The month of April is GenocidePrevention month here in the United States. It marks the anniversaries of sixmajor genocides around the world, including Darfur, Bosnia, Rwanda, Cambodia,the Holocaust and Armenia.
More than 50 of the world's leading humanitarianorganizations have joined together to launch a public awareness and educationcampaign during the month of April.
Jill Savitt, organizer of "GenocidePrevention Month" told VOA the groups hope theiradvocacy would prevent future genocides.
"Whatwe want the month to show is that there is a support among genocide survivorsto try and prevent such crimes from happening by rallying support from theinternational community," she said.
Tuesday,the groups pre-screened "The Last Survivor", a new documentary which tells thestory of four survivors including from Rwanda, Sudan, and Congo.
Savittsaid the groups have been working with genocide survivors for a long while.
"We'vebeen working survivors in the of all the previous genocides in the modern eraas well as survivors of ongoing atrocity crimes, and there has been become anetwork of survivor advocates who join forces for each other and the people ofDarfur to try and to talk to the international community about prevention. Oneof our partners in this project is Righteous Pictures which is a documentaryfilm company with two young film makers who have now made a documentary thatfollows four genocide survivors during their advocacy about genocide prevention,"Savitt said.
Shesaid her organization works with survivors from all of the previous genocides.
Wework with Darfurians who are living in exile in the United States and inCanada, and the UK. As part of this month, they are organizing events aroundthe world during April because April is the start of the seventh year of theDarfur genocide. We are working withCongolese, and while that conflict hasn't been called genocide, those survivorsof that massive crime are also trying to urge the international community toact," Savitt said.
Shesaid her organization welcomes President Barack Obama's appointment of retired Air ForceMajor General Scott Gration as his special envoy for Sudan.
But Savitt said it remainsto be seen whether General Scott would have the mandate to really bring peaceto Darfur.
"We welcome the appointmentof the envoy for Sudan. The Obama administration is showing leadership in thatregard. What we now need to see is this envoy really engaging Obama in the taskof bringing peace to Darfur. We need the envoy to do this job every day, tohave the mandate to address all parties, and access to the Oval office and tothe UN to try and bring in international leaders to bring the parties to thenegotiating table," Savitt said.