It was a marauding band of militia men. They attacked, unorganized but deadly on horseback and desert land cruisers.

Twenty-one of Mohamed Adam Yahya’s friends and family were killed.

His voice shook and tears welled in his eyes as he recalled learning of the attack while at college in Cairo, Egypt. More than 200 members of his village died that day in 1993. Yahya visited OSU Wednesday to spread awareness of the ongoing slaughter of his people in the Darfur region of Sudan, and to shed light on the lack of aid or military intervention from the international community to stop the killing. He wore a black business suit with a red tie, but it was Yahya’s eyes that were sharp. They crinkled at times at painful memory but, also burned with conviction to speak on behalf of his people.“ Yahya said the band that attacked his village was made up of hired militia hailing from countries as distant as Morocco and Kuwait.

Photo by Peter Chee/The Daily Barometer

Men not from Sudan but rather of mostly Arab descent who were paid by oil profits and militarily supported by the government of Sudan in wiping out the indigenous African population.

I lost 21 of my family members and friends, two of my brothers killed, two of my sisters were raped,” Yahya said emotionally during an interview. “Up to now, I don’t know how many more have been killed.”

“In one day,” he said. “Over 200 to 300 people killed, just in one village — imagine how many other people were killed in all the other villages.”

His parents were able to escape, sending a letter to Yahya that they were alive and the number of his family and friends who were murdered in the crisis.

Yahya said his village was one of 50 that were attacked in part from rising tensions between native African agriculturalists and farmers and the increasing number of Arab Muslims, immigrating to Sudan to feed their cattle and sheep in the especially rich land of Darfur.

The other reason for the massacre, Yahya believes, is from a concerted effort by the mostly Arab run minority government of Sudan to exterminate the African majority.

“The government (of Sudan) is working with the army (Jangaweed militia), you see, the government is backing them, they offer them a full cover when they are attacking villages, the Jangaweed will lead on horses, (burning and killing),” Yahya said.

The Sudanese government, now made up of primarily Arab peoples, came into power during the colonization period when the British Commonwealth first designated boundaries for Sudan and came into control with Egyptian forces in 1899.

“When I heard this I got very mad, I asked for an urgent meeting in Cairo to decide what to do,” Yahya said.

This was the moment he became resolute, he said, deciding to help push the issue into international conversation and help stop the bloodshed. “I felt my people have no voice, so I have become a voice for those people that don’t have a voice,” Yahya said.

Yahya has since created an international program to bring Democracy into Sudan by ousting the minority led Arab government residing in Khartoum, the Sudan capital. With the international program, called the Damanga Coalition for freedom and Democracy, Yahya hopes to personally visit the top five United Nations Security Council countries and educate as well as ask its leaders to send military forces into Sudan to stop the violence.

“The best way to fix this is to intervene militarily,” he said. “Troops are extremely needed at this critical time,” Yahya said.

Yet with the Sudanese government preventing United States, NATO or UN forces to intervene, Yahya said these international powers must circumvent the government and end the matter without the help of the Sudanese government.

“You can’t ask Hitler to allow the peacekeepers to go to save the Jews when they are slaughtered and burned,” he said. “You can’t ask for permission, he will never give you that permission, these leaders are worse than Hitler.”