| Africa Horn |
| Prosecuting Beshir won't help Darfur, says Kenyan PM |
| 2008-07-21 |
| Prosecuting Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir for alleged war crimes in Darfur is not going to end the conflict, Kenya's Prime Minister Raila Odinga said in an interview with BBC television Sunday. "I think that, basically, to try to exonerate people here and there or to appropriate blame is not going to resolve the issue of Darfur," he told the broadcaster from Nairobi when asked about his view of the move. The International Criminal Court (ICC) was asked last Monday for Beshir to be arrested on genocide charges. If granted, the arrest warrant would be the first issued by the court against a sitting head of state. The request, from ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo, has prompted criticism, notably from the Arab League, some of whose members have said it threatens the prospects for peace in the troubled western Sudanese region. Leaders of the African Union have also warned that indicting Beshir could lead to a power vacuum in Sudan, increasing the risk of military coups and even anarchy, scuppering efforts to resolve the situation. Odinga said: "So many lives have been lost in Darfur. "I think it's necessary for the African Union to be much more proactive on this issue, to lead the way, so that the rest of the international community supports the initiative of the African Union." Meanwhile, Darfur's new chief mediator Djibril Bassole made his first visit to Sudan on Sunday as he begins his uphill task of reigniting a stalled peace process. "This will be a difficult mission but it's not mission impossible," he told reporters after long talks with Sudan's State Minister for Foreign Affairs Ali Karti. Bassole, the foreign minister of Burkino Faso, faces numerous obstacles to securing peace. "My priorities will be defined by the Sudanese but we must strengthen dialogue and ask for a cessation of hostilities to create the conditions to search for a comprehensive political solution," Bassole said. Bassole's task will be complicated by the fact he speaks neither Arabic or English, the languages understood by those negotiating, whether from rebels or from the government. Bassole will be based in Darfur's main town el-Fasher, a critical improvement on his predecessors UN envoy Jan Eliasson and his African Union counterpart Salim Ahmed Salim who were often criticised for their "part-time diplomacy" jetting into the country for short visits every few months. |
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| Africa Horn |
| JEM urges Annan's mediation in Darfur |
| 2008-03-17 |
| A rebel leader in Sudan's region of Darfur has called for peace talks with the Khartoum government with Kofi Annan's mediation. We are calling for one single boss. We are calling for institutional reform for the mediation and we are suggesting that Mr Kofi Annan is suitable for heading this negotiation, to lead both the AU and UN," Khalil Ibrahim, leader of the rebel Justice and Equality Movement said on Sunday. Ibrahim said his movement was calling for "corrections inside the AU-UN mediation" that has so far failed to make headway in bringing peace. The group has refused to take part in African Union- and UN-sponsored peace talks aimed at ending five years of violence in Darfur where international groups say 200,000 people have died and 2.2 million been displaced. Ibrahim's call came one day before the top AU and UN envoys to Darfur, Salim Ahmed Salim and Jan Eliasson, open talks in Geneva between regional and international players that neither Sudan nor any rebel group will attend. In Libya, another rebel leader, Abdallah Yahia, said on Sunday that his faction was ready to take part in Sirte negotiations. "The leadership of the movement underlines its desire to reach a just peace in Sudan and announces its participation in the next round of negotiations in Sirte," said the head of the Sudan Liberation Movement-Unity. The rebel leader said the negotiations would however have to be restricted to the "military movements on the ground" and no other parties. |
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| Africa Horn | ||
| Darfur faction hints at deal | ||
| 2006-05-12 | ||
 A Darfur rebel faction is reconsidering its rejection of a peace deal signed by the Sudanese government and the main rebel group this month.
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| Africa Horn |
| Darfur peace talks extended |
| 2006-05-03 |
| The African Union has extended the deadline to reach a peace agreement for Darfur by 48 hours. Salim Ahmed Salim, the chief AU mediator, said late on Tuesday that the extension aimed at giving negotiators a further chance to strike a deal. "Nigerian President and African Union Chairman Olusegun Obasanjo requested to further extend the deadline for ending the talks by another 48 hours ... to explore what more could be done ... to adopt and sign the agreement," Salim said moments before a midnight deadline for the talks to end expired. Noureddine Mezni, AU spokesman, said the Nigerian president had also requested the extension so that a group of African heads of state who are due on Wednesday in the Nigerian capital Abuja, the talks venue, could participate. |
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| Africa Horn |
| Sudan's Government Steps Up Darfur Attacks, Rights Group Says |
| 2006-04-28 |
| Sudan's government is stepping up a military offensive in the Darfur region in a bid to win territory before an April 30 deadline to conclude peace talks with rebels, a U.S.-based human rights group said. Attacks this week on rebel-held areas in southern Darfur, using Antonov aircraft and helicopter gun ships, have displaced thousands of civilians, Human Rights Watch said today in an e- mailed statement. It urged the United Nations to accelerate efforts to send UN peacekeepers to the western Sudanese region. ``Khartoum's new attacks on civilians show the Security Council needs to move quickly on a UN protection force for Darfur,'' Peter Takirambudde, Human Rights Watch's Africa director, said in the statement. Sudan is blocking UN efforts to send a peacekeeping force, saying it won't consider accepting UN troops until it reaches a peace agreement with rebels at talks under way in Abuja, the Nigerian capital. The African Union's chief mediator, Salim Ahmed Salim, yesterday submitted a draft peace deal and urged government and rebel negotiators to sign it by April 30. The three-year-old Darfur conflict has killed tens of thousands of civilians and forced more than 2 million from their homes, the UN says. The UN calls Darfur the worst humanitarian crisis in the world and the U.S. government has accused the Sudanese government of committing genocide in the region. ``This is decision time; no more procrastination,'' Salim told government and rebel negotiators yesterday, according to an e-mailed statement. ``Every journey has a destination, for the Abuja peace talks, the end is at hand.'' |
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| Africa North |
| Sudan denies visas to UN mission |
| 2006-04-20 |
 Sudan refused to grant visas for a U.N. military assessment mission planning a U.N. peacekeeping operation in Darfur, a U.N. spokesman said on Wednesday. The Khartoum government has not consented to U.N. troops to augment the African Union soldiers currently trying to stop the killing and rape in Sudan's Darfur region. But officials said they would discuss it after a peace pact, under negotiation in Abuja, Nigeria. Salim Ahmed Salim, the African Union's chief mediator at the Abuja talks between the government and two rebels groups, told the Security Council on Tuesday he expected a ceasefire deal by April 30 but acknowledged frustrations lay ahead.Hedi Annabi, a U.N. assistant secretary-general for peacekeeping, went to Khartoum this week and spoke to President Omar Hassan al-Bashir and other officials about sending the U.N. team to Darfur. "They felt this was not the time for a U.N. assessment mission to go into Darfur until the Abuja process was completed," U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. "We have a clear political line from the Sudanese at this point." But Dujarric said planning continued and options for an eventual force in Darfur would be presented to the Security Council. "It's much more a bump in the road than the end of the road for us in terms of contingency planning," he said. U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said, "That's clearly a mistake that undercuts our ability to do contingency planning." Still, there has been hesitation among African Union officials about placing their 7,000 troops in Darfur under U.N. command. North African Arab nations support Sudan. More diplo-speak at the link... |
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| Africa Horn | ||
| AU tables new, improved ceasefire for Darfur | ||
| 2006-03-13 | ||
Mediators in peace talks on Sudan's Darfur region on Sunday presented the warring parties with a detailed ceasefire proposal designed to work better than an existing, often violated agreement.
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| Africa Horn | ||
| U.N., African Union Condemn Darfur Attack | ||
| 2005-12-21 | ||
The United Nations and the African Union on Wednesday condemned an attack on a village in Darfur in western Sudan in which camel and horse-riding assailants killed 20 civilians and burned their huts. The 500 men, suspected Arab militiamen known as the Janjaweed, swept through the village of Abu Sorouj in the war-wrecked Darfur region on Monday, killing the villagers and destroying and looting their houses, U.N. spokeswoman Radhia Achouri told reporters.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan condemned the attack, Achouri said, warning that 'the security situation in Darfur remains volatile. Militia attacks on villages continue.' Abu Sorouj was among a number of villages that were attacked this week in all three Darfur states 'and continuous displacements of people have been reported,' Achouri said. Recent fighting has forced 5,000 people to flea their homes in southern Darfur to northern areas, Achouri said. The African Union, which maintains 7,000 peacekeepers in Darfur, said it was 'outraged' by the Abu Sorouj attack. An AU statement said the organization's peace mediator Salim Ahmed Salim, condemned 'the unwarranted brutal killings of numerous innocent civilians, including women and children, and the destruction of their homes and property by armed militia.' AU-sponsored peace talks ended Dec. 7 in Abuja, Nigeria, and another round is not expected before the new year. The AU also urged Sudanese officials to ensure that the assailants 'face the full force of the law.'
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| International-UN-NGOs |
| UN plan demands more intervention |
| 2004-11-29 |
| The UN should be reformed to make intervention in failing states easier, a commission is set to recommend. The panel, which has examined how the UN could respond better to global threats, also calls for the Security Council to be enlarged, the BBC has learned. The report has been called the "biggest make-over" of the UN since 1945. It is thought that if the UN shows greater readiness to act, unilateralism by member states would be less likely. A year ago, in the wake of the international divisions over Iraq, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan warned the UN was at a "fork in the road". He said the organisation had to review its fundamental policies in order to address the increasing threats of global terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and nuclear proliferation. He asked a panel of 16 veteran diplomats and politicians, chaired by former Thai Prime Minister Anand Panyarachun, to examine ways the UN should be reformed. The route the panel is set to advocate is much more interventionist, moving away from the UN's traditional emphasis that it cannot meddle in the internal affairs of a member state. Pre-emptive The BBC has been told that among the panel's main findings are calls for a peace-building commission to be established to monitor potential trouble spots, offer help and advice, give warnings and prepare the way for armed intervention as a last resort. The panel wants member states to accept a new obligation - a "responsibility to protect" their own citizens. If they failed to do so, then intervention by the Security Council would be much more likely than under current UN procedures. At the moment, the Council can order intervention, and a member state can act in self-defence, if there is an imminent threat. The Council can declare a threat to international security but the definition is vague and the procedure unwieldy. This report recommends that the Council should be more willing to act pre-emptively, though according to five strict criteria: * the threat should be defined * the purpose of intervention should be clear * it should be a last resort, * the means should be proportionate * the consequences should be examined Whether the Council would in fact take action would depend on what the crisis was and how it voted. The UN would not have its own peace-keeping force, although several members of the panel wanted this. Broad definition Among the other main findings, the panel suggests threats to international security should be defined widely and should include poverty, pandemics like Aids and environmental disasters, not just threats from weapons of mass destruction, wars and failed states. Panel's members Anand Panyarachun (Chairman), former Prime Minister of Thailand Robert Badinter (France) Joao Clemente Baena Soares (Brazil) Gro Harlem Brundtland (Norway) Mary Chinery-Hesse (Ghana) Gareth Evans (Australia) Lord David Hannay (United Kingdom) Enrique Iglesias (Uruguay) Amre Moussa (Egypt) Satish Nambiar (India) Sadako Ogata (Japan) Yevgenii Primakov (Russia) Qian Qichen (China) Nafis Sadik (Pakistan) Salim Ahmed Salim (Tanzania) Brent Scowcroft (United States) The Security Council should be enlarged from 15 members to 24 - the five permanent members, the US, Russia, China, the UK and France, should keep their seats and their vetoes (any changes to that would simply not be agreed, it was felt). The panel does not, however, recommend how this should be achieved and simply offers two models. In the first, there would be more permanent members without a veto. In the second there would be some semi-permanent members who must be voted onto the Council every four years. Terrorism would be defined for the first time and should be made part of an international convention. Terrorism would mean any action targeted against non-combatants and civilians. To help stop the spread of nuclear weapons, countries wanting fuel for their nuclear power should have automatic rights to get supplies under the International Atomic Energy Agency so long as they complied with inspection regimes. These inspections should themselves be drastically tightened up. The system would work rather as the International Monetary Fund does where members have drawing rights on currencies. Regional organisation like the African Union should be strengthened. Any peacekeeping operation should be funded by the UN itself and member states should pay automatically. The G8 group of countries should be expanded and changed. One idea put forward is that membership of the G8, which is made up only of the rich, should be widened to 20 bringing in developing countries. The UN Human Rights Commission should be re-invigorated with more human rights activists and fewer diplomats on members' delegations. The report will now be considered by the Secretary General and then by the member states. Any institutional changes are likely to come only slowly but the thrust is clear - the UN must reform or lose its role. |
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