Photo courtesy of Africa action
Contributors to the darfur childrens drawings now exhibited at the United Methodist building in D.C.

By Robtel Neajai Pailey
WI Staff Writer
Thursday, February 2, 2006

Once a headline item that virtually disappeared from mainstream international news boards, the horrific killing of innocent people in Darfur, Sudan has been framed in the drawings of its youngest survivors. Erected in the United Methodist Building in Northeast, D.C., the drawings serve as a reminder that genocide rages on in the North African country, pitting armed government-supported militias against Darfur’s defenseless civilian population.

Dr. Jerry Ehrlich, a pediatrician from New Jersey, collected drawings from children in Darfur while he was working with Doctors without Borders in one of the camps for internally displaced people.

“I wanted to document the plight of the people through the eyes of children. I brought with me 25 boxes of crayons and about 400 pieces of drawing paper,” Ehrlich said.

He gave them to children, ages 8 through 12, and hid the drawings in a daypack under his medical instruments. He eventually transported the drawings to the U.S. for public display.

Africa Action, a D.C. based African affairs non-governmental organization, converted these drawings into an exhibit to help remind people of the on-going genocide in Darfur. In a whirlwind effort to mobilize support for the people of Darfur, the organization has prompted thousands of concerned citizens to send postcards of these drawings to the White House, thereby demanding action from President Bush and the United Nations.

Marie Clarke Brill, Africa Action’s Director of Public Education & Mobilization, said that the U.S. has acknowledged that what is happening in Darfur constitutes genocide.

“This means that a top priority of the U.S. should be providing protection to the people of Darfur,” she said. As a result of Africa Action’s effort on behalf of Darfur’s innocent civilians, hundreds of people have visited the “Children of Darfur: Picturing Genocide” exhibit where they are bombarded with heart-wrenching depictions of death and destruction.

Concerned citizens have also sent postcards of the children's drawings to the White House in recent weeks urging action, according to Africa Action, and many planned to participate in a rally at the White House on Feb. 2, when the U.S. is slated to become president of the United Nations Security Council.

“Moved by the exhibit of children's drawings from the youngest survivors of the violence in Darfur, viewers are compelled to give voice to the children's silent testimony to the genocide and the need for protection,” said Clarke Brill. Recent reports flooding out of Darfur indicate that the security situation is deteriorating at break-neck speed. It is now estimated that 80-90 percent of all villages in Darfur have been destroyed and 6,000 people die every month in overcrowded camps plagued by shortages of food, clean water, sanitation, shelter and medical supplies.

Comprised of eight children’s sketches in 24 x 36 billboard-like displays, the drawings are accompanied by an introductory piece of the same size inviting people to sign petitioning postcards to President Bush. In addition to its installation at the United Methodist Building in D.C., the exhibit has also circulated throughout area universities and organizations that host public meetings.

Africa Action was intrigued by the youthful lens of the exhibition because it dramatizes the effects of political inaction. Apart from its Stop Genocide in Darfur campaign, the organization also advocates for African debt cancellation and affordable HIV/AIDS antiretroviral medicines. For over 50 years, Africa Action has served as one of the oldest organizations in the U.S. mobilizing for equitable U.S. foreign policy in Africa.

Through mid-February, you can view the “Children of Darfur-Picturing Genocide” exhibit at the UnitedMethodistBuilding, 100 Maryland Ave. NE, Washington, DC. For more information on Africa Action’s campaign to halt the genocide in Darfur, go to http://www.africaaction.org/index.php, or call 202/546-7961.