Students signed petitions and letters to urge senators and Pentagon officials to end the Darfur conflict, while local arts groups performed alongside them last night at BU Central.

The fourth annual “Jamnesty: Darfur,” hosted by the BU chapter of Amnesty International, combined music, poetry, dance and food with human-rights awareness and activism, raising money for Amnesty International USA and its work in Darfur.

The letters were addressed to senators, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon. They expressed concern for the safety of civilians in Darfur and urged support for a strong peacekeeping force and an end to violence in the region, which the U.S. government has called a genocide.

The petition pressures China to support human rights in Sudan.

“We actually have been in the [GSU] Link collecting signatures,” said Amnesty International at BU President Rebecca Martin. “At this point, we are pretty on target. We wanted about 300 signatures on the petition, and tonight, we got at least 200.”

The Darfur conflict in western Sudan began in 2003 when a government-backed Arab militia group known as the Janjaweed began fighting with two rebel groups.

Since then, the Janjaweed, along with the Sudanese government, have displaced more than 2 million civilians from their homes and killed more then 400,000 people, raping and torturing many in the process, according to the Save Darfur website.

“We promote the acceptance of different perspectives and people,” said Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation senior Natasha Noel, a member of Speak for Yourself, a spoken-word group that performed last night. “These people in Darfur are being oppressed, and we speak against oppression. So, in that way, our message is parallel.”