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Inside the New Print Edition of CounterPunch: a Special Report by David Price on the CIA on Campus The CIA's New Campus Spies: Meet "PRISP", it may be at work on a campus near you. Program doles out cash to train tomorrow's spooks ; they say it's like ROTC, only it's all secret; a hundred spooklets on campus today; thousands down the road; pay back your loan by translating for torturers in tomorrow's Abu Ghraibs; meet PRISP's Frankenstein, Prof Felix Moos; anthropologists and the CIA, a deadly embrace by David Price; ALSO Alexander Cockburn on Disaster Relief as Scam; air-conditioned tents for the NGOs and money to burn; how tourist "development" deepened tsunami's impact; why governments love "relief". AND Humans and Woodchippers: When small isn't beautiful. Remember these stories are available exclusively in the print edition of CounterPunch. CounterPunch Online is read by millions of viewers each month! But remember, we are funded solely by the subscribers to the print edition of CounterPunch. Please support this website by buying a subscription to our newsletter, which contains fresh material you won't find anywhere else, or by making a donation for the online edition. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now! Call Toll Free 1-800-840-3683 or write CounterPunch, PO BOX 228, Petrolia, CA 95558

Wars of the Laptop Bombers   Today's Stories February 5, 2005 Alexander Cockburn Ward Churchill and the Mad Dogs February 4, 2005 Brian Cloughley The Army Symphonist: "Sometimes the Only Way to Change the Behavior of Someone Like That is to Kill Them" Bill Christison Election Parallels: Vietnam, 1967; Iraq, 2005 Elaine Cassel Did Zoloft Make Him Do It? Jacob Levich Chomsky and the Draft Kanak Mani Dixit Return of the Royalists in Nepal Ron Jacobs The Downward Spiral in Iraq   February 3, 2005 Ward Churchill On the Injustice of Getting Smeared: a Campaign of Fabrications and Gross Distortions Sharon Smith Resisting Soldiers Need Our Support Mickey Z. Leslie Gelb Asks Iraq: Who's Your Daddy? Mike Whitney President of Alienation: a Desperate State of the Union Jenna Orkin 9/11 the Sequel: the Toxic State of Lower Manhattan Saul Landau Elections Won't Prevent Civil War in Iraq Yitzhak Laor Strange is the Silence Dave Lindorff The Assault on Social Security: a New Campaign of Lies   February 2, 2005 David Domke / Kevin Coe Bush's Brand of Christianity Noam Chomsky Iraq After the Elections M. Shahid Alam O'Reilly's Fatwah on "Un-American" Professors: FoxNews Puts Me in Its Crosshairs Richard Oxman Ringing in 1984 with Ward Churchill and Derrick Jensen Joshua Frank The Suckering of Howard Dean Dave Lindorff A History Lesson from the NYT Nina Hartley Feminists for Porn Website of the Day War is a Racket   February 1, 2005 Joshua L. Dratel The Torture Memos Patrick Cockburn New Doubts About Allawi Robert Fisk "The Only Decent Food We Get is at Funerals" Uri Avnery The Stalemate Col. Dan Smith "W" Stands for Withdrawal Alison Weir Making America as "Secure" as Israel Alan Farago Heaven and Hell in the Everglades Ray Hanania Low Voter Turnout of Iraqi Expatriates: Less Than 10% of Qualified Voters Paul Craig Roberts American Police State Website of the Day Statisticians Refute Official Rationale for Exit Poll Errors       January 31, 2005 Dave Zirin Mr. Frank's Fatwah: New Republic Writer Calls for Death & Torture of Arundhati Roy and Stan Goff Robert Fisk Amid Tragedy, Defiance Chyng Sun Gonzales: Chief Prosecutor of Porn? Greg Moses The Real Scandals of the Texas Election Mike Whitney Cheney at Auschwitz Ali Tonak Turkey and the EU: Fantasies and Ultimatums Patrick Cockburn A Victory for the Shia Website of the Day Voting by the Script: Where Did the 8 Million Voter Turnout Figure Come From?     January 29 / 30, 2005 Manuel Yang / Peter Linebaugh A Dialogue About Murder in Toledo Gabriel Kolko Wilsonian and Neoconservative Myths Patrick Cockburn Baghdad: City of Empty Streets Robert Fisk This Election Will Change the World, But Not as the US Wanted Linn Washington, Jr. Con Job: Bush Pledges on Racism Lack Realism Bernard Chazelle Why the Children of Iraq Make No Sound When They Fall Gary Leupp "This Kind of Subject Matter": Bush's New Ed Secretary vs. Vermont's Lesbians JoAnn Wypijewski The Passion of Paul Shanley Alexander Cockburn The Case of Father Jerry Ron Jacobs Ballot of the Puppets in Iraq Brian Cloughley Smart Bombs; Wrong House: Iraq's Civilian Dead Fred Gardner Peron May Split Sister Dianna Ortiz Memo to Bush from a Survivor of the Guatemalan Torturers: Stop the Torture! Tom Reeves How Bush Brings Freedom to the World: the Case of Haiti Fran Quigley Report: Haiti Now "More Violent and More Inhuman" Suzan Mazur "Mr. Garsin from Kinshasa": an Old Hand Weighs In on the Murder of Lumumba Kurt Nimmo Condi Rice and the Neocon Plan for the Palestinians Lenni Brenner Holocaust History: Beyond the UN's Rhetoric Gilad Atzmon The Politics of Auschwitz Luis Gomez Power and Autonomy in Bolivia Mark Gaffney NASA Searches for a Snowball in Hell: Why Velikovsky Matters Ben Tripp Lament of the Mnemonopath Richard Oxman Meet the Fuqers Poets' Basement Louise, Collins, Shanahan and Albert Website of the Weekend Chemical Industry: Deceit and Denial     January 28, 2005 Rachard Itani Tsunami Aid By the Numbers: the US Really is a Miser Jensen / Youngblood Iraq's Non-Election Patrick Cockburn / Elizabeth Davies Attacks on Polling Places Leave 13 Dead Dave Zirin The Great Donovan McNabb: Proud "Black Quarterback" Dave Lindorff Suicide by State Execution? Karyn Strickler A Corporate Death Penalty Act? Jorge Mariscal Fighting the Poverty Draft     January 27, 2005 Seymour Hersh We've Been Taken Over By a Cult Cockburn / Sengupta The US's Bloodiest Day in Iraq Dave Lindorff Juke Box Journalism: Shilling for Bush Ignacio Chapela / John F. García The Laws of Nature Mike Whitney The Widening Chasm Among Conservatives Dr. Teresa Whitehurst Those Liberal Southern Baptists! Ray McGovern Reining In Cheney Russ Wellen Marginalizing Bin Laden Christopher Brauchli The FBI's Carnival of Errors Website of the Day Informed Eating         January 26, 2005 Saree Makdisi An Iron Wall of Colonization: Fantasies and Realities About the Prospects for Middle East Peace Scott Fleming In Good Conscience: an Interview with Concientious Objector Aidan Delgado Dave Lindorff Filling Saddam's Shoes: the Puppet Regime Return's to Torture Niranjan Ramakrishnan Salazar and Obama: Two Dismal Debuts Toni Solo The US and Latin America: a Not-So-Magical Reality William James Martin Condoleezza Rice: Confused About the Middle East William A. Cook Bush's Second Inaugural Address: the Lost Ur-Version Eric Hobsbawm Delusions About Democracy Alexander Cockburn The CIA's New Campus Spies     January 25, 2005 Brian Cloughley Iraq as Disneyland Mike Roselle Satan is My Co-Pilot Josh Frank / Merlin Chowkwanyun The War on Civil Liberties John Chuckman Freedom on Steroids Paul Craig Roberts A Party Without Virtue Dr. Teresa Whitehurst The Intolerance of Christian Conservatives James Petras The US / Colombia Plot Against Venezuela Website of the Day Lowbaggers for the Environment     January 24, 2005 Fred Gardner Last Monologue in Burbank Lori Berenson On the Politicization of My Case Uri Avnery King George January 22 / 23, 2005 Jennifer Van Bergen / Ray Del Papa Nuclear Incident in Montana Alexander Cockburn Prince Harry's Travails Jeffrey St. Clair The Company That Runs the Empire: Lockheed and Loaded Stan Goff The Spectacle Saul Landau Nothing Succeeds Like Failure Gary Leupp Official Madness and the Coming War on Iran Fred Gardner Is GW Getting the Runaround? Phil Gasper Clemency Denied: the Politics of Death in California Stanley Heller A Kill-Happy Government: Connecticut Chooses Death Greg Moses The Heart of Texas: an Inauguration Day Betrayal on Civil Rights Justin Taylor The Folk-Histories of John Ross Daniel Burton-Rose One China; Many Problems Elaine Cassel Try a Little Tyranny: Questions While Watching the Inaugural Mike Whitney Failing Upwards: the Rise of Michael Chertoff Mark L. Berenson My Daughter Has Been Wrongly Imprisoned Christopher Brauchli It Doesn't Compute: a $170 Million Mistake Gilad Atzmon Zionism and Other Marginal Thoughts Niranjan Ramakrishnan Day of the Rats Mark Donham The Secret Messages of Rahm Emmanuel Ben Tripp Adventures in Online Dating Walter Brasch Hollywood's Patriots: Soulless Kooks, Mr. Bush? Poets' Basement Wuest, Landau, Ford, Albert & Drum     January 21, 2005 Dave Lindorff A Great American Journalist: John L. Hess (1917-2005) Sharon Smith The Anti-War Movement and the Iraqi Resistance Don Santina Baseball, Racism and Steroid Hysteria Ron Jacobs Locked Out and Pissed Off: Protesting the Bush Inauguration Kurt Nimmo The Problem with Mike Ruppert Don Monkerud Once They Were Cults: Bush's Faith-Based Social Services Alan Farago Swimming Home from the Galapagos Derek Seidman An Interview with Army Medic and Anti-War Activist Patrick Resta       January 20, 2005 Paul Craig Roberts Dying for Sycophants William Cook The Bush Inauguration: A Mock Epic Fertility Rite Joshua Frank The Democrats and Iran: Look Who's Backing Bush's Next Eric Ruder Why Andres Raya Snapped: Another Casualty of Bush's War Mike Whitney Coronation in a Garrison State Robert Jensen A Citizens Oath of Office Peter Rost Bush Report on Drug Imports: Good Data, Bad Conclusions David Underhill Is It Torture Yet?: the Eclectic Fool Aid Torture Test James Reiss Adieu, Colin Powell: Pea Soup in Foggy Bottom CounterPunch Staff Voices from Abu Ghraib: the Injured Party       January 19, 2005 Marta Russell Social Security Privatization & Disability: 8 Million at Risk Mike Ferner Marines Stretching Movement: Protesting Urban Warfare in Toledo Nancy Oden The Nuremberg Principles, Iraq and Torture Tony Paterson A Catalogue of British Abuses in Iraq Dave Lindorff Bush's Divide-and-Conquer Plan to Destroy Social Security Doug Giebel BS and CBS: When 60 Minutes Helped Promote WMD Fantasies Alexander Cockburn Will Bush Quit Iraq?       January 18, 2005 Paul Craig Roberts How Americans Were Seduced by War: Empire and Militant Christianity Jennifer Van Bergen Federal Judge: Abu Ghraib Abuses Result of Decision to Ignore Geneva Conventions Douglas Lummis It's a No Brainer; Send Graner: a Rap for Our Time Ron Jacobs Syria Back in the Crosshairs? Seth DeLong Enter the Dragon: Will Washington Tolerate a Venezuelan-Chinese Oil Pact? Lance Selfa Stolen Election?: Most Democrats Didn't Even Bother to Inquire Paul D. Johnson Mystery Meat: a Right-to-Know About Food Origins Elisa Salasin An Open Letter to Jenna Bush, Future Teacher     January 17, 2005 Heather Gray Misconceptions About King's Methods for Social Change Robert Fisk Hotel Room Journalism: the US Press in Iraq Dave Lindorff What the NYT Death Chart Omitted: Civilians Slaughtered by US Military Jason Leopold Sam Bodman's Smokestacks: Bush's Choice for Energy Czar is One of Texas's Worst Polluters Gary Leupp A Message from the Iraqi Resistance Douglas Valentine An Act of State? the Execution of Martin Luther King Harvey Arden Welcome to Leavenworth: My First Encounter with Leonard Peltier Greg Moses King and the Christian Left: Where Lip Service is Not an Option   January 15 / 16, 2005 James Petras The Kidnapping of a Revolutionary Robert Fisk Flying Carpet Airlines: My Return to Baghdad Ron Jacobs Unfit for Military Service Brian Cloughley Smack Daddies of the Hindu Kush: Afghanistan's Drug Bonanza Fred Gardner The Allowable-Quantity Expert Dr. Susan Block The Counter-Inaugural Ball: Eros Day, 2005 John Ross Zapatista Literary Llife Suzan Mazur Unspooking Frank Carlucci M. Shahid Alam America's New Civilizing Mission Frederick B. Hudson Jack Johnson's Real Opponent: "That I Was a Man" Mike Whitney Bush's Grand Plan: Incite Civil War in Iraq Tom Crumpacker A Constitutional Right to Travel to Cuba Bob Burton The Other Armstrong Williams Scandal John Callender La Conchita and the Indomitable 82-Year Old Lila Rajiva Christian Zionism Saul Landau An Imperial Portrait: a Visit to Hearst's Castle Doug Soderstrom A Touch of Evil: the Morality of Neoconservatism Poets' Basement Davies, Louise, Landau, Albert, Collins and Laymon     January 14, 2005 Robert Fisk "The Tent of Occupation" Lee Sustar Bush's Social Security Con Job José M. Tirado The Christians I Know Dave Zirin The Legacy of Jack Johnson Sheldon Rampton Calling John Rendon: a True Tale of "Military Intelligence" Tracy McLellan Under the Influence Yves Engler The Dictatorship of Debt: the World Bank and Haiti Tom Barry Robert Zoellick: a Bush Family Man Website of the Day Ryan for the Nobel Prize?     January 13, 2005 Mark Chmiel / Andrew Wimmer Hearts and Minds, Revisited Joe DeRaymond The Salvador Option: Terror, Elections and Democracy Greg Moses Every Hero a Killer?...Not Dave Lindorff The Great WMD Fraud: Time for an Accounting Jorge Mariscal Dr. Galarza v. Alberto Gonzales: Which Way for Latinos? Christopher Brauchli Gonzales and the Death Penalty: the Executioner Never Sleeps Gary Leupp "Fighting for the Work of the Lord": Christian Fascism in America     January 12, 2005 Robert Fisk Fear Stalks Baghdad Josh Frank The Farce of the DNC Contest Jack Random Casualties of War: the Untold Stories John Roosa Aceh's Dual Disasters: the Tsunami and Military Rule Carol Norris In the Wake of the Tsunami Mike Whitney Pink Slips at CBS Alan Farago Can the Everglades be Saved? Paul Craig Roberts What's Our Biggest Problem in Iraq...the Insurgency or Bush?     January 11, 2005 Tom Barry The US isn't "Stingy"; It's Strategic: Aid as a Weapon of Foreign Policy James Hodge and Linda Cooper Voice of the Voiceless: Father Roy Bourgeois and the School of the the Americas Linda S. Heard Farah Radio Break Down: Joseph Farah's Messages of Hate and Homophobia Derrick O'Keefe Electoral Gigolo?: Richard Gere and the Occupied Vote Gila Svirsky A Tale of Two Elections Harry Browne Irish "Peace Process", RIP   January 10, 2005 Ramzy Baroud Faith-Based Disasters: Tsunami Aid and War Costs Talli Nauman Killing Journalists: Mexico's War on a Free Press Uri Avnery Sharon's Monologue Dave Lindorff Tucker Carlson's Idiot Wind Dave Zirin Randy Moss's Moondance Dave Silver Left Illusions About the Democratic Party Charles Demers Plan Salvador for Iraq: Death Squads Come in Waves William A. Cook Causes and Consequences: Bush, Osama and Israel     January 8 / 9, 2005 Alexander Cockburn Say, Waiter, Where's the Blood in My Margarita Glass? John H. Summers Chomsky and Academic History Greg Moses Getting Real About the Draft Walter A. Davis Bible Says: the Psychology of Christian Fundamentalism Victor Kattan The EU and Middle East Peace John Bolender The Plight of Iraq's Mandeans Robert Fisk The Politics of Lebanon Fred Gardner Situation NORML Joe Bageant The Politics of the Comfort Zone Mickey Z. I Want My DDT: Little Nicky Kristof Bugs Out Ben Tripp CounterClockwise Evolution Ron Jacobs Elvis and His Truck: Out on Highway 61 Saul Landau Sex and the Country Rep. Cynthia McKinney Time to End the Blackout Ellen Cantarow NPR's Distortions on Palestine Richard Oxman Bageantry Continued Poets' Basement Gaffney, Landau, Albert, Collins January 7, 2005 Omar Barghouti Slave Sovereignty: Elections Under Occupation Kent Paterson The Framing of Felipe Arreaga: Another Mexican Environmentalist Arrested Niranjan Ramakrishnan Old Vijay Merchant and the Tsunami David Krieger Cancel the Inauguration Parties Gideon Levy New Year, Old Story Dave Lindorff Ohio Protest: First Shot Fired by Congressional Progressives Christopher Brauchli Privatizing the IRS Roger Burbach / Paul Cantor Bush, the Pentagon and the Tsunami     January 6, 2005 Brian J. Foley Gonzales: Supporting Torture is not His Greatest Sin Greg Moses Boot Up America!: Gen. Helmly's Memo Leaks New Bush Deal Petras / Chomsky An Open Letter to Hugo Chavez Alan Maass The Decline of the Dollar Dave Lindorff Colin Powell's Selective Sense of Horror Jenna Orkin The EPA and a Dirty Bomb: 9/11's Disastrous Precedent P. Sainath The Tsunami and India's Coastal Poor     January 5, 2005 Alan Farago 2004: An Environmental Retrospective Winslow T. Wheeler Oversight Detected?: Sen. McCain and the Boeing Tanker Scam Jean-Guy Allard Gary Webb: a Cuban Perspective Fred Gardner Strutting, Smirking, As If The Mad Plan Was Working David Swanson Albert Parsons on the Gallows Richard Oxman The Joe Bageant Interview Bruce Jackson Death on the Living Room Floor       January 4, 2005 Michael Ortiz Hill Mainlining Apocalypse Elaine Cassel They Say They Can Lock You Up for Life Without a Trial Yoram Gat The Year in Torture Martin Khor Tragic Tales and Urgent Tasks from the Tsunami Disaster Gary Leupp Death and Life in the Andaman Islands   January 3, 2005 Ron Jacobs The War Hits Home Dave Lindorff Is There a Single Senator Who Will Stand Up for Black Voters? Mike Whitney The Guantanamo Gulag Joshua Frank Greens and Republicans: Strange Bedfellows Maria Tomchick Playing Politics with Disaster Aid Rhoda and Mark Berenson Our Daughter Lori: Another Year of Grave Injustice David Swanson The Media and the Ohio Recount Kathleen Christison Patronizing the Palestinians     January 1 / 2, 2005 Gary Leupp Earthquakes and End Times, Past and Present Rev. William E. Alberts On "Moral Values": Code Words for Emerging Authoritarian Tendencies M. Shahid Alam Testing Free Speech in America Stan Goff A Period for Pedagogy Brian Cloughley Bush and the Tsunami: the Petty and the Petulant Sylvia Tiwon / Ben Terrall The Aftermath in Aceh Ben Tripp Requiem for 2004 Greg Moses A Visible Future? Steven Sherman The 2004 Said Awards: Books Against Empire Sean Donahue The Erotics of Nonviolence James T. Phillips The Beast's Belly David Krieger When Will We Ever Learn Poets' Basement Soderstrom, Hamod, Louise and Albert         December 23, 2004 Chad Nagle Report from Kiev: Yushchenko's Not Quite Ready for Sainthood David Smith-Ferri The Real UN Disgrace in Iraq Bill Quigley Death Watch for Human Rights in Haiti Mickey Z. Crumbs from Our Table Christopher Brauchli Merck's Merry X-mas Greg Moses When No Law Means No Law Alan Singer An Encounter with Sen. Schumer: a Very Dangerous Democrat David Price Social Security Pump and Dump Website of the Day Gabbo Gets Laid   December 22, 2004 James Petras An Open Letter to Saramago: Nobel Laureate Suffers from a Bizarre Historical Amnesia Omar Barghouti The Case for Boycotting Israel Patrick Cockburn / Jeremy Redmond They Were Waiting on Chicken Tenders When the Rounds Hit Harry Browne Northern Ireland: No Postcards from the Edge Richard Oxman On the Seventh Column Kathleen Christison Imagining Palestine Website of the Day FBI Torture Memos     December 21, 2004 Greg Moses The New Zeus on the Block: Unplugging Al-Manar TV Dave Lindorff Losing It in America: Bunker of the Skittish Chad Nagle The View from Donetsk Dragon Pierces Truth* Concrete Colossus vs. the River Dragon: Dislocation and Three Gorges Dam Patrick Cockburn "Things Always Get Worse" Seth DeLong Aiding Oppression in Haiti Ahmad Faruqui Pakistan and the 9/11 Commission's Report Paul Craig Roberts America Locked Up: a System of Injustice                                     Hot Stories Alexander Cockburn Behold, the Head of a Neo-Con! Subcomandante Marcos The Death Train of the WTO Norman Finkelstein Hitchens as Model Apostate Steve Niva Israel's Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings? Dardagan, Slobodo and Williams CounterPunch Exclusive: 20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians Steve J.B. Prison Bitch Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber True Lies: the Use of Propaganda in the Iraq War Wendell Berry Small Destructions Add Up CounterPunch Wire WMD: Who Said What When Cindy Corrie A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter I Can't Hear From Gore Vidal The Erosion of the American Dream Francis Boyle Impeach Bush: A Draft Resolution Click Here for More Stories.     Subscribe Online

Weekend Edition February 5 / 6, 2005 War and Peace The Future of Sudanese Refugees in the West By BEHZAD YAGHMAIAN The Naivasha Protocols signed between the Sudanese government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) in Nairobi on Jan. 9 has been viewed as an optimistic sign to many westerners, to whom the ongoing conflicts have until now seemed both interminable and inexplicable. Despite the accord, however, the violence has continued. In places like Darfur, it has even intensified. More than 100 people were killed in a recent raid there by the Sudanese Air Force, which destroyed an entire village in order to make a point to the civilian population of an entire district. The struggle between the Sudanese government and the SPLM, which has trapped a largely defenseless civilian population in the middle, is far from over. The civil war has already killed nearly two million and displaced four million. Many of the war's victims have remained inside their country, described in the language of international relief and diplomatic discourse by the misleadingly innocuous term, "internally displaced persons." In the everyday parlance of blunt American English, we would call them homeless victims, brutalized by men with guns, their homes destroyed en masse, their women and girls gang-raped before the eyes of their fathers and husbands, their crops and livestock stolen or slaughtered, their communities wiped off the face of the earth. These internally displaced persons have already spent years in poverty and absolute destitute, lived in camps, and hoped to return to their villages and homes. Some left for Chad, Egypt, and others reached far-away lands in Asia and Europe. Will the new peace agreement result in a different outcome? The Sudanese migrants and refugees are doubtful. The Naivasha Protocols have not changed the facts on the ground for these people. Alarmed by the premature Western optimism over the Protocols, which they fear will become an excuse for further disengagement by the West from their plight, many displaced Sudanese are anxiously watching both the new peace agreement and the West's response to it. They are skeptical of any prospect of lasting peace, stability, and economic recovery in their country. There have been many failed peace accords in the past. Each time more violence followed, poverty remained, and living conditions worsened. And the sea of internally displaced and migrant Sudanese continued to move desperately, inexorably, to the West. While traveling during the past two years in the secret communities across Europe of migrants from North Africa and the Middle East, I met many such Sudanese migrants in Turkey, Greece, France, and Britain. They live in overcrowded safe houses, squat homes, or sleep on gravel beds alongside railroad tracks. They are men and women from all walks of life, who have clandestinely crossed many borders and faced life-threatening situations. But ironically, despite these hardships, they usually avoid any talk of the prospects for peace in Sudan. They fear losing any chance of being granted asylum if the European immigration authorities claim that the end of Sudan's suffering is at hand. And their fears are well-founded. "I hope the peace talks would fail. No country will accept us if they think there is peace in Sudan," Hafiz, a twenty-seven year old Sudanese told me in an overcrowded safe house in an Istanbul ghetto in the winter of 2003. He left SudanSudan in 1995 to escape mandatory military service and fighting in the civil war, the war he did support. . Working illegally in Lebanon for eight years, he made his way to Turkey with the hope of clandestinely crossing the border to Greece and applying for asylum somewhere in the European Union. His chances were nil. Twice, he was arrested and returned from the border. He was rotting in Istanbul. But, he wished to not return to his place of birth. He was haunted by the specter of peace. "Do you wish to go back to Sudan?" I asked Nur, a Sudanese woman who was once a mathematics teacher in her country. In April 2003, Nur left her home with her husband and her one-year old daughter. For fourteen days and nights they stayed in the bottom of a ship. Cheated by their smuggler, they were dropped off in Istanbul instead of Italy. The family made many attempts to flee to Greece. All failed. A year after arriving in Turkey, Nur became separated from her husband and her daughter. They made it to Greece. She did not. Two months later, she gave birth to a little girl. Everyday, she took her daughter and stood by the sea, imagining to be reunited with her family. Nur was a non-Arab Muslim and a victim of ethnic rivalry and war. But, peace meant returning to old animosities and sub-human conditions in her place of birth. "I have nothing in Istanbul. I have no money. I have no house. Things are bad. But, I think, someday, they will be different. Everything will change when I travel to another country. This will not be the same all the time. But, in the Sudan, nothing will change. Sometimes I dream that I am back in the Sudan. I am teaching. When I wake up, I am very sad." Nur's fears were echoed by the Sudanese who succeeded reaching the heart of the European Union. "I will wait until they accept me somewhere. I will not return," a young Sudanese once told me in Calais, a port in northern France. He slept outdoors by the railroad tracks near a canal away from the town center and waited for the opportunity to hide in a trailer aboard a ship and reach England. The young man wished to apply for asylum and become a British citizen. He too was fearful of the talk of peace in his place of birth. Fearing to Follow the Fate of the Afghans The Sudanese refugees have seen doors closed to the Afghani refugees and migrants since the fall of the Taliban in 2001, and they fear becoming the next group of desperate migrants to be denied protection in the West. In the winter of 2001, the Americans freed Afghanistan from the Taliban, and ended one of the most horrific regimes of modern history. Many refugees returned to their villages, and to what was left of their homes. Others chose not to return. Frightened by the renewal of local tribal and religious violence in their homeland, and the prospect of poverty in a country whose infrastructure and economy had been destroyed by the Taliban and war that ended its rule, these migrants continued their search for a new home in a Western country that would accept them. As the poverty in Afghanistan has persisted and its instability continued, still another wave of Afghans has joined the ranks of these migrants. The fall of the Taliban became the occasion for the end of the West's sympathy for displaced Afghans. Afghanistan was declared a safe country. Western states closed their gates to Afghanistan's poor and war-stricken citizens, and encouraged them to return home and rebuild their country. War was over. Reconstruction had to be started. As a result, a population of wandering Afghans emerged-driven from their places of birth, and kept behind closed doors elsewhere in the world. A similar prospect may await hundreds of thousands of desperate Sudanese migrants. The recent peace accord in Sudan is only a beginning in a long journey to peace and stability in Sudan. And it may not even be that. It may be a tactical false-start. The conflict in Sudan dates back to conditions created before its independence in 1956. With independence came a war of national identity and domination among the various ethnic groups and tribes; the Arabs of the north imposed Arabic as the national language on the non-Arab south. The south rebelled. Periods of violence followed, violence embedded in changing ideological and ethnic alliances, betrayals, maneuvers, and continuous fighting. But, in all of this, a single pattern remained: the indiscriminate assault on the civilians of all ethnic groups. The war has been marked by fighting, often with the goal of displacing civilians and controlling the depopulated territories, the denial of resources to opposing fighting alliances, and large-scale looting from civilians of their food-stocks. Haunted by this collective memory, the Sudanese refugees are pleading for help and genuine understanding. The severity of the conflict and failure of past peace efforts make it incumbent that the West and multilateral agencies like the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) treat the new agreement with equal parts of cautious optimism and grim determination to see after the needs of this struggle's victims. The UNHCR must urge the EU and other Western nations not to assume that the new peace accord is a conclusion to the refugee problem. The Sudanese are still fleeing war and its devastating economic and social consequences. The gates to the West should not be closed to the refugees. Behzad Yaghmaian is the author of Embracing the Infidel: The Secret World of the Muslim Migrant by Bantam Dell/Random House (forthcoming, 2005). He can be reached at Behzad.yaghmaian@gmail.com. WWW http://www.counterpunch.org