The US Congress calls it genocide. Beshir says it’s all an anti-Muslim plot “” not the genocide, mind you, but the reaction against it. From AFP:
KHARTOUM, July 24 (AFP) — Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir has accused the international community of targeting Islam in his country as the government struggles to fend off mounting international pressure over the Darfur crisis, the pro-government Al-Anbaa reported Saturday.
The paper quoted Beshir as telling supporters in the central region of Gezira following Friday prayers that the real aim of the campaign against his country was not the situation in the troubled western region of Darfur, but to derail the growth of Islam in the country.
Sudan has come under increased pressure from the international community in recent days to resolve the situation in Darfur, where the UN says at least 30,000 people have died in the 16-month-old conflict between government forces and Arab militia allies and two main rebel groups in the region.
“The international concern about the Darfur issue is targeting the status of Islam in Sudan,” claimed Beshir, who seized power in a bloodless Islamist coup in 1989.
Khartoum has brushed off criticism that it is not doing enough to help alleviate the humanitarian situation in Darfur, described by the United Nations as the world’s worst, and pledged to improve the access of international aid agencies to the region and the needy.
The Sudanese president insisted, however, that his government’s concern for Darfur was first and foremost because of the responsibility it felt for the people before God and not aid agencies or other countries.
He said his national “salvation” government, as the regime’s supporters refer to it, will continue “to adhere to Islamic sharia (law), set an example for social cohesion and bring humanity out of darkness to the light of Islam.”