The entire world seems to have covered and blogged to death the plight of the British school teacher in Sudan, Gillian Gibbons, who faced up to six months in jail and 40 lashes for allowing Sudanese school children to democratically name a teddy bear after the prophet Muhammed.
It’s on-its-face outrageous, and the blood-thirsty reactions of some so-called Muslim followers even more troubling. (Apparently its against Islam to name an object after the prophet but it’s perfectly acceptable and even reasonable to kill a woman whose only crime is of ignorance of the religion).
But in all the media coverage of the incident, the one issue I don’t see being raised is the apparent double-standard and contradictions of Sudanese law. Sure, the government pardoned Gibbons, but it wholeheartedly instigated and condoned Gibbon’s prosecution and sentence.
Of course, this comes from a government who attacked its own civilians with helicopter gunships and armed a local militia to raze villages and brutally rape and disfigure civilian women. Then, far from soliciting international help to deal with the humanitarian fallout, Sudan’s government blocked aid groups’ access to Darfur and enacted a policy towards the displaced people that would deprive them of food, sanitation and protection – in other words, to kill them.
Gillian Gibbons might be free, but two-and-a-half million Darfuris remain refugees from Sudan’s regime.
I find it a tragedy that Gibbons’ case has sparked worldwide condemnation by the governments of leading nations, yet systematic brutalization and genocide does not warrant the same concern.
Posted in Politics |
