US’s Rice backs major UN role in Sudan’s Darfur
Jan 16, 2006 (MONROVIA) — U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Monday she favoured a major U.N. role in Sudan’s troubled Darfur region and told Khartoum it must cooperate in accepting international help.
Rice, on a visit to Liberia for the inauguration of Africa’s first woman president, said the African Union mission in Darfur was “not falling apart” but it needed help from the United Nations and possibly more NATO assistance.
“I think it’s doing a good job but it is pretty close to the limits of what it can do in its size and configuration. There are issues in how to sustain it,” said Rice of the estimated 7,000 African Union (AU) troops struggling to keep the peace in Sudan’s vast western region.
“We favour a U.N. mission which has the qualities of sustainability that comes from the whole U.N. peacekeeping system,” she added.
Sudan has rejected U.N. suggestions that U.S. and European troops should be sent to Darfur and argues the international community should instead provide more cash to African forces already on the ground.
“I think the Khartoum government should be cooperative,” said Rice. “They have a problem in Darfur. The international community expects them to contribute to solving it and also expects them to allow the international community to contribute to solving it,” she added.
Tens of thousands of people have been killed in Darfur since mostly non-Arab rebels took up arms in early 2003 accusing the central government of neglect. Khartoum denies U.S. charges of genocide but the International Criminal Court is investigating alleged war crimes there.
Rice said NATO could also possibly do more in Darfur. Asked whether the United States was willing to provide troops, a move Khartoum opposes, Rice did not answer the question but pointed out that the United States was a member of NATO.
If there were to be any significant deployment of U.S. troops in Darfur, it would be Washington’s first major foray into African peacekeeping since it quit Somalia in 1994.
Rice stressed the AU wanted this to be an African mission in Darfur and hopefully there would be enough African troops to do the job.
“There will undoubtedly also need to be more forces available for the AU mission. We will pretty soon here be in the business of seeing who might be willing to contribute more towards the AU mission,” said Rice.
Rice said she was troubled by the deteriorating security situation between Chad and Sudan over rebel and militia raids in Darfur and this heightened the need for U.N. involvement.
Chad has demanded that Sudan disarm Chadian rebels in Darfur as a condition for peace talks to end the growing dispute. Sudan, in turn, accused the government in Chad of using the dispute to deflect attention from troubles at home.
Sudan may be in line for taking over the rotating chair of the African Union at a summit this month, a move senior State Department officials have said would be a conflict of interest because of the AU’s role in Darfur.
Rice declined to comment on the issue and said it was an internal AU affair.
(Reuters)