US warns of military buildup in Darfur
Aug 25, 2006 (WASHINGTON) — The United States warned of a massive military buildup in Sudan’s troubled Darfur region as Washington dispatched an envoy to hold urgent talks with the leader of the east African nation to end genocide there.
“We are very, very, very concerned about this — the buildup of military forces,” said Jendayi Frazer, US Assistant Secretary of State for African affairs, as she left for Khartoum carrying a letter from President George W. Bush to Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir.
She said she would push the Sudanese leader to agree to a UN force to stop unending bloodshed in Darfur despite the signing of a peace accord in May.
“The message I am taking to President Beshir is to amplify what President (Bush) has said many times — the United States interest is in ending the suffering of the people of Darfur,” Frazer told reporters.
Frazer accused Beshir, who is fiercely opposed to the presence of UN troops on Sudanese territory, of setting the scene for a military offensive in Darfur.
Beshir has informed UN Secretary General Kofi Annan that Khartoum would deploy 10,500 Sudanese forces to Darfur to provide security in the troubled region, where fighting and resulting famine has left about 300,000 dead and 2.5 million homeless.
The Sudanese forces “aren’t considered neutral and so we don’t feel that the people of Darfur will get any comfort” from the move, Frazer said.
She warned of heavy civilian casualties in the event of a military confrontation between the Sudanese government forces and rebel groups, including those which signed the May peace accord.
“It is not just the government of Sudan that is preparing for an offensive. We also heard reports that the non-signatories to the Darfur peace agreement, the National Resistance Movement and others are also preparing and rearming themselves to prepare for the offensive.
“We think the security environment is deteriorating and deteriorating very quickly and we are extremely concerned about this,” Frazer said.
She called for an “internationally legitimate” UN force to help implement the peace agreement aimed at bringing an end to more than three years of conflict in Darfur. Washington has denounced the violence in Darfur as genocide.
The peace accord was reached in the Nigerian city of Abuja after high-level intervention by both London and Washington.
A minority faction of the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) and the separate Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) have both refused to pen the peace deal.
The African Union has deployed a 7,000-strong peacekeeping force but due to inadequate funding it has decided to hand over the operation to an international force.
The UN Security Council held closed-door consultations Thursday on a US-British draft resolution to deploy a robust UN force in Darfur.
However, Beshir urged the council not to rush to adopt the text but instead to allow Khartoum sufficient time to resolve the crisis on its own.
(ST/AFP)