The following is an insightful post at The Sudanese Thinker.

This is an extremely well illustrated guide to the horrific Darfur situation. It’s not just well illustrated but it’s also accurate and non-politicized. If you’d like to gain a deeper understanding of the conflict, we advise that you take a look at it. You’ll find it useful and you’ll surely learn something new. We’d suggest it to anyone wanting to know more about the Darfur conflict (besides the pages on the right-side bar of darfur-awareness.org of course).

(Thanks to Ihsan) -
The Arab American Institute and Zogby International conducted a survey in several predominantly Muslim countries about the situation in Darfur.

Click here for the PDF file of the report.

Darfur has been bleeding steadily but things seem to be changing slowly for the better at the moment. The world is finally waking up and the rhetoric isn’t as vague as it used to be. There is genuine pressure being applied on the Sudanese government now. Moreover the West lead by the United States is beginning to realize that an end to this conflict isn’t possible without pressuring the rebels too. Pressuring Sudan’s government alone only encourages the rebels further.

The Genocide Olympics movement that has started gaining momentum is starting to become a concern for China which buys most of Sudan’s oil and also sells weapons to the government. This will mean that China will feel the need to apply more pressure on Sudan.

Sudan has recently accepted phase 2 of the UN-AU hybrid plan which is a good development. Also we’ve been witnessing more efforts to bring both the Sudanese government and the rebels to the negotiating table. The challenge is for the numerous rebel factions to agree on a common goal rather than having several and sometimes conflicting agendas. That will make negotiations a lot less complex.