Darfur rebels free 36 African Union personnel
Oct 10, 2005 (KHARTOUM) — Dissident rebels have released 36 members of an African Union team, including a U.S. monitor, who were kidnapped in Sudan’s powder keg western Darfur region, an A.U. spokesman said Monday.
Two members of the team, its Senegalese leader and a translator still were being held, Noureddine Mezni, spokesman for the A.U. in Khartoum, said.
“We are doing our level best now to secure their release,” Mezni said, adding that 36 were set free late Sunday.
The A.U. military high commander has gone to the Tine region in west Darfur, near the border with Chad, to negotiate the release of the two remaining captives, Mezni said.
The abductions occurred a day after two A.U. troops were killed by another rebel group – the first fatalities suffered by the pan-African body since it deployed peacekeepers to Darfur in April 2004.
The Sudanese government has condemned the abduction and killing of members of the A.U. Mission in Sudan but said it was up to the A.U. to stop the attacks. Khartoum also called on the international community to pressure rebels in Darfur to abide by a cease-fire agreement signed with the government.
“Serious measures should be taken by the African Union to halt this targeting of AMIS personnel, of the civilians and of relief workers in Darfur by the rebels” the official Sudan news agency reported Monday, quoting a statement issued by the government delegation to the peace talks in Abuja, Nigeria.
The government said it was committed to continuing negotiations to find a comprehensive solution to the crisis in the western region.
The rebel killings and kidnappings have been condemned by the A.U., which has described them as major violations of a shaky cease-fire deal aimed at ending the Darfur conflict that started in 2003 and has claimed the lives of more than 180,000 people.
The violence began after rebels took up arms against government forces against for what it regarded as years of state neglect. Sudanese authorities are accused of subsequently unleashing militias known as the Janjaweed against the rebels and fanning a conflict that has sparked what the U.N. has described as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
The A.U. members and one American were taken hostage by a faction from one of two main Darfur rebel groups, the Justice and Equality Movement, said an A.U. official.
A.U. Commission Chairman Alpha Oumar Konare had demanded “the immediate release of all abducted” personnel, who were being held by armed men led by rebel commander Mohammed Saleh in Tine.
The kidnappers were a dissident faction of the rebel Justice and Equality Movement, said Konare spokesman Adam Thiam.
“We see it as a very serious attack on the mandate of the African troops in Sudan,” Thiam said.
The A.U. first deployed to Sudan with less than 500 peacekeepers, but its mission has grown to 6,200 with financial and logistical support from the European Union, the U.S. and others.
(AP/ST)