Google Earth Updates Darfur With High Res. Imagery

In partnership with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Google has published new, high-resolution aerial photographs of the area, showing destroyed villages, displaced people and refugee camps. In some places, the resolution is high enough to show the burnt ruins of individual houses.

President Omar al-Bashir of Sudan has denied that widespread atrocities have occurred in Darfur, but the United Nations estimates that more than 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million displaced in four years.

Google has also studded the maps with icons representing refugee camps with tents and destroyed villages with flames. Each icon links to a window that gives the village’s name and information about the extent of its destruction.