Sponsored Terrorism Has a Long History on

¶ … sponsored Terrorism Terrorism has a long history on the international stage. It is the use of violence by specific groups looking to change the politics of a country or region. Starting with Guy Fawkes trying to blow up Parliament and the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, terrorists tended to be small groups of likeminded individuals, who received non-state support. The 1970s saw the introduction of terrorist groups funded by governments (Gareau, 2004).

These state sponsored terrorists, were a covert method of governments to wage war and carry out their interests without international scrutiny. Today, while states are apprehensive of publicly supporting any sort of terrorist activity, it does exist. The Darfur conflict is a modern example of state-sponsored terrorism. The conflict in Darfur started in 2003; the people of the Darfur region were growing dissatisfied with their political marginalization and chronic economic underdevelopment, along with elements of ethnic tension, which culminated in violence by two rebel groups.

Members of the Sudan Liberation Movement and Justice and Equality Movement attacked the military garrison at El Fasher (Jackson, Murphy, Poynting, 2011). The ethnic tension stemmed from the colonial era, when Arab tribes were shown favoritism in the colonial administration. Darfur, an area populated by non-Arabs, was neglected and underdeveloped. This trend continued after independence from British rule, as Arabs retained control of the government, continuing to favor Arab populated regions. The Arab elite also promoted Arab supremacist tendencies, developing antagonistic policies against Christians and Africans (Jackson, Murphy, Poynting, 2011).

The supremacist attitudes of the government in Khartoum, explains the extreme measures it took to suppress the Darfur rebellion. Khartoum argues it took legitimate counter-insurgency measures, an appropriate and necessary exercise of state power. However, non-Arab populations in Darfur experienced murder, rape, and carnage, planned and carried out by their own government (Gareau, 2004). Civilians were attacked, entire villages were burned, and large segments of the population were displaced. The actions of the Sudanese government can be construed as genocide, attempting to cleanse Darfur of non-Arab populations.

The government's constructed a multi-step approach to suppressing the rebellion and the civilian population in Darfur. The first step the Sudanese government took was an overall suppression of alleged rebel sympathizers. The governors of the Darfur region were removed from their positions, and were replaced with loyalists. The government abolished the courts in Darfur and instructed Interior Minister Ahmed Harun to plan the attack against rebels and the civilian population (Jackson, Murphy, Poynting, 2011).

Secondly, the government hired, armed, and financially supported nomadic Arab militias from western Sudan to fight the rebels and attack non-Arab towns and villages, which were suspected of supporting the rebels. However, the Janjaweed, were motivated by selfish reasons. They coveted the land in Darfur, and wished to enrich themselves and their tribes (Jackson, Murphy, Poynting, 2011). This served the Sudanese government's interest as it exploited existing tensions to their benefit. Exploiting ethnic tensions led to atrocious war crimes, as was seen in the Balkans.

The Janjaweed attacked villages, killing the men, raping the women and abducting children. They burnt entire villages,.