African-Americans are greeting the Beijing Olympics with a deafening silence when they should be denouncing the racial injustice of China’s support for Sudan.

The government of Sudan is persecuting hundreds of thousands of blacks in Darfur, and China is Sudan’s number one trading partner. Approximately 80 percent of Sudan’s crude oil is sent to Beijing, according to the Bank of Sudan.

Because of its extensive economic interests, China is in the strategic position to pressure Sudan to end government-sponsored violence in Darfur, which the United Nations says has now taken nearly half a million lives.

In light of the long struggles African-Americans have gone through in the United States — from slavery to Jim Crow to even the recent injustices in Hurricane Katrina’s aftermath — one would think there would be a stronger outcry for our brothers and sisters suffering in Darfur.

This year also happens to be the 40th anniversary of black sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos making black power fists after receiving their medals at the Mexico City Olympics in response to racial injustice in America and around the world.

Today, it seems like the only way to get black athletes to stand up for something is to threaten to take away their lucrative corporate sponsorships.

There are some who would say that “charity starts at home,” and with the growing HIV/AIDS epidemic, inadequate schools for black youth and police brutality aimed at African-Americans, we certainly have plenty of problems on our plate.

But isn’t Africa “our home” too?

In this country we demand to be called “African-American” to demonstrate our lineage to the continent.

How, then, can we forsake our brothers and sisters in Darfur today?

While some of us will be watching the Olympics over the next couple of weeks in Beijing, I would hope that true “African” Americans will remember what’s going on in Darfur and think about what the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. once said.

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

Talia Whyte is a freelance journalist and new media consultant. Her website is www.taliawhyte.com. She can be reached at pmproj [at] progressive [dot] org.