"21st Century Slavery-The Human Rights Dimension to Trafficking in Human Beings"
May 15-16, 2002
Gregorian University, Rome
Dear friends and guests, before I begin to share my experience and views on the issue of human rights, and precisely on 21st Century Slavery I wish to thank Mr. Jim Nicholson, Ambassador of the United States of America to the Holy See for having invited me as one of the panelists. I also wish to greet in a special way ....
I start with a prayer for peace and justice:
You bring back the captives of Jacob,
Yahweh, you are gracious to your land,
You take away the guilt of your people,
You blot out all their sin.
Yahweh's message is peace for his people, for his faithful,
If only they renounce their folly, His saving help is near for those who fear him,
His glory will dwell in our land.
Faithful Love and Loyalty join together,
Saving Justice and Peace embrace.
Loyalty will spring up from the earth, and justice will lean down from heaven
Yahweh will himself give prosperity, and our soil will yield its harvest
Justice will walk before him, treading out a path (Ps. 85)
I was asked to share my experience and views on the issue of the trafficking in human beings, i.e. 21st Century slavery. It is very humiliating to admit and publicly state in ones own country slavery is a sad reality. Nowadays with high Tec means of communication such statements reach millions of people in many countries in a matter of minutes. The Arabic proverb says: " the admittance of guilt is a virtue"; in all humility I would like to possess this virtue by admitting the existence of slavery in my country, the Sudan. Above all I want to see the end of such inhuman activity and the heeling of the traumatic wounds inflicted on the children. It is real a catastrophe that in most cases, the victims of the egoism of the adults are children. These are the very ones for whom Christ had loving word: " Let the little children alone, and do not stop them from coming to me; it is to such as these that kingdom of Heaven belongs." (Math. 19:14) and He goes on in their defense: " Anyone who welcomes one little child like this in my name welcomes me. But anyone who is the downfall of one of these little ones who have faith in me would be better drowned in the depths of the see with a great millstone around his neck. Alas for the world that there should be such causes of failing! Causes of falling indeed there must be, but alas for anyone who provides them! See that you never despise any of these little ones, for I tell you that their angels in heaven are continually in the presence of my Father in Heaven." (Math. 18: 5-7; 10)
In a gathering in Germany a few years ago, slavery was discussed and to my amazement someone questioned its existence. What could we name the abduction of children and women from their villages? Kids are taken by force, deprived of the loving care of the parents, relatives, tribe or clan. They are taken to remote areas; to them it looks like a foreign land. Their ethnicity is destroyed together with their language, customs, tradition and creed. This is not only slavery but it is also genocide/ethnic cleansing. I personally have witnessed some children who had been taken as slaves. I paid for the transportation of over 200 children who were identified and redeemed by their parents or relatives.
Mr. Chairman,
While we deeply appreciate and welcome the topic of this extremely important conference: Slavery in the 21st Century, we suspect that the objective is to discuss the slavery type labour practices that blight certain parts of our world today, I fear that these conditions are not the same with what obtain in my country today, where a very bloody practice of slavery takes place unfortunately with the acquiescence of the government of that country, if not with its full participation. Elsewhere in the world, in the countries of Southeast Asia like India and Pakistan for example, the governments of those countries are not known to actively encourage the enslavement of some of their citizens by other citizens as we see in my own country. The government of India, Pakistan and others would cooperate with those in the international community who want to do something to bring an end to this criminal practice of slavery. These crimes are therefore committed by citizens knowing of the legal consequences of their acts, if caught. In Sudan as we shall instantly enumerate, the government of the day is a full participant in the crime of slavery against some of its own citizens. This makes it very difficult to bring this place of slavery in the 21st Century to an end, let alone to apprehend its practitioners and to punish them.
In Sudan, Mr. Chairman, slavery by one group of citizens of that country against others is being practiced in the context of the civil war. As is well known, the current government of Sudan ? an Islamic Fundamentalist military dictatorship is fighting what it calls a holy Islamic (Jihad) war, mainly in Southern Sudan not against citizens of Sudan that the government calls infidels. The people of Southern Sudan are different from the people of Northern Sudan in that the people of Southern Sudan are ?now Arab and not Muslims but are black Africans who are politically led by educated Christians and practice Christianity or their own traditional African religions or beliefs.
Slavery in Sudan is therefore being practiced in the context of the civil war. The monetary or material gain from the practice of slavery in Sudan in this 21st Century is only a by?product of this criminal practice.
To release itself from any legal responsibility from the practice of slavery, the government of Sudan has over the years recruited, trained, armed and released some of its own army officers command Arab tribal militias against the people of Southern Sudan. The government also frees itself by this practice of arming and supporting tribal militia from what would have been a prohibitive expense of war. The Arab tribal militias are encouraged to loot whatever movabIe property they may find, like cattle from the opposing tribes and to capture into slavery, either to use for unpaid labour for themselves in their own agricultural land or sell to others for cash and profit. The idea is to encourage the Arab tribes to treat the African tribes as subhuman as possible and to force the Africans to give up their political demands and rebellion against the government.
It is in the context of war, rather than commerce that the practice of slavery in Sudan should be viewed and whatever international measures intended to put that practice to an end must keep this peculiar Sudan situation in mind.
WHAT CAN THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY DO?
The debate about what to do with the modern day slavery in Sudan has raged on for some considerable time now. To avoid having to take action, precisely because that action against slavery in Sudan would have to involve sanctioning the government of Sudan, some organizations have tried to adopt what amounts to the appeasement of the government of Sudan and of supporting slavery there. The government of Sudan has for a long time been denying that slavery existed in Sudan.
As our contribution to the debate in this conference, we would like to propose that a resolution be adopted here, calling on the government of Sudan to admit the existence of the practice of slavery in Sudan and to have an independent, not a government controlled committee to identify and to return to their relatives any African Sudanese children still in slavery. The resolution should also call upon the government of Sudan to disban all the tribal militias that continue to take part in the slave raids in Southern Sudan.
We have recently noted that the government of Sudan has been cooperating with the government of the United States of America to bring the war to an end in Sudan. We very much welcome this, because we are convinced that slavery in Sudan will only come to an end when the war ends. This is because as we said, slavery goes on in Sudan in the context of this war.
Mr. Chairman,
While this is not the topic of our conference here, I cannot end my statement to your August conference without acknowledging and appreciating the recent development in the Nuba Mountains, a part of my own diocese. These developments have been inspired by the United States of America's special Envoy for Peace to Sudan, former Senator John Danforth who was successful in working out a ceasefire in the Nuba Mountains between the government of Sudan and the rebel Sudan Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA) of the Nuba Mountains. That ceasefire is holding; international monitors are working at it and the people of the Nuba Mountains are happy and celebrating it. I hope that with the continuing involvement of the U.S. government, we can have peace, not only in the Nuba Mountains of my diocese, but in our entire country.
