SUDAN: Google Earth zooms in on Darfur crisis

U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum project will show villages, testimony on civil war

Times of India
Wednesday, April 11, 2007

Wsahington --- The online satellite imaging site Google Earth announced it was adding features that will allow users to zoom in on the crisis in Sudan's strife-torn Darfur region.

The project was spearheaded by the US Holocaust Memorial Museum and showcases 1,600 villages affected by the conflict, including photographs, data and eyewitness testimony.

Computer users can download the free Google Earth application online, then using the mouse "fly" over Africa to zoom in on the "Crisis in Darfur" section from a sky view perspective.

Destroyed houses, homes, mosques and schools are visible along with links to data, eyewitness testimony, fact boxes, pictures and maps that are updated regularly.

Four years of civil war in Darfur have killed at least 200,000 people and displaced more than two million, according to United Nations figures.

"The only way to stop the killing in Darfur is by informing people," said Dawud Salih, a Darfur resident, refugee and former Red Cross officer. "People must know what genocide looks like."

Google representative Elliot Schrage said on Tuesday the service will allow "users to visualize and learn about the destruction in Darfur as never before," and added that "technology can be a catalyst for education and action."

The Holocaust Museum is currently developing similar projects to educate about other world atrocities, under its "genocide prevention mapping initiative."

Date Posted: 4/11/2007