christian Nuba. There were targeted killings, especially of Nuba leaders; looting of land and cattle; and denial of medical treatment in the "peace camps," where Nuba have been confined for Islamization. These practices are clear violations of the Genocide Convention, Article 2, (a), (b), (c).

The "peace camps" have been characterized by additional violations of the Genocide Convention, specifically of Article 2 (d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; and (e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. Documentation abounds of:

• Separation of families, and men and women, to impede procreation within the group, violating Article 2 (d);
• Rape of women and girls, and forced sexual slavery – "temporary marriage" – which is an act of genocide in itself (Article 2 (b)), and impedes family formation and procreation;
• Castration of men and boys, which is also a violation of Article 2 (b) and impedes family formation and procreation;
• Enticement and transfer of children for Islamic education, which violates Article 2 (e).

Early warning signals

The denial of political and civil rights is the first sign that a group may be later targeted for genocide. Official definition and stripping members of the group of rights, resources, land, jobs and businesses, followed by segregation or isolation and concentration of the group are stages of a genocidal process which should intensify our sense of urgency. The creation of hunger and denial of food aid is also a clue or warning sign of genocidal intentions. All of these abuses have been inflicted on the Dinka and on the Nuba for years. Scholars, aid workers, development specialists and governments need to be more attuned to the ways in which apparently separate actions, policies, and health emergencies may comprise an overarching genocidal plan.

Photos Copyright © Teun Voeten

2 C.R. Browning, "Genocide and Public Health: German Doctors and Polish Jews, 1939-1941" in Browning, The Path to Genocide: Essays on Launching the Final Solution (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992) p. 158

3 J.M. Burr and R.O. Collins, Requiem for the Sudan: War, Drought, and Disaster Relief on the Nile (Boulder, Colorado: Westview, 1995), p. 227. Quoted in "Genocide by Attrition," see Note. 1.

Back to top