The Interpreter: Tales of a Darfur Refugee

The Translator brings us a compelling, yet hopeful, account by one of the men who contributed most to enabling countless journalists to safely bring to the world the terrible stories of the genocide in Darfur. Daoud Hari belongs to the Zaghawa tribe, whose conflict with Arab nomads had existed since his childhood, as they insisted on grazing cattle on land that did not belong to them. Knowing this, the government in Khartoum encouraged the nomads, as well as the armed Arab militias, Janjaweed, to kill non-Arab Africans and destroy their homes. Men, women, and children were killed. Village leaders were burned alive or tortured to death in front of their friends and children. Children were thrown into bonfires. So far, over two million people have died in this conflict. After a terrible attack on his village, Hari miraculously managed to escape to a refugee camp in Chad, from where he began to offer his services as an interpreter to NGO members and journalists. He returned several times to the conflict zones and witnessed indescribable tragedies, such as a terrible massacre where 81 young people were lined up and stabbed to death with machetes. The stench in the air made the BBC journalists accompanying him so ill that they had to be admitted to a clinic in Chad for three days to recover from that horrifying scene that more closely resembled hell.