UN might withdraw aid workers from Darfur – official
May 31, 2006 (PARIS) — The United Nations will withdraw its aid workers from the troubled Darfur region of Sudan unless their security is ensured soon, U.N. emergency relief coordinator Jan Egeland said on Wednesday.
Around 14,000 aid workers are trying to help more than 3 million people suffering from a three-year-old conflict that has killed tens of thousands and left many living in squalid camps.
“When we feel that we are gambling with the lives of our humanitarian workers, we will leave,” Egeland told Reuters.
“I hope it will be never but it could be next week.” Aid workers in Darfur and the surrounding regions of Chad and the Central African Republic have faced increasing violence including carjackings and armed attacks.
Egeland has been on a tour of capitals including Washington and Paris to try to drum up support for a regional initiative to help with security.
He met officials at France’s Foreign Ministry on Wednesday and was due to travel on to Madrid for meetings on Thursday.
“A regional crisis has developed now in connection with the Darfur conflict, which now includes Eastern Chad and even the Central African Republic,” he said.
“It’s a sign of how bad it is now that people in Chad flee to Darfur.”
VOID
Egeland estimated there were 13,000 refugees from Chad in Darfur and more than 50,000 Central African refugees in Chad, while Chad is home to some 280,000 refugees from Darfur.
“At the same time there is a complete security void for the civilian population and humanitarian workers. We are unarmed,” he said.
Talks intensified on Wednesday to persuade two Darfur rebel factions to sign a peace deal by a midnight deadline.
A May 5 deal was signed by only one rebel faction leader, Minni Arcua Minnawi, of the Sudan Liberation Army. African Union mediators have given two other factions until Wednesday to sign or face possible U.N. sanctions.
The camps have become tinderboxes of violence as thousands demonstrate against the deal on offer.
The Sudanese Organisation Against Torture said in a statement that police opened fire on Darfuris in the Otash camp in South Darfur on Monday, killing one and wounding three.
But Egeland said the international community also needed to think about a plan for the areas surrounding Darfur.
“Does everybody realize that even if we were able to implement a fragile plan for Darfur, if there is a void in Eastern Chad and a void in the Central African Republic, it threatens everything,” he said.
(Reuters)