MIA FARROW ACCUSES WORLD OF CLOSING ITS EYES TO DARFUR
Monsters and Critics.com, UK
Nov 29 2007
Berlin – The world is averting its eyes from the human tragedy in
Sudan’s Darfur Province, Mia Farrow said during a visit to Berlin
Thursday in her role as ambassador for the UN children’s organization
UNICEF.
‘What shocks me most about the situation in Sudan is not the many
deaths but that so few people are concerned about them,’ said the US
actress, who has visited the region seven times.
Farrow called for pressure to be exerted on China as the most important
trade partner of the region, saying that while there was widespread
condemnation of China, there was no action.
Farrow and publicist Michel Friedman lit a large torch recalling the
Olympic flame in front of Berlin’s Holocaust Memorial, in reference
to the 2008 Olympic Games being held in Beijing in the summer.
‘China hosts the Olympic Games next year. That makes them vulnerable,
and we should make use of that,’ Farrow told Deutsche Presse-Agentur
dpa.
China has come under pressure for pursuing its economic interests in
Sudan, from where it draws large quantities of oil, while ignoring
human rights abuses there.
China, which has a veto on the Security Council, has blocked UN
sanctions on Sudan and stands accused of selling arms to the region.
‘This flame represents the hope we all share for an end to genocide
everywhere,’ Farrow said in the company of Berlin school pupils who
lit their own candles at the flame before handing them to survivors
of genocide in Rwanda and Bosnia.
Charlotte Knobloch, president of the Central Council of German Jews,
said: ‘We cannot rewrite history, but we can influence the present.’
More than 200,000 people have lost their lives in the Darfur conflict
that has been running since 2003, according to UN estimates. More
than 2 million have been driven from their homes.
The flame lit by Farrow has been to Chad, Rwanda and Armenia. After
Germany it goes to Bosnia and Cambodia.