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 118 STAT. 4013 PUBLIC LAW 108–497—DEC. 23, 2004 (3) In response to two decades of civil conflict in Sudan, the United States has helped to establish an internationally supported peace process to promote a negotiated settlement to the war that has resulted in a framework peace agreement, the Nairobi Declaration on the Final Phase of Peace in the Sudan, signed on June 5, 2004. (4) At the same time that the Government of Sudan was negotiating for a comprehensive and all inclusive peace agree- ment, enumerated in the Nairobi Declaration on the Final Phase of Peace in the Sudan, it refused to engage in any meaningful discussion with regard to its ongoing campaign of ethnic cleansing and genocide in the Darfur region of western Sudan. (5) The Government of Sudan reluctantly agreed to attend talks to bring peace to the Darfur region only after considerable international pressure and outrage was expressed through high level visits by Secretary of State Colin Powell and others, and through United Nations Security Council Resolution 1556 (July 30, 2004). (6) The Government of the United States, in both the executive branch and Congress, has concluded that genocide has been committed and may still be occurring in the Darfur region, and that the Government of Sudan and militias sup- ported by the Government of Sudan, known as the Janjaweed, bear responsibility for the genocide. (7) Evidence collected by international observers in the Darfur region between February 2003 and November 2004 indicate a coordinated effort to target African Sudanese civilians in a scorched earth policy, similar to that which was employed in southern Sudan, that has destroyed African Sudanese vil- lages, killing and driving away their people, while Arab Suda- nese villages have been left unscathed. (8) As a result of this genocidal policy in the Darfur region, an estimated 70,000 people have died, more than 1,600,000 people have been internally displaced, and more than 200,000 people have been forced to flee to neighboring Chad. (9) Reports further indicate the systematic rape of thou- sands of women and girls, the abduction of women and children, and the destruction of hundreds of ethnically African villages, including the poisoning of their wells and the plunder of their crops and cattle upon which the people of such villages sustain themselves. (10) Despite the threat of international action expressed through United Nations Security Council Resolutions 1556 (July 30, 2004) and 1564 (September 18, 2004), the Government of Sudan continues to obstruct and prevent efforts to reverse the catastrophic consequences that loom over the Darfur region. (11) In addition to the thousands of violent deaths directly caused by ongoing Sudanese military and government-spon- sored Janjaweed attacks in the Darfur region, the Government of Sudan has restricted access by humanitarian and human rights workers to the Darfur area through intimidation by military and security forces, and through bureaucratic and administrative obstruction, in an attempt to inflict the most devastating harm on those individuals displaced from their villages and homes without any means of sustenance or shelter. VerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:54 Nov 10, 2005 Jkt 029194 PO 00000 Frm 00547 Fmt 6580 Sfmt 6581 C:\STATUTES\2004\29194PT4.001 APPS10 PsN: 29194PT4

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