The legal and humanitarian impact of the crisis in the Darfur region of Sudan is the subject of a March 26-27 conference at Duke Law School that will bring together diplomats, experts in war crimes prosecution, academics and policymakers.
"Looking Deeper: What Darfur tells us about Genocide, International Criminal Law and the Future of a Country," is free and open to the public.
Speakers at the conference will include Marie Besancon, founder of NGO American Sudanese Partnerships and a fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University; Rod Rastan, legal adviser in the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC); and Roger Winter, former special representative of the deputy secretary of state for Sudan.
The conference takes place Thursday, March 26, in Room 3041 at the Law School on Duke's West Campus. Registration begins at 2:30 p.m. and the session concludes with a reception at 5 p.m. The conference resumes at 9 a.m. Friday, March 27, in Room 3037 at the Law School and concludes with a plenary at 4:30 p.m. Parking for both days is available at the Bryan Center, also on Duke's West Campus.
The Sudanese government ordered the expulsion of aid agencies from Darfur after the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for the arrest of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir on March 4. The United Nations is warning of an impending humanitarian disaster.
Bashir is accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity for his role in the Darfur crisis, which the United States has labeled genocide. The U.N. estimates that since February 2003 as many as 300,000 people have died in Darfur, and more than 2 million people have been displaced.
The student-organized conference is sponsored by the Student Organization for Legal Issues in the Middle East and North Africa (SOLIMENA), and the Center for International and Comparative Law at Duke Law. Other sponsors include the A.B. Duke Endowment, the Law School's Career and Professional Development Center, the Duke Islamic Studies Center and Duke's Political Science Department.
The full conference schedule and registration information are online at http://www.law.duke.edu/conference/darfur.