Obama's Darfur Approach Shaken by ICC Arrest Warrant

Days after his administration decried the Sudanese government's role in the killing of civilians as "genocide," President Obama vowed to work toward ending the bloodshed.

But Obama's plans to reshape Darfur policy have been shaken by this month's issuance of an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir by the International Criminal Court at The Hague.

Bashir, who displays open contempt for the ICC, responded to the warrant by expelling 10 foreign aid groups from Sudan. And that prompted the top U.S. intelligence official to argue the ICC had undermined U.S. efforts.

"I think it'll make it harder, yes," Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair said at a Senate hearing last week.

Darfur activists are now starting to see a "disconnect" between the bold action once promised by Obama as a presidential candidate and the potentially drawn-out approach the administration might now have to pursue.

"The situation on the ground is not waiting for the policy review to be concluded," said Jerry Fowler, of the Save Darfur Coalition. "We need the presidential engagement and we need it now."

The activists want Obama to name a special envoy for the issue -- something officials say is in the works -- and take other swift actions.

"We need to look at a broad panoply of significant and serious costs for this regime in Sudan if it continues to use starvation as a weapon of war," said John Prendergast, co-founder of the ENOUGH Project.

Official estimates say hundreds of thousands of people have been killed, and more than 2 million have been displaced, since the government in Khartoum started arming local "Janjaweed" militias against the mostly black, non-Arab Muslim farming population in Darfur.

The ICC issued its warrant March 4 charging al-Bashir with war crimes.

But the United States -- like China, India and Russia -- is not a member of the ICC. This fact proved thorny as the administration tried to react to the arrest warrant nearly two weeks ago.

State Department spokesman Gordon Duguid at first called al-Bashir a "fugitive from justice" and said that status could be used as a "lever for the international community."

Then he had to clarify that he's a fugitive "in the eyes of the ICC."

On Monday, the State Department turned its fire back on the Sudanese government, arguing that the ICC is not to blame for the aid groups' expulsion.

"It had nothing to do with what was going on in the Hague," spokesman Robert Wood said. "The Sudanese government is responsible for any results that flow out of this."