US’s Rice in Cairo Tuesday to discuss Darfur troops

Oct 2, 2006 (CAIRO) — US State Secretary Condoleezza Rice arrives in Cairo tomorrow to discuss Darfur crisis in an attempt to persuade Khartoum to accept UN takeover from African forces in western Sudan.

US State Secretary Condoleezza Rice will on Tuesday 3 October on a lightning visit during which she meets with President Hosni Mubarak, Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit, among a number of other officials.

Rice is scheduled to meet over a working Ramadan Iftar banquet with her counterparts of Egypt, Jordan, and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member states, the Egyptian state-run MENA reported.

Egypt has been acting as an informal intermediary between the Sudanese government and the United Nations over a U.N. Security Council resolution which proposes sending 20,000 U.N. peacekeepers to restore law and order in the troubled region.

Khartoum has rejected the resolution as a violation of Sudanese sovereignty and an attempt to restore colonial rule. Analysts say the Sudanese government is also worried that some officials could be arrested on war crimes charges.

Rice, while in Cairo, will also discuss the developments in the file of Sudan’s western Darfur Region.

(ST)