After five years and hundreds of thousands of dead, the world is finally doing something about the conflict in Darfur. This spring, thousands of European Union peacekeepers began deploying to eastern Chad, bordering Darfur, to protect a quarter-million refugees and aid workers and to tamp down on violence spilling over the border. Technology is playing a key role in both the humanitarian and security strategies: satellites helped aid workers spot water sources for refugees, and French UAVs buzz over the peacekeepers' heads, keeping an eye out for bandits and rebels. More importantly, logistical technology -- trucks, airplanes, helicopters and sophisticated planning -- enables the U.N. to move tens of thousands of people at a time over long stretches of rough terrain.
But even with all this technology, is the international campaign for Darfur too little, too late? Refugees continue to flood across the border, and armed attacks this year nearly toppled the Chadian government. It's a bad situation that could still get much worse.
I'll be on the Chad-Sudan border from mid June to mid July with photographer Anne Holmes, covering the E.U. peacekeepers and the U.N. refugee camps. We're totally independent on this trip, and to help cover our costs, Guerrilla News Network has launched a fund-raising campaign. Check it out. And look for dispatches from Chad here at DANGER ROOM in June and July.
(Photo: El Tirador Solitario)
