Here at Enough, we often swap emails with interesting articles and feature stories that we come across in our favorite publications and on our favorite websites. We wanted to share some of these stories with you as part of our effort to keep you up to date on what you need to know in the world of anti-genocide and crimes against humanity work.
Despite recent reports on violence across ethnic lines and the growing humanitarian crisis in South Sudan, groups like the South Sudan Theatre Team, a group of dramatists and cultural leaders, are celebrating their differences through artistic and cultural outlets. In 2012, the theatre company translated Shakespeare's 'Cymbeline' and performed it in South Sudan and at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre in London. In their inspiring documentary film, they show that there is promise for a more united, peaceful South Sudan.
You can support the South Sudan Theatre Team by donating on their Kickstarter website.
Mamoun Eltlib is a Sudanese writer who grew up under the regime of current President Omar Al-Bashir. Eltlib was an avid reader as a child who indulged in Arabic literature despite his school not having any books. Now, as leader of the Sudan Writer’s Union, an organization founded in 1985 that encourages freedom of expression through writing, Eltlib spearheads the country’s contemporary literary scene inspiring others to seek conflict through dialogue. In Believer Magazine’s interview with the writer, Eltlib speaks on the potential of Sudan’s promising cultural revolution.
"We want to make deep things, we don’t care about the government, we don’t care about the political parties, they are not our target –our target is the people, spreading knowledge, spreading music and fun and dance."
Photojournalist Shannon Jensen has documented her time in South Sudan’s Nuba Mountains in a unique, yet very simple way. After being denied by various international publications for work that “had already been covered,” Jensen began to look at her subjects in a different way. She noticed how many of the South Sudanese refugees were attached to their shoes, as beaten up and worn as they were. “I think that shoes are pretty important to the refugees in a very different way than to any of us,” she said. Jensen’s images are currently on exhibit at the Open Society Foundations’ “Moving Walls” exhibition at the society’s New York headquarters through October 3.
In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, armed groups that finance their operations by trafficking and poaching wildlife are being targeted by U.N. sanctions. These armed groups have benefited financially from ivory, which has led to a sharp decline in the Congo’s elephant population. The Garamba National Park in the north-eastern region of the country, a census showed fewer than 2,000 elephants were left in 2012, compared to 22,000 in the 1970s. The Security Council resolution also stressed the importance of preventing M23 rebels from regrouping in Congo.
South Africa’s main opposition party has chosen Mamphela Ramphele as their presidential candidate to challenge the ruling African National Congress in this year’s election. Ramphele who has been an activist, doctor, academic, and World Bank executive will become the first black presidential candidate of the Democratic Alliance, an organization considered to be a product of the anti-apartheid movement of the 1970s and 1980s. The 66-year-old woman is looking to combat the corruption and lack in government efficiency which has embodied much of Jacob Zuma’s current presidency.