US envoy in Sudan on new Darfur mission
Sunday, March 4, 2007
UNITED STATES envoy Andrew Natsios arrived in Sudan late last Friday on his third mission focused on the conflict in the country's western Darfur region, the official Suna news agency said yesterday.
Natsios will have a series of meeting in Khartoum and will also visit Darfur and Juba, the capital of south Sudan, it added.
Abdel Basset Senussi of the Sudanese foreign ministry told Suna that he hopes Natsios's mission "will relaunch the search for a solution in Darfur and increase pressure on non-signatories of the peace accord so that they will rejoin the peace process".
The Abuja agreement aimed at bringing peace to Darfur was signed on May 5 last year by the Khartoum government and a single rebel group, Minni Minnawi's Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) faction.
Since then, the violence has since continued unabated and rebel splinter groups have flourished.
On his most recent mission in December, Natsios failed to convince Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir to accept the deployment of UN peacekeepers in the war-ravaged western region.
The envoy's visit comes hard on the heels of an unprecedented move by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, which last Tuesday accused two Sudanese officials of a string of war crimes in Darfur.
According to the United Nations, at least 200,000 people have been killed and some 2.5 million displaced since the conflict erupted four years ago. Some sources say the death toll is much higher.
Officials from Beshir's ruling National Congress Party meanwhile berated First Vice President Salva Kiir, himself a former rebel from south Sudan, for calling for international peacekeepers to go to Darfur.
Kiir had on Friday told Arab news network Al-Jazeera that "when the government has failed to protect civilians and their property in Darfur, outside help becomes necessary".
"This help must consist of an international force charged with protecting civilians from killings and assuring the arrival of humanitarian aid," he said, once more distancing himself from Khartoum's official line.
But one of Beshir's advisers, Majzub al-Khalifa, retorted that "from a security point of view the current situation in Darfur is much better than in (the southern Sudanese capital) Juba", local press reported.
But the African Union mission currently working in Darfur warned yesterday that risked being "paralysed" after a civilian working for the AU was beaten up and robbed at his home in Darfur's main city of al-Fasher. "If this continues, we are at risk of being paralysed," AU spokesman Meznim said after four armed men burst into the employee's house.
AFP
Natsios will have a series of meeting in Khartoum and will also visit Darfur and Juba, the capital of south Sudan, it added.
Abdel Basset Senussi of the Sudanese foreign ministry told Suna that he hopes Natsios's mission "will relaunch the search for a solution in Darfur and increase pressure on non-signatories of the peace accord so that they will rejoin the peace process".
The Abuja agreement aimed at bringing peace to Darfur was signed on May 5 last year by the Khartoum government and a single rebel group, Minni Minnawi's Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) faction.
Since then, the violence has since continued unabated and rebel splinter groups have flourished.
On his most recent mission in December, Natsios failed to convince Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir to accept the deployment of UN peacekeepers in the war-ravaged western region.
The envoy's visit comes hard on the heels of an unprecedented move by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, which last Tuesday accused two Sudanese officials of a string of war crimes in Darfur.
According to the United Nations, at least 200,000 people have been killed and some 2.5 million displaced since the conflict erupted four years ago. Some sources say the death toll is much higher.
Officials from Beshir's ruling National Congress Party meanwhile berated First Vice President Salva Kiir, himself a former rebel from south Sudan, for calling for international peacekeepers to go to Darfur.
Kiir had on Friday told Arab news network Al-Jazeera that "when the government has failed to protect civilians and their property in Darfur, outside help becomes necessary".
"This help must consist of an international force charged with protecting civilians from killings and assuring the arrival of humanitarian aid," he said, once more distancing himself from Khartoum's official line.
But one of Beshir's advisers, Majzub al-Khalifa, retorted that "from a security point of view the current situation in Darfur is much better than in (the southern Sudanese capital) Juba", local press reported.
But the African Union mission currently working in Darfur warned yesterday that risked being "paralysed" after a civilian working for the AU was beaten up and robbed at his home in Darfur's main city of al-Fasher. "If this continues, we are at risk of being paralysed," AU spokesman Meznim said after four armed men burst into the employee's house.
AFP
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