AU chief urges Sudan to halt Darfur bombings
Jan 29, 2007 (ADDIS ABABA) — African Union commission president Alpha Oumar Konare has urged the Sudanese government to stop aerial bombing in the strife-torn Darfur region as he opened a summit of the 53-member organisation.
The Sudanese government “should stop the bombardments and massacres” in Darfur, Konare told African heads of state gathered at the AU headquarters in Addis Ababa.
His remarks come ahead of a vote by AU leaders on Khartoum’s bid to assume the presidency of the organisation which rights groups say should be blocked given the situation in Darfur.
Konare said that there had been signs of progress in ongoing negotiations to send a joint AU-UN force to Sudan but he added that we have to “apply these moves this without delay.”
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon held talks with Konare about the deployment of the joint peacekeeping force for Sudan.
UN sources said both Ban and Konare expected the force to be deployed by the end of next month, despite the reluctance of Sudan’s President Omar al-Beshir to accept UN troops to bolster a struggling 7,000-strong force.
The sources said they expected Beshir to be more open to persuasion if Khartoum secures the right to chair the African Union for the next 12 months during an ongoing summit in Addis Ababa.
Strong opposition among some African states to the idea of Sudan assuming the chairmanship has dominated build-up to the summit.
While the US has been fiercely critical of the Sudanese government, a top official declined to give her verdict on the wrangling.
“It is good to have a debate. I hope the presidents can come to an early decision so that the other issues can also be addressed,” US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer told AFP.
“It is up to the African leaders to decide.”
Ban and Beshir are expected to meet later in the day on the sidelines of the summit for what UN officials described as a “major showdown”.
In a speech to the summit Ban is also expected to stress “the central importance” of a joint international effort to end the crisis in Darfur where the UN estimates some 200,000 people have been killed since 2003.
Konare also warned that chaos will prevail in Somalia unless a proposed peacekeeping force is sent rapidly to the war-torn country.
“If the African troops are not deployed rapidly, then there will be chaos,” Konare said.
The African Union has given the green light to a force of nearly 8,000 troops to go to Somalia but only three countries — Uganda, Malawi and Nigeria — have so far committed troops.
The force was meant to deploy at the end of the month but Konare said that the commitments so far amounted to only 4,000 soldiers.
Konare said that it was vital that a transitional government which recently ousted hardline Islamists from Mogadishu with the help of Ethiopian intervention pursue reconciliation and a lasting solution in a country which has known no central authority for the last 16 years.
“If the troops go to Somalia without a genuine political solution then we will become occupation troops,” he said.
(AFP)