For four years, the government of Sudan and rebel groups have been engaged in a bloody conflict affecting 4.5 million people in the Darfur region of Sudan.

According to the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC), some 400,000 people have died in Darfur since 2003. Those remaining have been displaced from their homes and now live in camps across the region. A further 230,000 are estimated to have fled to neighbouring Chad as the conflict threatens to spill across state borders.

The government in Khartoum has been accused of genocide by George Bush and by the Sudan Divestment Taskforce. Some refugees and commentators have even alleged that the actions by the Janjaweed militia—the government-backed forces—amount to an attempt to drive black Africans out of the region.

The real truth in this matter is unclear. This conflict, like so many contemporary incidences of civil war, is not simple. Its sources are multi-layered and the warring factions are blurred and constantly changing.

The United Nations has yet to recognise the situation as genocide. It has acknowledged that war crimes have been committed by members of the Sudanese Government, particularly the Border Intelligence Guards and pro-government militia forces. But according to the UN, while there have been mass murders and rapes, ‘genocidal intent’ is not present, and thus it has yet to secure the trial of the Sudanese Government in the International Criminal Court.

Whether a genocide is taking place in the eyes of the UN or not, the extent of Sudanese suffering is extremely severe. Nevertheless, the crisis appears to continue to be escalating. Of the estimated 4.5 million affected, nearly one million people cannot be reached by humanitarian assistance. The area deemed unsafe for humanitarian workers has quadrupled in size over the past year, according to UN humanitarian access maps.

According to Darfur expert Hamid Ali Nur, “The government is continuing to create this conflict by giving money and arms to different groups”.

Like many African states, Sudan carries a large burden of debt. The country relies heavily on Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) to sustain government expenditures. “But the government redirects the overwhelming majority of this FDI into military outlaysm,” claims a report published last month by the Sudan Divestment Taskforce (SDT).

Among those foreign corporations investing in Sudan is the China National Petroleum Company (CNPC). According to the SDT, the CNPC “plays the role of the enabler in the Government of Sudan’s genocidal campaign against its own people”.

The news that this University owns shares in CNPC’s majority-owned, publicly-traded subsidiary Petrochina means that it is indirectly supporting the continuation of the conflict and human rights abuses in Darfur.

The question now is: how soon will this University engage in an ethical investment policy?
While divestment of this kind will in no way simply solve the problems in Darfur, it would nevertheless start the ball rolling in terms of removing the pro-government force’s ability to arm themselves and thus perpetrate these kinds of atrocities.

Fulford:
Aspden, Keith (Lib Dem) 503 votes
Craghill, Denise (Green) 212 votes
Smith, Alan (Labour) 266 votes
Suddons, Samantha (Conservative) 153 votes

Heslington:
Fletcher-Hall, Grace (Labour) 251 votes
Henniker-Heaton, J (Conservative) 182 votes
Jamieson-Ball, Ceredig (Lib Dem) 436 votes
Sanderson,Peter (Green) 266 votes

Fishergate:
D’Agorne, Andy (Green) 1,308 votes
Dickinson, Ernest Peter (Labour) 706 votes
Dickson, Robin (Conservative) 649 votes
Gibson, Thomas (Labour) 576 votes
Hudson, Nicholas (Lib Dem) 146 votes
Nunn, Susan (Lib Dem) 157 votes
Phillips, Stephen (BNP) 111 votes
Rutherford, Michael (Conservative) 495 votes
Taylor, Dave (Green) 1,086 votes

Hull Road:
Brown, David (BNP) 259 votes
Collingwood, Andrew (Green) 327 votes
Cossham, John (Green) 341 votes
Cregab, Richard Thomas (Labour) 819 votes
Crockett, Tom (Conservative) 643 votes
Johns, Michaels-Perring (Lib Dem) 355 votes
Pierce, Roger (Labour) 803 votes
Williams, Rachel (Lib Dem) 414 votes
Yonge, Alan (Conservative) 544 votes

Acomb:
Dawson, Ian (BNP) 520 votes
Dyson, Will (Green) 297 votes
Horton, David (Labour) 1,303 votes
Lewis-Strodder, R (Lib Dem) 448 votes
Mayne, Alexander (Lib Dem) 399 votes
Simpson-Laing, T (Labour) 1,301 votes
Thompson, D (Conservative) 426 votes
Tucker, Michael (Conservative) 529 votes

Last week’s City Council election saw the return of a Liberal Democrat-dominated Council once more. This time, however, their monopoly over other parties in the Council has been dramatically reduced from a majority of 29 to a mere 19, only beating Labour’s share of positions by one councillor.

The Conservatives, who have had no representation in the Council since 2003, were successful in winning eight of the Liberal Democrat’s lost seats.

If Labour form coalitions with Green or the Conservative Councillors, the Lib Dems will be kept out of government, and how these coalitions are formed will now be the decisive factor in shaping the nature of local government in York for the next four years. Fortunately for all, with under 4,000 votes in total, the BNP will not have any seats in the Council.

The Lib Dems’ dramatic reduction in votes mirrors widespread dissatisfaction with their performance in local government over the last term. Unpopular actions such as the closure of the Barbican Centre, the introduction of the Ftr buses and the likely approval of the much-opposed Heslington East development at the University, were set to be key deterrents against a Lib Dem revival.

Heslington residents voted by a significant margin to return to office Lib Dem Councillor Ceredig Jamieson-Ball. The Heslington residents’ opposition to the proposed Heslington East development has been well-publicised, making Jamieson-Ball’s clear victory somewhat remarkable.

The Heslington ward itself is a very particular ward, consisting of both a transcient student population and permanent local residents, who have been known to not always see eye to eye on many issues, not least the politics and policies of the local Council.

This particular make-up of the Heslington ward, similar to the other key student-dominated wards of Hull Road and Fulford, meant that the result was all the more unpredictable. The Green Party candidate, Peter Sanderson, who has remained steadfast in his opposition to the Hes East development, might have seemed the most likely victor in a ward where local residents already keenly feel the drawbacks of proximity to the University.

Sanderson received the second largest number of votes, only beating the student Labour Party candidate, Grace Fletcher-Hall, by 15 votes. This is in itself somewhat surprising. The student candidates had been expected to fare well in wards with a high population of student residents.
“It is likely the student candidates would do better where the students are voting – but it’s very difficult to predict a ward like this anyway, because obviously most of the people here haven’t voted before”, Grace Fletcher-Hall commented on polling day.

Jamieson-Ball has admitted, however: “I was quite confident about my support base in the village, but obviously didn’t really know what was going on on campus with facing a Student Union Labour candidate.” With many students moving to the area only recently, it is likely that they will vote for familiar faces, rather than according to policy.

Despite this, neither student candidate was successful in winning the Heslington seat, nor were any other student candidates elected. On campus dozens of students were unable to vote due to registration problems.

“It is quite unjust that many students have been randomly disenfranchised,” said Fletcher-Hall.
In a ward where voter turnout is far less than 50%, the denial of some of the electorate’s right to vote has important implications for the legitimacy of those in power. According to Jamieson-Ball, however, the loss of votes has not had a marked impact: “I don’t think it was votes from any particular party that were lost…it was probably proportional as per the result.”
National issues, it was claimed last week, would set the agenda, rather than local politics. The new Labour Councillor for Hull Road, Richard Cregan, was keen to distance himself from the now decade-old Labour Government: “I must emphasize the word ‘local’ because we are a local party”.

“Some people vote for local reasons, others for national”, Peter Sanderson explained. But in the Heslington ward, the expectation is that it is “going to be more national than local”.
Jamieson-Ball agreed with this analysis, saying: “The electorate voted on issues they felt passionate about, some of which will be local, some of which will be local, some of which will be national”.

The convicted murderer has been on hunger strike for 114 days since a second conviction was secured against him last year, which he believes was politically motivated. He had served his 18 year sentence for his role in the murder of 25 people in the 1980s when he was jailed for a second time, charged with making terrorist threats in an article he wrote from prison.

The hunger strike led to his hospitalisation a month ago. The government, fearing for his life, has now permitted him to serve the rest of his sentence under house arrest.

De Juana is one of the key leaders in Eta’s terrorist wing which has, over the last four decades, been responsible for the murder of 800 people. His release has sparked outrage among the Association of Terrorism Victims (ATV) and conservative opposition the People’s Party, who deplore Prime Minister Zapatero for negotiating with Eta.

Yet it seems the government has been backed into a corner over the affair. If they did not take action to prevent his death, de Juana would have been martyred in the name of the Basque separatist cause.

This would surely have intensified its strength and conferred legitimacy on the cause, decreasing any likelihood of swift conflict resolution. A similar tactic was used by Bobby Sands and IRA prisoners in Northern Ireland in the 1970s.

The golden question is, how best does a government deal with terrorists? In Northern Ireland, the British government and the Democratic Unionist Party’s (DUP) outright refusal to negotiate with Sinn Fein up until the 1990s (and still today for the DUP) did not successfully work towards relieving sectarian tensions or facilitating the peace process. A policy of non-negotiation, while perhaps morally legitimate, has not proved successful.

Recent events demonstrate that the Zapetero government has made the right decision. The death of de Juana would only have re-ignited the terrorist cause, blocking any prospect of a peace settlement for perhaps another generation. The People’s Party and the ATV remain outraged by the decision, but it is unlikely that open hostilities will break out. The peace process halted by the December Madrid bombings can now recommence, but what happens when de Juana is released from house arrest is another question. A full resolution is unlikely in the near future, as the Basque people still demand secession – a right is not supported by the United Nations.

This comes as part of a government drive to see a greater number of working class students attend university. While this may be in the pursuit of the admirable cause of giving a greater number of poorer students the choice of attending university, it may only serve to deter middle-class applicants from applying.

Such a clause will surely only increase the widespread speculation that government interference in the admissions process is in fact a device for social engineering and postcode lottery tactics, despite the fact that a Ucas spokesman has claimed the information is to be used only for “statistical purposes” and not in the allocation of places.

The Government has already spent an estimated £350 million in campaigning to increase the number of students from poorer backgrounds, although evidence from the Higher Education Statistics Agency suggest that the middle classes still dominate. It has been said that “equal examination grades do not necessarily represent equal potential”, because factors such as social background afffect pupils’ performance.

There is indeed a very valid concern for ensuring consistency in the quality of pre-university education across the board, as differences between state and independent schools may affect the academic achievement of some students.. Yet to accept or reject students on this assumption is not only unjust to high-achieving middle class students, it is also highly patronising to those students accepted because of background rather than merit.

What is even more shocking, however, is that universities will have no way of proving whether this personal information is true, rendering this whole exercise pointless. Applicants are therefore likely to alter information tactically.

The most obvious barrier against equality and fairness in university admissions is, of course, the trebling of the cost of university education this year. There has already been a 4.5% drop in applications across the board, with students from all backgrounds being deterred by the prospect of a high level of graduate debt.

Some statistics even suggest that there has been a particular fall in applications from middle-class students who failed to qualify for new grants because they are on the cusp of the cut-off point, or because their parents’ income is more than £30,000 per annum.
Students are increasingly looking abroad to countries like the USA to satisfy their higher education needs. American institutions like Princeton have already seen an increase of 6% in applications from British students.

More worrying, however, is the prospect that by the end of the decade the cap on tuition fees is due to be lifted and universities are expected to increase top-up and tuition fees dramatically to meet their high-funding demands. Given the current trend, it is likely that this will be accompanied by a general decrease in applications and in particular applications from not only low-income group students, but lower-middle class pupils too.

The solution is perhaps to leave the cap on what could easily become a skyrocketing level of tuition fees and a plummeting level of students.

The debate has been triggered partially by government proposals seeking to redress the highly uneven balance of conviction rates in rape trials, and partially by the incidence of “false” cases, which have seen some women “crying wolf”.

To combat this, ministers have proposed the naming of women who are found to have falsely accused men of sexual assault. This has already been practiced in the recent case of a man who spent three years in prison after being falsely accused. The House of Lord’s Court of Appeal has since named the woman involved. There is, however, the worry that this legislation would further deter many women from coming forward to report such crimes. The numbers of reported attacks are much fewer in comparison to the actual suspected incidence of sexual assault.

The real crux of the current furore is, as always, the delicate issue of consent. Cases of alleged rape are notoriously tricky to prove, often culminating in a moral judgement on behalf of the jury as to whether the accused or the accuser is telling the whole and honest truth. This is reflected in the shockingly low rate of conviction in such cases, with only 5-6% of accused rapists being convicted, according to the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO).

The role of alcohol in many cases makes the jurors’ decision all the more difficult. Not only does alcohol confuse the mind, altering the accuracy and even existence of memory, but it also lowers inhibition and alters normal behaviour patterns.

The water is further muddied by the apparent proliferation of the use of so-called “date-rape” drugs such as GHB and Rohypnol. Yet the extent of the usage of such drugs is, in reality, much slimmer than is often imagined. A study from 2004 –2005 has shown that of 120 victims only two cases showed evidence of such drugging. Detective Chief Superintendent, Dave Gee, a co-author of a recent ACPO report, has claimed, “The most common method of spiking drinks is alcohol.”

This has led government ministers to propose amendments to legislation concerning the legality of “drunken consent”. The core of the amendment would be to invalidate a female’s consent to sex if she is inebriated. In practice this could mean many men becoming liable for charges of rape or sexual assault, following sexual intercourse with a “drunk” female.

How, in this case, is “drunk” to be defined? Need the person involved consumed as much as a bottle of Jack Daniels or is half a glass of wine enough? What if both consenting parties are under the influence? Where is the line to be drawn between rape and consent? The proposal is in this respect outrageous. While it is one thing to affirm that it is morally wrong for a male to take advantage of an inebriated female, it is another to label consensual drunk sex as rape, with the accused facing the serious possibility of a long prison sentence and being listed on the sexual offenders’ register.

The reaction to the proposal has been predictably fierce. Some have proclaimed the responsibility to be among the women themselves who get so drunk that they have no idea where they are and what their name is. Some even go to the extreme of seeing it as women’s own fault. Others, including a number of women’s groups, have reacted equally strongly, asserting that the blaming of victims is totally unjust. They are still victims of a crime and should be treated with equal sympathy.

The debate seems set to continue. What seems to have been overlooked, however, is that it is almost impossible to proclaim universal judgements about cases as a whole, when each case is unique. Perhaps we should all leave the decision to the jurors – having access to the evidence from both sides, they are the ones who are most informed.

The conflict in some ways seems only to have enabled Hezbollah to strengthen their hold on much of the population of Southern Lebanon, while Israel has come under criticism from both internal and external bodies about its conduct during the war.
In Lebanon itself there is much reconstruction to be done.

Unexploded cluster bombs have been discovered in close to 750 separate locations in the South, which will prevent more than 200,000 displaced people returning to their homes.

Cluster bombs are still legal to use when directed against military targets. Israel has claimed that Hezbollah militants have been hiding out in civilian areas, which has made it ever more difficult to distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate targeting. Their use, however, has been criticised jointly by Amnesty International, the United Nations and Human Rights Watch.

The United Nations predicts that it may take up to two years to fully sweep the area for unexploded ordinances. Bombs can be found on rooftops, mixed in with rubble and litter, across fields, roads and driveways. Over a hundred people have so far been wounded by these unexploded devices.

Politically the situation also remains volatile. The leadership of Hezbollah have rejected calls by the UN to disarm, and there is still a very significant de facto Hezbollah presence in the south. Lebanese troops have now been able to move into the region though, supported by a UN peacekeeping force numbering around 6,000.

There are many who also worry that the destabilisation of the Lebanese government during war could result in the return of the only recently departed Syrian forces back into the country. Syria has been accused by the United States of financing and backing Hezbollah.

For years prior to the conflict, Hezbollah acted almost as a “state within a state” in Southern Lebanon, setting up schools and providing services for the local population. Many argue that it has been the failure of the Lebanese government in allowing this kind of situation to continue that allowed Hezbollah to become so powerful.

Israel and the United States both view Hezbollah as a terrorist group. The position of the UK is a little cloudier, recognising the militant wing as a terrorist organisation, but not its political side.

By Adam Sloan and Claire Yeo
POLITICS EDITORS

The bicentenary raises the key question of how should we commemorate the event. How exactly should Britain today respond to the darker side of imperialism, to the country’s complicity in the slave trade?

The University of York is hosting an international bicentenary conference in April 2007. Speakers from all over the globe are to address the meaning and impact of the western abolition of slavery and its legacy. David Lammy, MP and Minister for the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, has already visited Hull this year to inspect the preparations for the event.

Yorkshire itself has its own particular connections to the slave trade. William Wilberforce, one of the key leaders in the Emancipation of the Slaves movement, was born in Hull. John Beecroft of Whitby was responsible, as British Consul to West Africa, for persuading local chiefs to discontinue the sale of their fellow Africans into a life of slavery.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, has, this year, apologised on behalf of the Anglican Church for its role in the slave trade. The Church was one of the great profiteers from the slave trade through its sugar plantations in the West Indies. This apology follows in line with the City of Liverpool’s apology in 1999. Bristol, also a key centre for the trade is as yet to follow suit, but before it will do this, a response needs to be made by the government to the fierce debate about the relevance and, even, adequacy of these apologies.

The argument is that if Britain apologises for its role in the slave trade, then should not the Italians apologise for the slavery of the British under the Roman Empire? Should not Africa apologise to its own people for its role in the capture and sale of its own citizens into slavery? Should not an apology be made for the virtual slavery 200 years ago of the British working class?

This debate, while important, detracts from the contemporary nature of slavery. Should we not be concentrating our attention on the slavery that is occurring now, in Africa, South Asia, China and in parts of the Arab world? UN figures show that 12.3 million people are still subjected to modern forms of slavery, be it people trafficking or forced, bonded or child labour.

Continuing the battle begun by the anti-slavery activists, such as William Wilberforce, should be a key part of the commemoration.

Indeed, the recognition of Britain’s not so glorious past is crucial to understanding that much of this nation’s power, then and now, has been built on the back of horrific and unjustifiable exploitation. It is a part of our heritage that we must confront.

These events “have profound meaning for everyone in this country. It is an event of such significance to Britain’s history and our identity today,” MP David Lammy has commented.
James Walvin, speaker at the conference and member of the committee advising the government on the issue, explains, “The bicentenary presents an opportunity for Britain to come to terms with its past.” The British Empire put more slaves into plantations in the Americas than any other imperial power.

The key issue is that it provides a chance to remember that things were not at all as glorious as we are often so keen to imagine. There was barely an institution existing in the eighteenth century that was not in some way connected to the slave trade. For Walvin, while apologies are all very well, Britain’s coming to terms with this heritage is more important.

Apologies will do little to rectify the terrible atrocity of slavery. Reparation payments to descendents of the oppressed will not aid those who are still enslaved. Only by intensifying the fight against modern slavery will the commemoration be fully complete.

It has been relatively under-reported that many of our university lecturers have been actively engaging in an academic boycott targeted against the state of Israel. While we have all been worrying about the duration of the AUT’s recent “assessments boycott,” which has had us all up in arms about finalists’ prospects of graduating on time, it seems that there have been some other interesting developments occurring within the university teachers’ union. Few of us may actually be aware of another policy of the union’s sister organisation NATFHE for which Israeli academics, rather than British students, have had to bear the brunt.

Up until May last year, the AUT itself had been actively boycotting the Israeli universities of Haifa and Bar-Ilan, with the intention of extending this to include the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. It had claimed that these institutions had been complicit in the government’s “abuse” of Palestinians. This boycott involved tactics such as refraining from any form of academic or cultural cooperation, collaboration or joint projects with Israel; suspension of subsidies and funding to these institutions; and supporting Palestinian academic and cultural institutions directly without requiring them to partner with Israeli counterparts.

Although the AUT’s special council has since voted to revoke all such motions of this nature in favour of preserving academic freedom (a dubious principle to advocate considering the obvious detrimental impact the boycott has on academic freedom), the union’s new partner and sister union, NATFHE, still has in place a motion inviting its 69,000 members to consider a boycott of academics and universities which do not distance themselves from Israeli government policy.

The union, which has very recently merged with the AUT to form a larger umbrella organisation UCU (the University and College Union), has accused the government of pursuing what it has called “apartheid policies” in Israel which have been likened to those of the apartheid regime of South Africa in the 1980’s. The union has also condemned what it cites as “discriminatory educational practices” in Israeli higher education.

While the boycott is said to have expired with NATFHE’s amalgamation into UCU, many see this as merely a “technical matter” that does not indicate a change regarding Israel, and should not constitute grounds for assuming a victory for freedom of speech over the boycotts. The AUT, by contrast, have totally reversed this policy, stating, “the AUT does not endorse this policy and is strongly advising its members not to implement it.”

The actions of both unions are highly contentious. Several academics, including Oren Ben-Dor from the University of Southampton, have argued that the AUT’s overturning of the boycott is a “missed opportunity to awaken Israelis, and in turn Palestinians, to the urgent need to engage in a debate about all the skeletons in the cupboard.”

The effectiveness of a boycott as a means of improving dialogue is highly questionable, and is seen by many as merely counterproductive. Supporting trade unionists in Israel and Palestine which are working for peace seems, instead, a much more proactive way of improving the situation. Yet the central issue is not whether the unions are correct in their accusations, but whether or not they legitimately should attempt such a boycott. Indeed, the move seems, in many ways, little more than a blatant denial of freedom of academic speech, a principle that is central to the integrity of academic unions. As AUT’s general secretary, Sally Hunt, has stated, “UK higher education has had a long and proud tradition of defending academic freedom. The struggle to maintain academic freedom whenever it is under threat is one that the AUT will always support and which will always guide our work.”

Surely, therefore, their actions against the Israeli academics run counter to this claim
While we can accept that the AUT are now taking a more proactive approach to the Israel-Palestine conflict, the NATFHE are not. “By pursuing such a policy, NATFHE will isolate its members and their students rather than Israeli academics,” as Israeli Ambassador to the UK, Zvi Heifetz, has commented. Again, it would seem the wrong people are being unfairly targeted.

For the first six months, the assembly will have no legislative powers, and will be continued to be ruled from Westminster. The absence of the 108 members from the chamber has cost the taxpayer nearly £100m in members’ salaries. We must ask, however, whether this new attempt at devolution in Northern Ireland will lead to any permanent stability for the province?

The Mr Hain’s new policy provides a framework to timetable events, rather than allowing them to drift on endlessly. A 24 November 2006 deadline has been imposed, by which time the assembly must have a power-sharing agreement or face salaries being withdrawn.

The 2003 elections saw the polarisation of political representation, with moderate parties losing substantial ground to extremists. The formation of an executive must be by coalition but Sinn Fein and the DUP, the two largest parties, have so far refused to negotiate. Mr Hain’s ultimatum, however, should provide politicians with incentives to approach the negotiating table.

Recent outbreaks of sectarian violence have again lead to doubts about the stability of the peace settlement. The murders of Catholic schoolboy Michael McIvleen, and of Denis Donaldson, a high ranking Sinn Fein official who had been an informant for the British government, have deepened tensions.

The IRA’s final decommissioning of its weapons has, however, has been a landmark of progress in the period between sessions. The Independent International Commission on Decommissioning reported last September that the IRA had met its commitments to withdraw all of its arms and this has been a crucial step in the peace process.

The sectarian divide is two-sided, however, and the accusations of republican terrorist links are not the only ones holding up the process. The loyalist paramilitaries, UVP and UDA, have not been recognised as observing the ceasefire.

The situation is again at a deadlock. Sectarianism appears to be ingrained into Northern Ireland politics. The deadline could potentially be just what is needed to force the politicians to the bargaining table. If it does not force some kind of solution, however, the democratic deficit is set to continue. This, while being undoubtedly better than the violence of previous decades, cannot be endured indefinitely.