There was a peace treaty signed Sunday in Sudan, marking significant progress in the effort to end the country’s 21-year civil war.

This conflict has claimed 2 million lives and forced 3 million more to flee the fighting. News of the treaty was buried because of the unsurprising Palestinian election results. And while the treaty is certainly imperfect (making no mention of the genocide in Darfur, among other problems), it is certainly a less-expected piece of very good news.

Some reports claim that old conflicts in the Democratic Republic of Congo are on the verge of flaring up once again. The genocide that started in Rwanda has at times involved nine nations fighting in the country formerly known as Zaire. This fighting has led to almost 4 million deaths.

The conflicts are similar in many ways. Both are deadly on a level not seen in this world in 60 years. Both have political and cultural elements that encourage their continuation. But perhaps the most important similarity is that they are both occurring in Africa.

The United States and the rest of the world have taken a keen interest in humanitarian problems in Europe and Asia, with an intervention seemingly every other year. From a purely numerical standpoint, these problems pale in comparison to those found just to the south. The global response to Africa’s conflicts has been lacking.

Africa’s problems don’t sell newspapers. African issues don’t generate billions in aid unless they have the potential to affect non-Africans. America and other Western nations seem to have trouble identifying with Africa, even though we are no strangers to civil war and ethnic conflict ourselves.

Even in the new movie “Hotel Rwanda,” roundly praised as a rebuke of the developed world’s failure to intervene in an African humanitarian crisis, the sympathetic protagonist is a Westernized African, while the villainous Hutu Interhamwe militia are the only prominent characters who appear to speak a language other than English. It is saddening to note that even our most sympathetic representation of Africans requires us to project our own culture upon them.

But there is certainly hope. The public and private donations so far to the victims of the recent tsunami have been an unprecedented outpouring of international aid.

Without disrespecting or neglecting the victims of that tragedy, we must focus this newfound charitable energy toward these ongoing problems. With luck we can bring Africa along in our foreign policy goal of freedom for all.

To do any less would be shameful.