African commission on HR to examine situation in Sudan’s Darfur

BANJUL, Gambia, Sep 10, 2004 (PANA) — The African Commission on Human and
Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) Friday announced plans to hold in South
Africa from 18-19 September an extra-ordinary session devoted to
the difficult human rights situation in west Sudan’s Darfur
region.

According to a press release issued in Banjul Friday by the
commission’s Public Relations Officer, Moussa Gandega, the
decision to hold the extra-ordinary session was taken by the last
Ordinary Session held in the Gambian capital.

It was also recommended by the President of the Commission of the
African Union, Alpha Omar Konare.

“It is recalled that during the 35th Ordinary Session of the
African Commission held from 21st May to 4th June 2004 in Banjul,
The Gambia in which the Periodic Report of the Republic of Sudan
was examined, the African Commission was cautioned about the
serious allegations of human rights violations in the region of
Darfur, Sudan and it decided that it will send a fact-finding
mission to the region,” the release stated.

The ACHPR sent a five-member team of its commissioners on the
fact-finding mission in Darfur region from 8-18 July 2004.

The extra-ordinary session in South Africa is expected to adopt a
draft report made by the fact-finding mission and examine the
prevailing human rights situation in the troubled Darfur.

“At the end of the fact-finding mission and while awaiting for
the examination and adoption of the draft mission report, and in
conformity with Article 111(3) of the Rules of Procedure of the
African Commission, the Chairperson of the African Commission
sent a request to the President of the Republic of Sudan, His
Excellency Omar El Bashir,” the release noted.

Konare stressed the necessity “to take urgent provisional
measures relating to questions of security, the protection of
women from rape and violence, access to displaced persons and
the supply of humanitarian assistance, the need to reassure the
safe return of displaced persons to their villages, among other
things,” the press release reiterated.

The African Union has sent a group to monitor a cease-fire signed
by the government of Sudan and two rebel groups operating in
Darfur on 8 April 2004. It has also sent about 300 troops from
Nigeria and Rwanda to protect the monitors.

The 18-month conflict in Darfur has reportedly killed about
30,000 persons, displaced over one million others and sent more
than 100,000 fleeing into neighbouring Chad.