Bush to name former USAID head as envoy for Darfur
Sept 19, 2006 (UNITED NATIONS) — President Bush has decided to name Andrew Natsios, a former administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, as his special envoy for Darfur, the Washington Post reports in its Tuesday edition.
By this appointment Bush hopes reviving a diplomatic effort to end a 3 1/2 -year spree of violence in Sudan that has left hundreds of thousands dead, said a senior administration officials.
Bush is expected to announce Natsios’s appointment Tuesday in a speech to world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly.
The initiative follows increasing pressure from Congress and human rights advocates to do more to halt what the Bush administration has termed the world’s only ongoing case of genocide.
The Post said that U.N. officials privately expressed concern that Natsios may pursue a confrontational approach that will harden Sudanese opposition to a U.N. force in Darfur.
“By selecting Natsios, the administration has chosen a blunt representative with considerable backing among the American aid community and a long record of butting heads with the Sudanese over the delivery of humanitarian assistance”.
When Powell traveled to Darfur in July 2004, he was accompanied by Natsios, then USAID administrator. As the plane flew over the blackened remains of ravaged villages, Natsios described his dismay at the Sudanese government in a stream of expletives.
“I think he won’t be fooled by these guys,” said John Prendergast of the International Crisis Group, a sharp critic of the Bush administration’s Darfur policy.
(ST)