Sudan receives Chinese envoy with renewed rejection of UN forces

May 20, 2007 (KHARTOUM) — The Sudanese government renewed its opposition to a proposed 20,000-strong hybrid African Union-United Nations peacekeeping force for Darfur after talks with a visiting Chinese envoy Sunday.

“The government has agreed on a combined operation and not joint forces for containing the crisis in Darfur,” said presidential adviser Majzoub al-Khalifa Ahmed after the talks with Liu Guijin, the Chinese foreign ministry’s Africa director. Guijin is also the Chinese envoy for Darfur appointed earlier this month in wake of increased pressure on Beijing to use its leverage to convince Khartoum of accepting UN peacekeeping forces.

“The government also agreed to the UN heavy support package to the African Union to help resolve the conflict,” Ahmed added, referring to UN plans to provide logistical support to the overstretched 7,000-strong African Union force currently in place in Darfur.

A three-phase plan floated last year by then UN chief Kofi Annan is supposed to culminate in the deployment of UN peacekeepers to bolster the embattled African force in Darfur, a region the size of France.

But Khartoum has accepted only the first two stages of the plan, accusing the Western powers of plotting to recolonize the country under the guise of the UN mission. The second phase is supposed to set the infrastructure for the UN-AU hybrid forces as part if the final stage of the plan.

Khartoum’s acceptance of the second phase of the plan is still in question given the contradictory statements of Sudanese officials. Last week the spokesman for Sudan’s foreign ministry Ali al-Sadek, said that his government will not provide the logistics needed for the accommodation of the UN troops that will be deployed in Darfur without funding from the UN to the AU troops.

However the spokesperson for the UN mission in Sudan (UNMIS) Radhia Achouri said that the UN “will help the AU by providing support personnel and equipment but not paying up their budget” and stressed that “the African Union Mission in Sudan will continue to be financed through donations from member States”.

Analysts say the Sudanese government is worried that a robust UN force might lead to the detention of senior officials who have been implicated in human rights abuses in Darfur.

At least 200,000 people have died in the western region and more than two million more fled their homes since ethnic minority rebels rose up three years ago drawing a scorched earth response from the military and allied militias.

China — Sudan’s major trade partner — has drawn mounting Western criticism in the run-up to the Beijing Olympics over its failure to do more to rein in its ally.

(ST/AFP)