The Sudanese Embassy was shut down this week after a series of protests staged outside the building. This should encourage AU students who have activist aspirations. Sometimes protests really do have an impact, and students shouldn't stay home just because they think real results are unlikely. The AU students involved in these protests should be proud of what they have accomplished.
If anything, it's beneficial just to call more attention to the situation in Sudan, which has been appallingly neglected by the international community. Although the Arab militia called the Janjaweed have killed thousands of Africans, the United Nations, the European Union and Amnesty International have declined to call it genocide.
The United Nations was founded on the principle of "never again" after the horrors of the Holocaust were revealed. Yet, there have been genocides since 1945, including one in Sudan's neighbor Rwanda in the 1990s. Nearly 800,000 people died, and afterwards the international community once again cried "never again."
In Sudan, they have another chance to stop genocide and nobody seems to be doing anything. The United Nations and other groups should condemn these atrocities for what they are and stop pretending they don't know what's going on.
In the meantime, people around the world, such as the students who protested in front of the Sudanese embassy, should put pressure on world leaders to do something to stop it.
