The International Criminal Court's prosecutor filed charges July 14 against Sudan's president for waging genocide in Darfur through mass murder and rape — a high-risk strategy that could backfire against the people in the desert region where tens of thousands have died.

Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir AP PHOTO

Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo asked judges of the International Criminal Court for an arrest warrant for President Omar al-Bashir on 10 charges related to a campaign of extermination of three Darfur tribes.

The U.N. has estimated 300,000 people have died since 2003 directly from attacks or indirectly through starvation. Some 2.5 million people have been evicted from their homes and live in refugee camps — still targeted by Sudan's military and government-backed militias.

A three-judge panel was expected to decide in two to three months on Moreno-Ocampo's request for a warrant.

The court, which began work in 2002 as the world's first permanent war crimes tribunal, has no enforcement arm and relies on governments to act as its police force.

Sudan denounced the indictment as a political stunt and said it would ignore any arrest order against al-Bashir.

Sudan's anger could undermine talks to resolve the decades-old problem between north and south Sudan, stymie efforts to bolster the ill-equipped, 9,000-strong U.N.-African Union force in the western Darfur region, and endanger relief operations that are keeping 2 million people alive in refugee camps, the Brussels-based International Crisis Group said.