Previous | Next :: Clooney V Janjaweed : National Press Club DC | April 30, 2006, 11:29 pm

Looking to do the right thing: George Clooney joined Democrat Senator Barak Obama and Republican Senator Sam Brownback at a press conference today at the National Press Club. They called on Americans to attend 'Save Darfur: Rally's to Stop Genocide' across the country on Sunday. They also called on the US government and other NATO countries and UN security council members to help end the genocide in Darfur. Clooney has just returned from a trip to Darfur where he saw for himself the tragic effects of the genocide carried out by the government of Sudan with its troop's in helicopter gunship's and with it's proxy militias on horse back: 'The Janjaweed'. It is estimated that up to 300,000 may have already died and 3.5 million who have fled are now dependent on foreign aid for their survival. This is a pretty packed press conference as you can imagine. A couple of Senators talking about Darfur would bring a bit of press, but the presence of George Clooney brings tons........er.....20 odd TV crews what seems like hundreds of reporters and scores of photographers. Its what we in Britain would call a 'bun fight' but I have to say the US press guys are pretty well behaved compared to us Brits. There was no real pushing or fighting in the press pack which you get plenty of in Britain.(The craziest ever press pack fights I ever saw were in Algeria and Hong Kong was pretty crazy too) Still even with well behaved colleges it was difficult to see and certainly difficult to move to where you would like to be. The unwritten code of practice for these events is you are not supposed to move.... TV guys in particular hate that......but I just have to....... I hate to shoot one image only. This image I made by moving to one side and waiting for George Clooney to look back (moving required me to leave the room via one door run round the corridor and back in through another luckily the Emcee Joe Madison of Black Eagle fame allowed me to have his place otherwise I literally could not see the front through the throng).