Sudan will extend AU force mission in Darfur – report

Sept 18, 2006 (LONDON) — Sudan is expected to withdraw its deadline for African Union peacekeepers to leave the war-torn western region of Darfur at the end of this month, when AU foreign ministers discuss the mounting crisis in New York today, London based The Guardian cited a senior officials in Khartoum.

“Sources in Khartoum now say the government is willing to let the African Union remain in Darfur, and accept some changes in its powers.» It is likely we will arrive at an extension of the African Union mandate when the ministers meet in New York.”

There seems to be a common interest. It will give time for all sides to find a way out of this,” Ghazi Salahuddin Atabani, a senior presidential adviser, told the Guardian yesterday. The government wants to explore what it calls “African Union Plus”, a plan to keep the AU troops but give them extra back-up in the form of helicopters and surveillance technology from western states.

Sudanese president Omar al Bashir’s ultimatum for an AU troop pull-out threatened to leave the huge area with no international monitors and provoke a major escalation of a three-year war which has already left a quarter of a million people dead.

Led by the United States, the UN Security Council has called for international forces to replace the AU troops with better equipment and a stronger mandate. Although the resolution says the troops require the consent of Sudan’s government, President Bush hinted at the weekend that they should go in regardless.

“What you’ll hear is, well, the government of Sudan must invite the United Nations in for us to act. Well, there are other alternatives, like passing a UN resolution saying we’re coming in with a UN force in order to save lives,” he said.

President Bashir has repeatedly said he would not accept UN troops, accusing the west of wanting regime change and trying to recolonise Sudan. “We don’t want the United Nations back to Sudan no matter the conditions,” he said in Havana after meeting the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan.

The civil war in Darfur reached a peak two years ago after raids by government troops and militias known as janjaweed targeted hundreds of villages supporting rebel forces. More than 2 million people were forced to flee, and tens of thousands were killed.

(The Guardian/ST)