MIA FARROW LEADS TORCH RELAY THROUGH COUNTRIES THAT HAVE SUFFERED GENOCIDE
By The Canadian Press
The Chronicle Journal, Canada
Aug 15 2007
American actress, Mia Farrow, left, weeps next to a Rwandan girl and
Sudanese genocide survivor at the Nyanza Genocide Memorial Site in
Kigali, Rwanda, Wednesday. (AP/Andrew McGregor)
KIGALI, Rwanda (AP) – Mia Farrow joined genocide survivors in a
torch-lighting ceremony Wednesday at a Rwandan school where thousands
died in a 100-day frenzy of killings in 1994.
The 62-year-old actress, whose screen credits include "Rosemary’s Baby"
and "The Purple Rose of Cairo," is leading an Olympic-style torch relay
through countries that have suffered genocide to press China, host of
the 2008 games, to help end abuses in its ally Sudan’s Darfur region.
More than 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million been chased from
their homes in Darfur since 2003, when tribes of ethnic African
farmers rebelled against the Arab-dominated central government,
accusing it of neglect and discrimination.
"We welcome China’s recent UN vote to allow a peacekeeping force into
Sudan," said Jill Savitt, director of Dream for Darfur, the group
that organized the ceremony. "However, China now must continue to
press Sudan to ensure that the words on paper translate into action.
That means adequate and verifiable security on the ground in Darfur."
The UN Security Council has authorized a joint UN-African Union
operation of 20,000 peacekeepers and 6,000 civilian police for
Darfur. Sudan at first resisted the proposal, but backed down. The
new force will absorb a 7,000-member African peacekeeping force now
in Darfur, and was to be in place by year’s end.
The school where Farrow appeared Wednesday is Ecole Technique
Officielle, where 2,000 Rwandans were executed during the country’s
genocide.
The killing started within hours after the president’s plane was
mysteriously shot down over Kigali late on April 6, 1994. Hutu
militiamen, known as interahamwe, set up roadblocks across Kigali
and on April 7 began hunting down Tutsis and moderate Hutus and
killing them.
The Darfur torch relay will also go to Armenia, Bosnia, Germany,
Cambodia and finally in December to Hong Kong.