WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Sam Brownback today voiced his opposition to the Obama Administration's newly announced policy toward Sudan.

"I strongly oppose the Administration's policy toward Sudan that gives incentives and rewards to a genocidal regime headed by Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, an indicted war criminal," said Brownback. "Such a policy is engagement to the extreme, and blind to fundamental principles of justice. This new policy sends the wrong message to tyrants around the world, that they will not be brought to justice, and instead may even receive American concessions. While all parties in Sudan must fully implement the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, the ends cannot justify the means."

This week, the Obama Administration outlined its policy toward Sudan. The policy offers incentives to Sudan if it works to improve the situation in Darfur, but the Administration will not make public what these incentives are.

Brownback continued, "Not so long ago, the United States declared a genocide taking place in Sudan under our watch. That declaration brought real responsibilities and obligations, not the least of which was to pursue justice against the perpetrators of brutal violence, as we did for Charles Taylor, Radovan Karadzic, and Heinrich Himmler."

In the course of the six year genocide in Darfur, as many as 300,000 people in Darfur have died; as many as 3 million have been forced to flee their homes.

Five years ago, the United States Congress unanimously declared that the government of Sudan committed the crime of genocide. The Bush Administration affirmed this determination. In March of this year, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Bashir for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Bashir is the first sitting head of state sought for detention since the ICC's establishment in 2002.