-Caveat Lector- Freeing the slaves Boston group says it bought liberty for thousands in Sudan By Michael Paulson, Globe Staff, 7/13/2001 Thirty-three dollars. That's what it cost to buy a woman freedom from a life of rape and servitude, and a child a future with his own family, according to a member of a group of Boston clergy and human rights advocates just back from Sudan. Three Boston ministers, a Harvard student who is crusading against global slavery, and a prominent local TV personality plan to announce today that over the last two weeks they have purchased freedom for nearly 4,000 Sudanese women and children who had been kidnapped and enslaved during that country's brutal civil war. The price they negotiated to buy each slave was less than the going price for a goat, which is worth $40, or a healthy cow, which is worth $100 in Sudan. ''I'm the descendant of slaves, and I don't forget my history,'' said the Rev. Raymond A. Hammond, pastor of Bethel AME Church in Jamaica Plain, who just returned from Sudan. ''I felt a kind of sadness and pain, realizing this was still going on, and the plight of these people is being ignored, suppressed, and denied.'' Hammond went to Sudan with his wife and co-pastor, the Rev. Gloria White-Hammond, the Rev. Gerald Bell, another local cleric, WBZ-TV anchor Liz Walker, and Harvard senior Jay Williams of the Boston-based American Anti-Slavery Group. The trip was coordinated by the American Anti-Slavery Group and Christian Solidarity International, a human rights group based in Switzerland. The group is one of an increasing number of delegations traveling to Sudan to redeem slaves. The slaves are mostly southern Sudanese, either Christian or adherents of traditional African faiths, who have been kidnapped by Muslims from northern Sudan. The act of paying money to redeem slaves has been controversial, criticized by some who argue that it encourages kidnappers. Hammond rejected that notion. ''I'd heard all of the concerns that people have raised that this might stimulate the slave trade, but what became very clear is that those are allegations raised by people who have never been there and have never talked with the local leadership,'' he said. ''And, frankly, given the silence of most world governments on this issue, there's no evidence anybody much cares about what happens with people who've been sold into slavery, so the arguments about it exacerbating the situation are pretty specious.'' Sudan has been roiled for 18 years by a civil war that has killed 2 million people, according to the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, which last year declared the Sudanese government ''the world's most violent abuser of the right to freedom of religion and belief.'' The US State Department has accused the Sudanese government of supporting the enslavement of non-Muslims, and in March the Religious Freedom Commission declared that, ''Government security forces and government-sponsored militias continue to abduct women and children into conditions of slavery.'' Sudanese officials have denied supporting slavery, although they have acknowledged ''abductions'' they attribute to renegade militias. The Sudanese government has described US human rights groups as ''Sudan-haters'' and has blasted the United States for interfering in Sudanese domestic affairs. The war in Sudan is religiously charged, and has attracted increasing attention from Christians around the world. The government in Sudan is Muslim, and many of the victims of the war are not; among those being persecuted are Christians, which has raised the ire of Cardinal Bernard F. Law of Boston and other Christian leaders in the United States. Hammond, who returned to Boston before the rest of the group, said he and his wife have been concerned about the situation in Sudan for several years, but that ''after having talked to people for a long time, we thought it was important to go and see for ourselves.'' He said the group had pre-arranged, through local officials and slave brokers, to pay to redeem slaves. He said he spoke with numerous freed slaves. ''The overwhelming majority were women and children, because typically the men were killed, and a common story was that if the woman was old enough she might be gang-raped and then sold to a master who might make her his concubine, give her to another slave as a wife, and would probably have her involved in working in the house, tending sheep or goats, or other menial tasks,'' he said. ''In some cases, attempts were made to force them to become Muslims, or to give them Arabic names. Several had experienced genital mutilation, and several had stories of having been beaten, and they had the scars to prove it.'' Hammond said the freed slaves were returned to their villages and their families. He said he repeatedly looked for any evidence that the former slaves, particularly women who had borne children to Muslims or to other slaves, were being shunned by their families, but found no such evidence. Hammond said he and the other travelers who return today will attempt to pressure governments to urge Sudan to stop slave-taking, and will encourage Americans to put pressure on oil companies and investors that he says are profiting from the conflict in Sudan by taking oil from areas that have been ''ethnically cleansed.'' He also said he wants to push to make sure that any peace deals in Sudan include provisions for the repatriation of slaves. ''We think this is as egregious as anything that's taken place in the context of apartheid, and should be treated as such,'' he said. Hammond and the other travelers are African-American, and he said his awareness that his own ancestors were slaves in North and South Carolina helped push him to act. ''There are all kinds of injustices around the world, but some are particularly egregious, and if we don't respond, it says something profound about who we are as people of faith and as human beings,'' he said. ''These people are not statistics; they're not rhetorical puppets or symbols. These are real people trying to lead real lives.'' Michael Paulson can be reached by e-mail at [EMAIL PROTECTED] <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! 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