Simon Deng

Last week, the Univeristy of Illinois at Springfield had the opporotunity to meet Simon Deng and hear him speak about the current situation within the Dafur Region. Before his speech we presented Mr. Deng with our donation to the region and told informed him that we would continue to work towards creating as much awarness as possible. A co-worker and I had the opporotunity to meet with Mr.Deng after the presentation to discuss more in depth about the topic. He stated that this war had been on going a year before the countries independence in 1956. The war is based and will continually be based on the issues of religious conflicts. Those who decided against the conformity have been taken as prisoners and killed, this was particulary present in the the south of sudan. Up to 1million people were found dead in locations that were labeled as "safe zones". This comes as a shock to me because my main focus had just soley rested on the Darfur region when in actuality the south suffered the most brutal attacks. I encourage everyone to continue spreading awarness/knowledge about the crisis so we can come to a resolution. Education is key.