When he was asked this week to comment on the genocide and war crimes charges filed against the

When he was asked this week to comment on the genocide and war crimes charges filed against the leader of Sudan by the special prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, President Bush noted that the United States is not under the court’s jurisdiction.

Bush had a good reason for making the point — his support for Prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo’s actions would have had the effect of legitimizing the court — but in the end, the case against the Sudanese president, Omar al-Bashir, isn’t about jurisdiction. It speaks to al-Bashir’s inhumanity towards his own people.

It also delivers a strong message to the millions of people around the world who, like the victims of Darfur, are suffering at the hands of bloodthirsty leaders: We have not forgotten you.

Although it has taken more than four years to officially hold al-Bashir responsible for the ethnic cleansing campaign that has claimed more than 200,000 lives and displaced more than 2.5 million residents of Darfur, the charges of genocide and war crimes are significant.

Prosecutor Ocampo has chronicled state sponsored violence in Darfur over the past five years and concluded that the president had “masterminded and implemented” a plan to destroy three main ethnic groups.

Ocampo also said that in response to a rebel uprising in Darfur, al-Bashir sent government forces and Arab militias known as janjaweed to destroy the villages inhabited by the three groups. On the president’s orders, pro-government forces slaughtered 35,000 civilians and raped thousands of women and girls.

Nobody expects al-Bashir to give himself up in light of the arrest warrant issued by a three-judge panel of the International Criminal Court, not does anyone think that the charges will in any way change his murderous ways.

Criminal enterprise

But what the prosecutor’s action has done is put the Sudanese government on notice that it is now a criminal enterprise and that any future ethnic cleansing campaigns will be justification for a United Nations-led intervention.

Indeed, President Bush, in responding to the question about the charges against al-Bashir, said that the U.N. should move quickly to deploy the 28,000-member peacekeeping force to Darfur.

The deployment has been delayed because of a lack of troop preparedness and the failure of the U.N. to get a hold of the necessary equipment, such as helicopters.

U.N.-African Union soldiers who are on the ground are already paying a deadly price. On Wednesday, a Nigerian company commander was shot and killed while on patrol near a peacekeeping camp. His death came a week after seven U.N.-A.U. peacekeepers were killed a Darfur during an ambush by about 200 gunmen on horseback and in SUVs.

There can be no doubt that the attacks have the blessing of President al-Bashir.

And more can be expected — given the threats from his henchmen following the charges and the issuance of the arrest warrant by the prosecutor of the ICC.

Government officials have said that things could get worse, not better, in Darfur.

It’s a threat that must not be taken lightly. The international community should make it clear that further bloodshed will result in an all-out military campaign against the government.

As for the criminal court’s proceedings, if there is a way to try al-Bashir in absentia, it should be pursued. What is important is for the prosecutor to lay out in detail the evidence he has accumulated.

The world needs to know what happens when it turns a blind eye on crimes against humanity.