Darfur
Darfur is a region of the far western Sudan, bordering the Central African Republic and Chad. It covers an area of some 196,555 km² (75,890 miles²), with an estimated population of around 3.1 million people. It is largely an arid plateau with the Marrah Mountains (Jebel Marra), a range of volcanic peaks rising up to 3,000 m (10,100 ft), in the centre of the region. The north comprises a sandy desert, while bush forest exists in the south.Darfur's economy is primarily based on subsistence agriculture, producing cereals, fruit and tobacco as well as livestock in the drier north. Formerly, it was a centre of the slave trade, providing a major route by which African slaves were exported to the Arab world. The main ethnic groups are the Fur (after whom the region is named) and the Baggara, both ethnically African peoples. Its main towns are El Fasher and Geneina.
Christian kingdoms emerged in the region between about 900 and 1200 but were destroyed by Muslim invasions in the 13th century, leading to the Islamicisation of Darfur's inhabitants. It was ruled for several hundred years by the empire of Kanem until breaking free from their rule in the 17th century. Power then passed to a local dynasty, the Keira family, who ruled Darfur as an independent sultanate from 1640 onwards. It was conquered by Egypt in 1874 and by the army of the Sudanese Muhammad Ahmad in 1883. It became semi-autonomous under Anglo-Egyptian rule in 1898 before the last sultan led a revolt against the British Empire in 1916. This was put down, the sultan was killed and Darfur was incorporated into British-ruled Sudan.
In 1994, Darfur was divided into three federal states within Sudan: Northern, Southern, and Western Darfur. It became the scene of a bloody rebellion in 2003 against the Arab-dominated Sudanese government, with two rebel groups - the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) and the Justice and Equality Movement (Jem) - accusing the government of oppressing black Africans in favour of Arabs. In response, the government mounted a military campaign of aerial bombardment and ground attacks by an Arab militia, the Janjaweed. It was accused of committing serious human rights violations, including mass killing, looting and rapes of the non-Arab population of Darfur. By the spring of 2004, several thousand people had been killed and hundreds of thousands more had been driven from their homes, causing a major humanitarian crisis in the region.