Pronk remains UN envoy in Sudan through end of year
Oct 27, 2006 (UNITED NATIONS) — The top U.N. official in Sudan, Jan Pronk, will return to Khartoum and stay in his post through the end of the year, despite the government’s announcement he was “history,” the United Nations said on Friday.
U.N. chief spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Secretary-General Kofi Annan “has now confirmed that Jan Pronk will continue to serve as his special representative in the Sudan until the end of the year, when his contract is set to expire.”
The Sudanese government had told Annan on Sunday that it considered Pronk’s job terminated and wanted him out of the country within three days.
He was ordered out after publishing comments on his personal Web site that the Sudanese army lost two major battles to rebels in the troubled Darfur region and morale was low.
“For us Mr. Pronk is history,” Sudanese Ambassador Abdalmahmood Mohamad said on Thursday. “He was not supportive, he was abusive and he became part of the problem not the solution.”
U.N. officials had insisted that Pronk remained Annan’s top envoy to the war-torn nation, but Pronk was called to New York for consultations. He was due to address the Security Council on Friday.
Pronk was expected to return to Khartoum in November “to organise an orderly handover to the officer in charge of the U.N. mission,” Dujarric said.
Asked if Sudan had agreed to Pronk’s return, Dujarric said: “The dates are being worked out but we do not expect any problems with the scenario we’ve laid out for you.”
A former Dutch parliamentarian and cabinet minister, the 66-year-old Pronk has been in his post for two years.
Violence has increased in Sudan’s western Darfur region in recent weeks between rebels and the government and its proxy militias. More than 200,000 people have died in the past three years and 2.5 million are living in arid camps.
Khartoum has refused to allow a U.N. peacekeeping mission into the region to replace a smaller and underfinanced African Union force of 7,000 troops and monitors.
(Reuters)