Paving the 'war and destruction' path

International | President Bush gives a diplomatic pass to a brutal Islamist government, yet evidence persists that Khartoum is using U.S. "good faith" to crush the Christian south | Mindy Belz

Calling for an end to dictatorships in the Middle East has not prevented the Bush administration from telling one of the world's most brutal dictatorships on African soil to stay the course.

In a written communique delivered to Congress on April 22, President Bush certified to lawmakers that Sudan is "negotiating in good faith" with rebels from the south who have fought a 20-year civil war against Islamic rule. While admitting that "there is still much work remaining," the president asserted, "both sides have made significant progress negotiating a just and comprehensive peace for the people of Sudan."

Those assertions put the National Islamic Front government in Khartoum on equal footing with southern and mostly Christian Sudanese brutalized by the government's long-standing policy of forced Islamization, slavery, and government-induced famine. Last year lawmakers and the president agreed to end that sort of status-quo diplomacy. By failing to distinguish oppressors from victims, they agreed, it had brought no real breakthrough in Sudan's civil war. In addition, the equivocating comes despite evidence the Khartoum regime is undertaking a military buildup to carry out further attacks on the south.