Editor's note: This blog was written Enough Project intern Mia DiBenedetto.
On July 11, 2014, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Ranking Member Bob Corker (R-TN), and African Affairs Subcommittee Chairman Christopher Coons (D-DE), wrote a letter to President Obama expressing deep concern over the escalating violence in Sudan. The Senators urged the Obama Administration to elevate its current efforts toward addressing the violence in Darfur, South Kordofan, and Blue Nile, as well as to strengthen the existing mandate to "ensure the protection of civilians, improve humanitarian access, and seek sustainable political resolutions."
The letter acknowledges current U.S. efforts towards the crisis in Sudan and supports Special Envoy Donald Booth's focused endeavors for peace in South Sudan, but states that more is needed:
"...increased U.S. attention to Khartoum's recurrent policy of opportunistic violence across Sudan is urgent and necessary. The international community should ensure unrelenting scrutiny on the government of Sudan to stem the loss of innocent lives and prevent its policies, set in motion a decade ago, from becoming permanent."
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