A group of eight Darfuri refugees were on Parliament Hill last week to make an urgent, personal call to action, encouraging MPs of all political stripes to urge the government to contribute to a UN peacekeeping mission to Darfur, which they say is balancing on the edge of failure.

This visit is just one more step in the long struggle the Sudanese-Canadian community has waged over the past years for meaningful support from the Canadian government.

David Swann, a Liberal MLA from Calgary, co-ordinated the trip to Ottawa as part of an ongoing campaign called "Christmas for Darfur: Troops on the Ground."

"We want the Canadian government to take leadership and get troops on the ground," he says.

Mustafa Mousa, a member of Calgary's Darfuri community, says Sudan is in desperate need of help.

"There is a bad humanitarian situation. The janjaweed is still raping women and the government is training a militia," he says, "So now we are looking for the Canadian government to participate, to implement the Security Council resolutions and to send aid."

Mr. Mousa says Canada's diplomatic clout is also badly needed.

"The Sudanese government is now mobilizing the other countries to influence the international events," he says, "so we need Canada, as a member of UN, to force and push other countries to protect the people of Darfur."

Siddiqa Adom, who escaped Sudan for Canada three years ago, is a high school student in Calgary.

Her message is simple.

"My mother died because of this, and I don't want my other family to die," she says.

Mr. Swann says he and his Darfuri comrades spent two days engaging MPs in whatever way they could, from scheduled sit-downs to impromptu meetings in the halls of Parliament.

The delegation met with a number of government members, including Jason Kenney, Deepak Obhrai, Kevin Sorensen and Patrick Brown.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper, however, declined to meet with the Darfuri delegation.

"We've requested an audience with the prime minister," Mr. Swann says. "They came back to us within five minutes and said it wasn't possible."

Mr. Swann says the mission currently suffers from a dearth of leadership.

"The world is looking for leadership and the UN is looking for leadership," he says, "Canada has an opportunity to lead here and stop the first genocide in the 21st century."

He adds that Canada is not following through on its earlier UN actions.

"We signed R2P [Right to Protect], and what are we doing?" he asks. "I don't see the evidence that we are actually going to follow through on that commitment."

As part of this initiative, Mr. Swann is enduring a 14 day fast, during which he will consume only water and clear juices.

The fast, which has inspired by Mahatma Ghandi, "identifies with the suffering and the hunger that's going on over there," he says. "It raises the level of importance in people's minds when somebody decides to give up a common everyday requirement for life to make a statement about he inadequacy of the world response to Darfur."

Mr. Swann is currently carrying on his fast outside Prime Minister Harper's Calgary constituency office.