The Darfur rally last week raised a small level of awareness, but the event remains an effective step forward toward an end to the conflict in Sudan, according to officers of AU's chapter of STAND: A Student Anti-Genocide Coalition, the group that helped organize the event.
Since the April 13 rally, students from Georgetown University and George Washington University have expressed an interest in collaborating with AU's chapter on Darfur advocacy, according to Victoria Bosselman, the chapter's secretary.
Part of the awareness resulted from the arrest of 18 students during the rally. None of the arrested students were AU students, according to Dana Fleitman, the chapter's president.
The students had refused to leave the gates of the White House in front of Lafayette Square as an act of civil disobedience, Fleitman said.
"When people are willing to sacrifice time and their police records, it gets attention," she said. "It shows we're serious and tired of the slow pace [in resolving the genocide in Darfur.]"
Bosselman said it is important to advocate ending the conflict in Darfur even though the United States faces other pressing issues like the Iraq war and the impending recession.
Genocide has continued in different areas of the world in the past decades, a trend that needs to stop, she said.
"This is happening to people who can't help themselves," Bosselman said.
She and Fleitman said President Bush has helped increasing awareness to the issue by being the first and only head of state to classify the conflict as genocide, but that he needs to follow up on his promises.
One initiative STAND wants Bush to support is the African Union Mission in Darfur, a joint African Union and United Nations peacekeeping effort that will use military force to protect civilians and aid workers in Darfur, according to Bosselman.
Fleitman said it is important for the United States to influence other countries, including China, to pressure the Sudanese government to end the genocide.
China is Sudan's largest trading partner but has acquiesced to international pressure by sending engineers to help peacekeepers in Darfur and having an envoy discuss peace with the Sudanese government.
For now, Fleitman and Bosselman are pleased with the turnout at the rally, which drew between 400 and 500 people.
"It wasn't the biggest rally I've ever seen but the people who came were passionate," Bosselman said.
AU's chapter of STAND finalized the event in the weeks before the rally, Fleitman said.
Originally, the group had planned to hold the event April 27, but STAND's national chapter wanted the event to coincide with Amnesty International's "Global Darfur Day."
The National Park Service was aware of the intended act of civil disobedience and Park Service officers cited the arrested students and released them within hours, according to Fleitman.
