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Tuesday, July 1, 9-10 pm ET
WIDE ANGLE's season premiere presents an account of what the U.N. Secretary-General has called “the largest humanitarian crisis in the world.”
With the Darfur Peace Agreement in shambles and fears rising
that the region is headed for a new cycle of bloodletting, "Heart
of Darfur" provides an eyewitness account of what the U.N.
Secretary-General has called "the largest humanitarian crisis in
the world." Granted access to the capital city of North Darfur in
Sudan, WIDE ANGLE reports from Al Fasher, once a sleepy desert town
of 30,000, but today home to 100,000 refugees and 10,000 U.N.
personnel. The film captures the desperation of daily life in Al
Fasher's sprawling Abu Shouk refugee camp and travels beyond Al
Fasher into the volatile rebel-held areas of Sudan to portray the
lives of black African villagers who get up every morning to face
yet another day filled with threats of looting, murder and rape by
Sudan's pro-government Arab militias, known as the Janjaweed.
Cameras follow "the busiest man in Africa" - charismatic General
Martin Luther Agwai, commander of the new combined U.N.-African
Union peacekeeping force for Darfur - on a mission as he
helicopters into hostile areas, attempting to coax rebel leaders
and some of the Arab tribes to the negotiating table. Despite
leading the world's largest peacekeeping operation, Agwai, the
former head of Nigeria's armed forces, acknowledges the limitations
of his role: "We are not here to compel any peace. We are here to
work with the Sudanese people - both the government and the parties
- to assist them to find peace." After five years of fighting in
Sudan, an estimated two-and-a-half million people have fled their
homes, more than 200,000 have been killed and two thirds of all
Darfuris - some 4.3 million people - need humanitarian assistance
of some kind. "Heart of Darfur" provides a nuanced report from the
heart of an international crisis. At the conclusion of the film,
New York Times op-ed columnist Nicholas Kristof discusses
the worsening conflict and humanitarian crisis in Darfur with WIDE
ANGLE anchor Aaron Brown.