Clooney, Wiesel to plead for UN action in Sudan’s Darfur
Sept 13, 2006 (UNITED NATIONS) — Oscar-winning US actor and director George Clooney and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Elie Wiesel will address the UN Security Council Thursday on the humanitarian crisis in Sudan’s Darfur region, UN and US officials said.
The two celebrities will appear at a closed-door meeting of the 15-member body Thursday afternoon to urge world action to protect the people of Darfur who, according to UN officials, face a disaster following renewed fighting between government troops and rebels.
The meeting, hosted by US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton, was arranged as part of a formula that allows members of civil society to address the council to raise issues of concern.
“The situation in Darfur is not getting better, it’s getting worse,” said Clooney who has been very active in the US campaign to save Darfur. “We need the international community to commit all of its resources to bring an end to this extraordinary suffering. The critical hour for Darfur is now.”
Wiesel, who is also campaigning for the protection of the people of Darfur, said: “there is no choice but to act in defense of defenseless people . . . Those who commit genocide must not be allowed to hide behind national borders and claims of sovereignty.”
Also Wednesday UN chief Kofi Annan warned of a disaster in Darfur unless Khartoum reconsiders its opposition to the deployment of a 20,000-strong UN force to take over peacekeeping from cash-strapped African Union troops in Darfur.
“If the African Union forces were to leave, and we are not able to put in a UN follow-on force, we are heading for a disaster, and I dont think we can allow that to happen,” he told reporters.
But Sudan again rejected plans for a UN takeover in Darfur.
Sudanese State Minister for Foreign Affairs El-Wasilla Al Samani said Khartoum would have no option but to bid farewell to the AU force as it leaves on September 30 and handle peacekeeping in Darfur.
Monday, Annan strongly condemned a Sudanese government onslaught against rebels in Darfur, saying the latest fighting “shows utter disregard” for the Darfur Peace Agreement, signed in Nigeria last May by Khartoum and the main Darfur rebel movement. Two other rebel groups have refused to sign the deal.
The combined effect of war and famine in Darfur has left up to 300,000 people dead and displaced 2.5 million in three and half years of civil war, pitting the Sudanese government and allied militias against ethnic minority rebels.
(ST/AFP)