White House Regains Sanity--Darfur a Genocide Again

Yesterday the President's Special Envoy to Sudan Scott Gration put his foot in is mouth when he declared that. "What we see is the remnants of genocide," he said, implying the region's worst violence is behind it.  "It doesn't appear that it is a coordinated effort that was similar to what we had in 2003 to 2006," he said. President Obama disagrees, As recently as June 5, a day after his Cairo speech,  Obama described Sudan  as a "genocide that's taking place."

After Gration made his little fau pax, UN Ambassador Susan Rice,who served as top Africa official at the State Department during the Rwandan genocide, had an absolute cow, and after a long night of internal debate, the Administration backed away from Scott Gration's statement (without really backing away):

US Tries to Walk Back From Comments Downplaying Genocide in Darfur

 ABC News' Kirit Radia reports: Special Envoy to Sudan Scott Gration's comments yesterday that Darfur is experiencing only the "remnants of genocide," thus implying the troubled region's worst violence is in the past, have exposed a deep disagreement on the matter within the Obama administration.

Just two days earlier US Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice described the situation as "genocide" and at a press conference in Germany earlier this month President Obama used the phrase "ongoing genocide."

After Gration's comments yesterday, Rice was furious, according to US officials.

The remarks touched off a debate within the administration, which is working to complete its policy review on Sudan. The debate continued today, and even delayed the start of the State Department daily briefing by over an hour until language could be agreed upon at the National Security Council, officials said.

Today, Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affair PJ Crowley walked back from Gration's comments when asked to explain the discrepancy.

"I think there is no question that genocide has taken place in Darfur. We continue to characterize the circumstances in Darfur as genocide," Crowley said.

When asked if Gration had misspoken, Crowley said: "there's room in the administration for a debate about the interpretation of the facts that go into that judgment."

Gration's comments also irked the Darfur advocacy community.

"President Obama and Ambassador Rice recently labeled the situation in Darfur as an ongoing genocide, and it is troubling that key players in the administration are not singing from the same song sheet with regard to this fundamental issue," Save Darfur Coalition President Jerry Fowler said in a statement today.

John Norris, Executive Director of the Enough Project, told ABC News today that his group believes genocide is ongoing in Darfur.

"We believe that the ongoing efforts by the government of Sudan meet the classic definition. That they, through their actions, not only through their support of the Janjaweed, government denials, denial of humanitarian aid, seem to be designed to destroy people in whole or in part," he said.

This is just one more example of an administration where one hand of the foriegn policy end, does not speak to the other, except of course when they are bashing Israel.