Darfur's landscapes have a cruel beauty, and few are more unyielding than the nomadic encampment of Aamo. It is in a stony wasteland on a plain ringed by mountains formed from ancient volcanic cores. A distant sweep of pink sand marks the course of a seasonal river, Wadi Kutum. Many years ago, I stayed there as a guest of the nazir ('paramount chief') of a clan of Arab nomads known as the Jalul. With their broad black tents pitched on the sand, camels browsing on the thorn trees, and sparse but finely worked possessions, they were the stuff of coffee-table ethnography books. Today, Aamo lies at the centre of the violence that is disfiguring Darfur: tens of thousands are already dead and hundreds of thousands have been driven from their homes. The first massacre of the conflict took place just a few miles from Aamo, when the Janjawiid militia murdered several dozen villagers who had sought safety in the town of Kutum.

LRB 5 August 2004 | PDF Download