Darfur Violence May Be Worse, Despite UN Efforts

UNITED NATIONS: April 5th: (Reuters) - The violence against civilians in Sudan's Darfur region may be worsening, despite seven U.N. Security Council resolutions and four years of efforts to end it, the United Nations chief said on Friday. "Four years ago this week, the Security Council first took up the issue of Darfur," Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a statement. "The situation remains grim today, as then, if not worse. Violence targeting civilians, including women and girls, continues at alarming levels with no accountability or end in sight" and Kartoum and the rebels have yet to "lay down their arms and commit to a peaceful settlement," he said. "A peacekeeping operation can only be effective when there is a peace to keep."

Ban's comments came after the U.S. presidential envoy for Darfur, Richard Williamson, sent him a letter urging him to speed up deployment of peacekeepers to Darfur and ensure that at least 3,600 new soldiers and police are there by June. Only some 9,000 of the planned 26,000 U.N.-African Union peacekeepers have been deployed to Darfur. Western governments have blamed Khartoum for the slow progress, saying it has delayed approval of the composition of the force and set up unnecessary obstacles. U.N. peacekeeping officials also complain of a lack of helicopters needed to move troops around Darfur, which is roughly the size of France. Some diplomats say neither The United States nor Russia has put enough pressure on China to influence Khartoum to stop trying to delay the deployment.

In an interview with Reuters on Thursday, Williamson said these problems should not be used as "excuses" for delaying deployment and urged the United Nations to act with urgency. Washington has not offered troops or helicopters but has pledged some $500 million to build camps and train and equip the mostly African Darfur mission, known as UNAMID. Ban made it clear the Security Council's action on Darfur over the years has done little to stem the violence. "Although the Security Council has adopted seven resolutions related to Darfur since 2004, the conflict and suffering of the people of Darfur continue," Ban said. "As a result of ongoing attacks by armed forces and groups, more than 100,000 civilians have been forced to flee from violence this year alone, at a rate of 1,000 per day."

International experts estimate around 2.5 million people have been displaced and 200,000 have died in five years of violence in Darfur which Washington calls genocide. Khartoum denies genocide and puts the death toll at 9,000. Separately, Ban told the Security Council in a new report that UNAMID urgently needed more helicopters if it was to be effective on the ground. However, he said he was accelerating the deployment of troops to Darfur, beginning with Egyptian and Ethiopian units. Following their deployment, troops will arrive from Thailand and Nepal, Ban said. The deployment of non-African troops in Darfur has been sensitive for Khartoum, which insists UNAMID must be "predominantly" African.

Ban's spokeswoman Marie Okabe said Khartoum had officially approved the deployment of the Thai and Nepalese troops, though Sudan's U.N. envoy indicated Khartoum could be hesitating. "We will exhaust all possibilities for troops from Africa," Sudan's U.N. Ambassador Abdalmahmoud Abdalhaleem told Reuters. "After that we will consider others, with the consultation and approval of the government."
By Louis Charbonneau
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