Evening Exchange; Conrad Lynn, Esq. - Civil Rights Lawyer

Heaven itself became a little better because I use fried rice. Yes yes that's right I turned against it and nationalism. Oh yeah. In such a way that he actually started advocating it up here. He kept us from a different. Route. So many did now pad nor what not as I remember a member of. Talk with freedom fighters from different areas of the African Diaspora up next

evening Xchange. Good evening I'm Kojo Nandi welcome to evening Exchange as we prepare to mark the 30th anniversary of the March on Washington. Each of us who happen to be around in 1963 have various memories of that day. While many of us involved in the civil rights movements of the 60s can boast of having a working knowledge of the writings of CIA large James or W.B. Dubois and Malcolm X Martin Luther King. Few of us can say that they have advised or defended these great thinkers in a court of law. My first guest can meet Conrad Lynn for more than 60 years he has worked on hundreds of civil rights cases everything from the first efforts to desegregate the U.S. Army to defending the Black Panther Party and members of other radical organizations Mr.

Lynn has written about his illustrious career. In his book there is a fountain. Welcome comrade Len. Hi. You know here I believe you have mentioned that this is the first time a black university has invited you to be on a broadcast at such an institution. Why is that. Well I understand now at first I wish unhappy about it because as a lawyer I did not make much money in the kind of cases that I handle. And a great deal of my income came from speaking at various colleges. They were always colleges of the north and the West but never in the Deep South. And I could understand a Southern college like Duke not inviting me. But I wish unhappy that Howe would get it right it couldn't have been because during the earlier part of the century when you were a an

undergraduate student at Syracuse University you first joined the Young Communist League and had a reputation throughout a part of your career as being associated either with the communist parties or Marxist Leninist organizations and that made some black organizations a little afraid to be associated with Conrad lamb. Well they were not only a little afraid they were very much afraid I had made it very plain that they would not invite me to speak. The only. College that the only black college was Lincoln University on one occasion I spoke. But despite that you went on to have and as we said illustrious career and I wanted for you to reflect for a little while and what occurred to you when you were like all of us saw the Rodney King beating on television because the first chapter of your book deals with a notorious case in New York called the Harlem six which was a martyr case which was precipitated

by something called the fruit stand riot of 1964 in which a number of young people under 12 years old were being beaten viciously by police officers. And when a few people attempted to stand up for them they too were viciously beaten. Could you tell our viewers a little bit more about that case and about how you see the whole issue of police brutality particularly against African-Americans in the light of the Rodney King beating. Yeah sure. There are these little children coming from out of school around 115 Street and Lenox Avenue and in Harlem and they were coming home for lunch and it was. There was a store a fruit store there on the corner of hundred and sixteen street and annex Avenue and the man had his fruit out on the stand in the open. And

so one of the little girls some about 8 years old she saw this grapefruit and it looked like a bore to her. So she took the grapefruit and threw it and the and the other children started throwing. Now the proprietor who was of Italian descent he understood these children. So he blew his whistle for the usual cop who was on the beat and who would understand these children. But LaGuardia the mayor was anticipating a long hot summer. And without noticed anybody had put in the basements of the public buildings in that area. These heavily armed riot police who were big men especially trained with flak jackets tactical squad they're called Yet the tactical squad. And so when they blew a whistle instead of demand their usual cop on the beat. They had these bees these big cops came out guns. Yes and they started beating these little

children. Well it just happened at that time that their little children were screaming. These boys 17 18 and 19 were in a karate class in that area and they just happened to be ending their session. And they came out and they saw these cops these children and they rushed and they were trained in karate. So they were able to clear the way for that to keep the children from being beaten so badly and to hold off the cops until the crowd collected quite a crowd by the thousands wouldn't die and the cops for their way out and left the scene. Now gesture a week later. Of this Jewish lady in the next AM NO had a store running 716 street she had a store and she was being robbed by some young men. And they called a play and she was killed in the course of the

robbery and her husband was wounded and show that which of course she brought to the attention of the police right away and the police immediately went and got the lead as they were taken today leaders of the fruit stand riot. That is those young men who were defending the young people who were beating the children who were being beat being beaten up. One of the young men arrested for the martyr of the two people in that clothing store right. Yes. Now after 1964 it took until I think one thousand seventy four. Yes for that case to be ultimately resolved. That's right. But because you've been in practice for 60 years did you expect what you saw when you saw Rodney King being beaten. Well. I wish I wish horrified at the way he would be meeting because we short of live TV and even the president he would have felt that well his first reaction was one of a shock because he could see him savvy.

He's not stupid. He could see what was happening on that street that they were emotionally beating that man to death and show up. When the jury brought in a verdict of Not Guilty and showed cops it was inevitable that there would be a spontaneous uprising because of your practice did you find yourself saying that I thought this might have changed by now. Or did you find yourself saying we kept trying to tell the authorities that this kind of thing goes on all the time and has really never stop. Well I throughout my life I've seen the rise and fall of the oppression of the black people. Sometimes it's a levy a more liberal view and people try to the majority population tries to show some humanity. But then it reversed out particularly in a depression and the Great Depression when a Great Depression now then you have a great rise of tension

and hostility against blacks as it is now because of this these few steps of affirmative action. In the Forbes magazine this week for the bag state they they make it plain that they think that one reason white the white people of the middle class just shuttering show is because blacks are getting preferential treatment. So that is the kind of relationship between the economy and the kind of actions that we see police taking out if you go back with you for a little bit because those who have noted your career defending the oppressed and defending people in the southern United States may not know that you had you were raised in Long Island University you were part of a predominantly white community. And before you went to Syracuse University you were not really aware at least not from your personal experience of the kind of racism that existed in the United States why was that.

That that was true because we live by family lived in a village Limburger are at it. We were the only black family. When I graduated from high school I was Joni were always going to go to college because these were farmers white farmers and tradesmen and show their children go to college they just went on to be married later. So I was the only one going to college and the white people had a cake sale to raise money to send me to sure he was university so natural. I did not have a feeling that there was great pressure dish even though my grandmother had told me of some things I felt that. In the north there was not that kind of feeling and Syracuse University. I also got very fine treatment until I joined the Young Communist League. During the period when you were either joining the Young Communist League or getting that fine treatment you began to associate I guess to your fraternity with a number of other young people from other

colleges. One of them was Adam Clayton Powell who was then at Colgate University That's right. And tell our viewers how you described his behavior at that time. Well I don't watch very fair skin. And he had light brown hair. And if so it should act Coalgate way it was. He was white. He considered himself in the past as white but he loved the beautiful brown skinned black girls who would go who were going to Syracuse University which was coed so he would come over from Colgate on weekends. He would come over to Syracuse to be with the beautiful a rowdy skater girls and he was then one of the brothers. After you got involved with the Young Communist League and your thoughts began to turn to more serious thing was that the major influence and turning you into the kind of activist lawyer that you later became. You did have to take all of the courses that could have prepared you to be a lawyer on Wall Street if that's what you

wanted to be. What was the influence that made you want to become an activist lawyer. Well I think it mainly where ad base was the repression because I came out of law school in 1032 and news we were still in a very great depression. And I couldn't get a job as a rule a law up. Practitioner in any office in Syracuse in the Syracuse area although they had been so nice to me otherwise and I came to New York City and finally a lawyer for the face bank in Harlem I can't remember the name of the bag now but the face bank in Hong was opened by Rockefeller. Yeah Johnny Rockefeller and the lawyer for the bag and black man James Johnson and he hide me of all people nobody wants what I did but he be a bank lawyer hired me even though I was a communist.

Let's take a telephone call for Continental and thank you on their Caller go ahead please. Oh yes I do a lot of times my question does come up with America having a very hard time. When it comes to mid-level management jobs for black Americans. But I I'd. Never buy buy up to marry down and not if he questions whether or not I don't understand your question. My question is corporate America growers in the black community. There is a mid-level manager managed to challenge 30 white people corporate America people on the high end staff have a hard time by not primarily just promoting people out because they're afraid of not permitting people in the black community. Well we're in a depression now and I'm representing now at this very time black educated black people well trained

who have gotten mid level mid level jobs in management and knowledge being taken out because of the pressures they're firing them and putting whites in a place that's exactly what's happening. That's the reality and you're still working to defend those people there were but there was a time after you got out of the service of the end of World War 2 that you decided that you didn't want to practice law anymore why I was there because I think the law itself the practice of law corrupt why I well she I've been in the army and any army you have a chance to think say and it seemed to me that. There was just generally too much. Favor attention by judges and the great principles of law that I had lain under Cardozo and Oliver Wendell Holmes and these great lawyer a great judge of the Warren court.

They seemed a not a fit in the actual practice it in the courts. So I was reluctant to return to I thought the law was too corrupt. What made you come back. Well I was persuaded to come back by some Harlem lawyer and also by a great lawyer who was the general counsel of the Civil Liberties Union. OK remember the name but the two lawyers were both. Veterans of the Army one had been a major and me Riddick his name was reading and they kept they have to be. And finally I came back to the law. We have to take a short break right now but when we come back we'll ask Conrad Lin to tell me and you why he was often referred to as the lawyer of last resort. Stay with us we'll be right back. No. Welcome back we're talking with the pioneering activist and civil rights lawyer Conrad Lynn.

And we promised Mr. Lynn that you would answer the question of why were you often before to as the lawyer of last resort. Well. I guess I was referring to that because there were instances where the NAACP the National Organization would not take a case because they felt it would hurt them nationally and I could see a kissing case where these two were to let's talk about that for one second. Yes the kissing case 1958. Tell us what the two little boys 7 and 9 2 or black children were accused of kissing a white girl 6 on the cheek. The fact is that the white girl kissed one of them and the mother went very upset. This was in North Carolina and a show she called the police and they had the boys put in jail and showed that was a kissing case. I Why was why was the end of place AP afraid to handle a case now because they said it was a

it was a sex case. Sex tape and the head at the end of the NAACP he refused to take the case and all show he barred he tried to stop Robert Williams who is a local president of the NAACP in the North Carolina. He tried to block him but the Nation magazine persuaded V to go in because the NAACP would not take it. And that's how I got in a case in in addition to which you would take the case of members of the Socialist Workers Party those people who were dismissed as Trotskyites Trotskyist by members of the Communist Party and seen as hard as left wing nuts by members of the establishment. They would have to come to Conrad Lynn. Yes that's true. And even after the Communist Party expelled me her legs fell. I still really fed economy initially.

That is amazing but for those people who may think that most of this book talks about the occurrences that took place in the past they're Let us talk a little bit about the future because of your orientation not only as an attorney but as a thinking human being. You have all of us felt very strongly about how the society needs to be organized why there are depressions and recessions and what we need to do to get out of it. What is the mission well as a matter of fact. I was so affected by the Great Depression that after the war after the Second World War One of my friends I couldn't understand what was just a reason why we had to have these periodic great depressions. Now when there was a religious reason that God was was was punishing people for their sins. Well I had heard that in church too but I thought there must be something else. So I was in fact I was teaching that at New York University Law School and I was invited to West Germany in Munich and that one of the great

libraries of the world to take a crash course on what was the real reason for the repression. And how do you get out of it. And then they taught me that what is really needed because depressions are manmade they said that it was necessary where profits were going down to five people by the thousands to put machinery in their place cut down on the social services and above all break to unions. That was Hitler's weapon. And Van Hayek wrote some books for Hitler to put this into practice. He wrote one book or monetary theory and the trade cycle and the Road to Serfdom was another book. This was to show that to the press. Shooting is not caused by God but by man. And of course Hitler's motive was to create an army also to fight other capitalist nations for markets. Now you can you characterize what we are in though not as a recession

but as a depression a major depression and the distant pression started when the crash of the stock market occurred at the end of 900 68 at the end of 68 in November 68 when the crash of the stock market occurred. Now some of the writers the serious writers are beginning to admit this is a major depression. Now there's one way that these German scholars showed me how you can get out of the Depression and that is not to have just an income tax because that did not bring in enough you have to get to the accumulated masses of capital. That have been organized by individuals not corporate capital but individual capital like the man who is running for president who ran against him. The two other candidates are talking about Ross Perot Ross Perot Ross Perot it's worse between 3 and 4 billion dollars. Well the

proposal arrived there in the pamphlet I produced after I came back from Germany called the capital levy a solution when the cupboard is bare. I propose that we leave these great corporate giants like Ross Perot. We leave them 100 million so they could you know that a new start. And then we take in one tax a capitalist Levy of all the holdings of people who are worth more than 100 million. Now this. It wasn't just my idea which idea of the owner of the nation and the publisher of the nation in Asia. I'm the master of the nation right now. Each of them ultimately he was a Wall Street banker and he publishes The Nation magazine and he came out for a capital levy. Now if these billionaires and these people who are worth more than 100 million if they had one tax we could pay off the national debt and and do all the things necessary to put your people back to work.

Now I am appealing to the patriotism Ross Perot right on this program period to his patriotism. He was he's I believe devoted to the future of our country. He just doesn't know about the solution I get and I'm informing him and he can lead the way. Conrad Lynn is the author of There is a fountain an autobiography a remarkable journey that is still continuing today and has a vision for the future let's go to the telephone caller thank you for waiting you're on there go ahead please. Thank you so much you are really going to work. He said you know when it first came out and I've read portions of the updated version I just wanted to ask you and if you would talk about how is father felt about him joining the Communist Party and also his dealings with Malcolm X. Thank you thank you. You would you know how I joined the company yes or yes. Well I went to college to be a preacher of the gospel that the religion advice very favorite subject was philosophy. Well at Syracuse University the

favorite school of philosophy was German philosophy. So they had us wrestling with a manual count and then after the manual came we had to go in to Schopenhauer. And so one of my Russian friends he was a graduate student. He suggested to me because he knew I didn't know that. I asked the professor we going to study Kant's greatest disciple. I said Well who is that he said. Call mocks. So I asked a professional in or innocents in class how are we going to study our. Conscious greatest disciple and the president professor said Who is that. I said call mosques and he said you'll never study that man in his class. Well you don't say that to an 18 year old boy because the very thing you forbid him from reading that was enough for you that you had to read him though that was it.

How about your relationship with Malcolm X. When Malcolm Malcolm was a product of the prison and he had studied a lot of people don't understand how deeply Malcolm studied in the prison he was a real intellect. Remarkable and like and he's never been paid enough credit for that. Now they always paint him into pictures and even on the shows that there'd be a showdown that his speech is against white people. But now Kim had an opportunity to go to Mecca and then he traveled in Europe and in Africa and he realized he told told me when he came back he said to me I found out that there were of millions of Muslims who were not black. He was leader of the Black Muslims. These are they were all black. No he said blacks. And then we began discussing the basic problems of society and Malcolm to me which a great influence because at the end he realized that what we need is an alliance of the people

who are oppressed that mocked him for death. You said that he liked the writings of see the large names and that when you discovered that he may have been a Muslim and you were not a Christian but you were not religious but you were united in your anti-capitalist sentiments and that's right and that's right a certain degree of unity before we go tell us also about your relationship. With Paul ropes or Paul Robeson of course was as you know a great singer but he was also a lawyer a lot of you would have no doubt that he had gotten a graduate from Columbia Law School very brilliant band and he was in a very wealthy firm and Wall Street but he was also a great singer. And then at that time. And. He found that this operation in Wall Street offended him because he knew that this benefited the very wealthy and not the poor show. He left the law. He was a great singer and became a great actor.

Now I met Paul while I knew he was a lawyer and empower news of our day will always visit a restaurant up in Harlem. And it's clear that and Ben Davis Ben Davis Adam Powell and Paul Robeson they were all over six feet and I was the only one who was a little fella. Had I ever said I have the honor to share and we would talk at this restaurant. Morse paradise that was maybe restaurant small paradise and they would kid me about this communism or I'm dead. But poor question very serious you know Paul Robeson was extremely serious and it was then that I found out that he was he was beginning to feel that only and show me that Russia was there a possibility for the black people all over the world. To gain their freedom now Paul never joined the Communist Party he started it. He certainly did not but getting back to Adam Clayton Powell. Yeah when you came back to the law one of the first jobs you had yes was Adam Clayton Powell was somehow trying to get

ownership of a white owned predominantly white or exclusively white apartment building. That's right what role did you play. Well I was his lawyer. I was in so I would say it was a very difficult battle but we were able to pull it off. And in the end show Adam. Really like me I was just offended by Adam because he was not good to some of his friends and who I knew and sure accuse and show it hate me. And I would do. But I know that Adam was a great influence because later on he did such great work in Congress. The book is called there is a fountain the autobiography of Conrad learn what you have heard today was merely one iota of the information that you will find in this book. It is more than worthwhile reading. Mr. Lynn not only thank you for being here but thank you for everything you've done during your illustrious career. Thank you very much. We're out of time in this segment when we come back. The civil war in the Sudan. Stay with us.

Don't leave yet. Hey. Ho ho.

Welcome back. For 10 years northern and southern Sudan have been locked in a bloody civil

war. Roman Catholic Relief officials and the U.N. Human Rights Commission of chars the government in Khartoum with engaging in a reign of terror in the South that has left hundreds of thousands of people dead. Meanwhile the government has charged the anti-government forces of the Sudanese People's Liberation Army with blocking food relief efforts and causing death by starvation. The war has been characterized as a classic holy war with the Muslims of the North I think questions in the south. But it gets a lot more complicated. Join. Us to talk about this issue is Colonel Dr. John governing the commander and chief of the Sudan People's Liberation Army. Also with us is Dr. Solomon young director of African studies here at Howard University. Colonel gran up until 19 83 you were a member a leader of the Armed Forces of the government of Sudan based in Khartoum. Tell us about what it was in 1983

that made you defect from that government and form and found these Sudanese people liberation movement and the Sudanese people Liberation Army. Well it goes but quite a bit. There was a first war yes I know war that ended in 72 that ended in 72 and started in from different I had to and have years of that war I was a member of then after Grinnell College and that is how I joined the Sudanese army as a result of the 1972 I did the one in which six six thousand guerrillas were absorbed into the Sudanese army and that word is interest and absorbed into the Sudanese army because it is connected with with the second war. That is that the war the US that is started in 1983. Basically the fundamental issues that led to the first war in 1955 were not adequately addressed in the 1972 ideas of agreement.

So both parties governments that have come and gone in Khartoum and principle the people of southern Sudan looked at the ten year period from 1972 to 1983 as a Despite And everybody knew that hostilities were going to start again. Technically you were supposedly sent to mediate the dispute in the south in 1983 but obviously by then you know where your sentiments lie. You know what you told us a few seconds ago that there was going to be a resumption of hostilities. And so you decided apparently to become to take a leading role in the Southern Sudan. What I later learned in the media that been sent to board my hometown to mediate which is where I learnt it was news to me. Gone to war on leave. I had my annual leave and that is on record in the 70s. I was director of military research at the General Headquarters.

I got my annual leave which is my right. And I went home. And things flared up prematurely because we were planning to make that move in August. But events moved quickly and the situation exploded in mail May 16 1983. So a lot of people feel that what we're seeing in the Sudan is a religious war between Muslims and Christians. Some believe it is a racial or cultural war between the Arabs in the north and the Africans in the south. Some believe that it is a political war that the people of the Southern Sudan really need political independence from the north. And some believe now with the split within the Sudanese People's Liberation Army that has also taken on an ethnic character of division within southern Sudan. Is it all of these. Anyone. Yeah all of the above would be. I would check all of the above but then I would caution anyone who is looking to see the new

situation to take into account the lessons of history in Sudan in Africa and elsewhere in the world. Now let's look at the problem and I would like to hear Dr. Grant my colleague here to respond to it. So we have a dialogue and discussion. First of all is do war really a war between Arabs and blacks incident now. Personally I give you a very interesting story myself and I think this will highlight the problem. When I was in the United States I know when I was growing up in the gun base to read about Sudan and other places you know I had an idea in my head at the time I was a young boy before I came to America that dissidents of the black people like me. That's my impression. So when I came to America and I said leaving the premise that the Arabs were fighting the blacks in Sudan I came to believe that myself. So when I went to Sudan as a diplomat I had an idea to drive it out. He has spent 12 years in Sudan and I was telling him when we boarded the plane in Saudi Arabia we had

these Arabs he point to me as he will discuss wool burnous. These are not the blacks that know these are not really what I came to realize really is that in northern Sudan black people African-Americans here Africans have identified themselves totally out of culture to the point that really fun on talks about blacks in white mice phenomena is that. And it creates a problem in terms of that with the black Sudanese who have been highly exposed to Western culture but they are not in any way engaged in any act of self deception or self definition which again is that the actions you see Southern Sudanese intellectuals play with a gun here does not seem to have an adverse action you see in the northern Sudanese see themselves as Afro Arabs really believe I think that is one point that needs to be emphasized doctoring or care to comment on for.

I'll give another. And I do it another when I was at Fort Benning in 1974 so if I were to from the Sudanese Army major and the captain myself I was a captain and was odometer us when we came to the Pentagon. This is an annual ritual where I lied to students come to the Pentagon every year. We were in a room a large room. Now there were various desks. There's a Latin America desk the European Desk in the Middle East desk the African bass the far east and west and so on. And there was this young lady reading that the desks and then the student the offices from that region would get up and go. The middle is the scam. The Middle East desk saw a lot of Scott I've been there when I was Captain Michael he was a major. I waited for where he would go. He didn't go to the Middle East

then the African dance was announced. He didn't go to. And then the younger the young lady ran out of desks and we were left in the hall and the young lady looks at us he looks and he obviously were black and he said but the African DOES have been called already and the major fumbles with these books and oh I'm sort of. And he got up and went to the African desk when we went there with my dad was from Nigeria. And later on I related to him the story and he made a joke afterwards whenever we went to classes the Sudanese the Africans that's what I'm underlining is that there is a crisis of identity which you have to young for two and I gave that in one of the agreements that we reached with the Democratic Unionist Party and I want to refer again to what he said I gave him

our vision. No this are done in terms of what the problem is in the first war in which I engaged in we have fought for separation of Southern Sudan for 17 years. We didn't get it. We ended up with a local autonomy. When the water started again in 1983 we were engaged in a white debate among ourselves what should we fight for. When you look at the Sudan first of all the names were done it's in Arabic blood and Sudan means the land of black people and that is literally what what it means. Now when you look at the statistics the demographic breakdown of this was done in 1956 when the British man left that was the last census. Those who claim to be registered as Africans with 61 percent. Of those were registered as Arabs were 31 percent. Those are available statistics that are available in libraries plus 8 percent others. I don't know what these others are. What's the point you are making about that relative to today's situation.

The point I'm making is that in 1983 when our movement started and this is and this is your point that what is a war about. Yes we we we we reasoned that the issue really is not to go away from the Sudan. The issue is duty defined as done according to its objective realities that well the land belongs to all of us in the north in the south in the East and in the West. The what does happen is a fairly old leadership since 1956 and failing to. I have had a Sudanese community where that transcends all the local isms allow me to interrupt you one second to give you our perception in Washington of what that objective reality is. It is one that there have been more than five hundred thousand people killed in the Sudan over the course of the last 10 years. Some two hundred and fifty thousand in 1908 alone and there are estimates that it could be as much as half a

million in 1902 alone. But nobody knows for sure. The other thing that is for sure that seems to be objective reality is that the people in the Southern Sudan do not like the way in which they are being ruled. They say oppressed by the government in Khartoum the UN the US Committee on refugees is saying that it is clear that there should be independence at this point for southern Sudan. Do you think Dr. Yang that that is a reasonable and workable solution. You know let me just build up you know on wood doctor that I was seeing with regard to the. Competing visions of Sudan I think Dusty problem. There's a crisis of identity now. Most Sudanese Benaud lead to deal with that reality but I think days a crisis of identity in terms of Sudan and I've stayed in a Muslim state is Sudan and African state. Now doctor that of course is on record as being someone who led to many Sudanese national integrity and national sovereignty intact provided that you

redefine who is a Sudanese what is a Sudanese What are you a Sudanese. Now this of course is where the religious factor enters to equation because you know right now you have a military dictatorship hard to restore power in 1999 when a foreign American is a military dictatorship whatever name it claims for itself is a military dictatorship. Now this military dictatorship is now projecting itself as an Islamic state. And of course it is being supported by the Islamic Front. This is where this is the unfortunate development because it really tense. Here unwittingly willingly or unwittingly you tend but a society with dictatorship and this was not done by Bashir himself. This was done before him but I know Mary knew me was the first one a military dictator who ran out of dancing partners. So he stumbled over to the national front of a National Front in Sudan. So that is where the U.S. factories but did hide reality you're talking about with regard to Sudan is

defiled that millions of people are dying. Doctor then here is a leader in that country is Dr. hasn't tried be Mardy and all the other people. What has to happen is a new national conference incident for them to deal with getting that doctor going. Colonel Grand what will it take for that level of bloodshed and and in large numbers that we are giving are not military combatants most of the people that we are talking about who have died as a result of this war are civilians there has been bombing in southern Sudan. Your group is accused of indiscriminate revenge killing also what will it take to bring an end as soon as possible to that mass level of death that is the death in the present war. The death in the first water. Nobody talks about it as to me is run from a minimum of seven hundred and fifty thousand people. Seven hundred fifty thousand people in the first war that died some estimates go up to one and a half million. That is in the

17 years of war. There is lots of suffering and there's immense suffering now in southern Sudan in the Nuba Mountains where there is a version of I think a Sudanese version of ethnic cleansing the Nuba are 1 million people they are not southern Sudanese they are part of the north. And there is where you have a difficulty as to whether whether noggins on the south end we have there are peace talks that are going on now in terms of how do we end this. We have proposed a Sudanese Confederation. A confederation of two states that maintains unity for the Sudan. We have depicted this as two circles intersecting with one another. With a commonality in the middle event diagram. Where you have two states northern and southern by Northern I mean by Southern I mean those areas where there is fight. Southern Sudanese in the Sudan proper the Nuba Mountains then guess and this is where the fighting is. This is a

southern state. We need a commonality. The shaded area in which we share in common and we need to put it in operational terms this is what we had no shooting now in. We are proposing that after two years an interim puter two years three years whatever we are going on five years after the interim period we go forward for a referendum and this and the southern Sudanese people the people of the southerners that as well as with another new state will be asked do you want to continue the marriage in the united Sudan. You want a confederate. I do want to opt out of the Sudan and the country breaks up. That would be the choice of the sort of these people to make. So that model gives opportunity gives opportunity for a united Sudan to define itself during the interim period. But that is a preferred option if that is not possible then. The country can break break up. That is a likely option.

Should the Sudanese people not lend a little it is what will bring this interim about what will cause a cease fire to occur from everything that I have been reading and I may be misinformed. We have a country that is ravaged by drought starvation disease in which a great deal of fighting is still going on. It is good to hear that the air that there is a negotiation process in place but it seems that there is still fighting going on in here and you just deal with so many issues here one is that the Sudanese are trying to solve their problem and group with the government that is in her film so and there is something called the Nassir faction. Yes it is also something called the National Democratic Alliance correct. Yeah so I mean all these different groups trying to work out a peace team is not that very but its not but what most of us are concerned about is the lust of life. Yes is that thousands of Sudanese people especially in the south dying. Yes no there is. Food is not seriously a problem. Shouldnt just

how food but food is being used as a weapon. Yes you see and that because it is serious because it has moral implications in the case of if you will who are dying now. The question is this. And I think this is where it has to respond and all his fellow countrymen. Well politically and the position must deal with and that is how can you redefine the Sudanese nation in such a way that you can have a confederacy. The way he's proposing it a federal structure or a unitary structure but with a pluralistic political system in place. That is what has eluded the Sudanese. Now I think and I would like to hear Dr. then respond to this and can that be done without the forceful intervention of the United Nations. Well I have to appeal to the United States government. And the United Nations on the seventh. Request of

the international community to reinforce the peace process. I was told it is difficult to see how they will further. I was asked to the U.N. today at Brookings. What progress we have made in my answer was that we haven't broken down yet. And that is the progress that we have made that is we are still talking at this point it is not in my view. For the United Nations for the international community to have a role. For the secretary general for example to appoint a special representative to the peace talks for a kind of European economic community for the United States for the United Kingdom for the World Council of Churches for Islamic organizations to send observers so that we open up. We open up the peace process. And make the ceasefire. My organization declared a

ceasefire unilateral cease fire that was reciprocated by the government. We need to institutionalize that cease fire and make it permanent so that relief is able to go one one of the other things I am appealing for is an increase in the resource flow. The needs are immense. So your problems your problems or the resource availability and you have the problem of accessibility. The problem of resource availability is an appeal that we make to the international community says ability. We'll need to the cooperation of the government the cooperation of the guerrillas and intervention and intervention is or active participation of the international. Allow me to take one telephone call in this segment please call or thank you for waiting you on the air please make your question whole comment but you know that to both gentlemen the question before the advent of the the movement before the advent of the moment and not assume that

you had almost uni's people in Africa. How do you reconcile the fact that a reprehensible practice of slavery being practiced by a Saudi Arabian The Libyan and Yemeni to have Indigenous services from Africa come to live in a virtual thing that they've reached an Arab state. How can it be justified by any means the military economically what do you see that relationship to what's going on in the Sudan because we're dealing with a crisis here and I really don't want to get into philosophical or our doctrinal issues religiously. What are you saying about how to get on the ground. I think it's an economic question. Are you have people who are be in 10 years serving in the nation. Do you think that's the problem in the Sudan. I think that that is the main power. Let's see if Colonel Grant agrees. We have a

challenge of a crisis of identity as we said before. Our position is that nations nation states or multinational states are products of historical movement of peoples people who for whatever reasons they move in search of economic opportunity escaping religious persecution or even poor for curiosity and their example is here in the United States of America where the Irish came here the English Italians Spanish and in evidence they Africans were brought here all the same which is movement. Now they interact in finding themselves in the graphical space they interact economically politically socially and then use social political entity emerges. That has happened in this country now when when you refer to go to church the English then called themselves English Americans Irish-Americans or with respect to black people in the nineties just Africans in the United States

where it was invented negro. This was to uproot them. The Yoruba welcome here did not remain a Yoruba American. Unfortunately we are out of time but your answer to the question that seeks to oversimplify the very complex differences that are caused by the movement of people still time I think is more than appropriate we have to take a short break we'll be right back. That's our show for tonight our thanks to all of our esteemed guests for joining this kind of go and good luck to you

and the people of Sudan. Thanks to you all for watching. Good night.