Bush considers no-fly zone for Darfur an option

June 6, 2007 (HEILIGENDAMM, Germany) — U.S. President George W. Bush said on Wednesday the United States may support the enforcement of a no-fly zone over Sudan’s Darfur region to help put an end to the fighting there.

“We would consider that,” Bush told reporters on the sidelines of a Group of Eight (G8) summit when asked if a no-fly zone to stop the violence in Darfur was an option.

Fighting by government-linked militias and rebel groups in the western region of Darfur is estimated to have killed 200,000 people and forced 2 million more to flee their homes since 2003.

A dispute over who is to command a proposed 23,000-strong United Nations-African Union force is holding up deployment, according to U.N. officials, but the plans are expected to be delivered to Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir soon.

“I want to see people helping Darfur by joining us and sending clearer and stronger messages to President Bashir,” Bush told a small group of reporters in the Baltic coast town of Heiligendamm on the first day of the 3-day G8 summit.

“I’m frustrated because there are still people suffering and yet the U.N. process is moving at a snail’s pace,” he said.

The United States and Britain have both threatened Sudan’s government with tougher U.N. sanctions if Khartoum does not support international efforts to end the conflict in Darfur.

The two allies have been working on an expanded U.N. sanctions resolution for weeks, but Russia and South Africa have questioned the timing and China has opposed further penalties.

In London British Prime Minister Tony Blair was asked by a member of parliament what the G8 can do for the Sudanese people.

“I hope what they can expect is a recommitment to sanctions if the Sudanese government does not abide by the peace accord that has been set out, stop bombing their citizens,” he said.

“The Sudanese government should also welcome in the hybrid Africa Union-United Nations force which is the only way we’re going to keep the combatants apart,” Blair said.

The U.N. Security Council has imposed an arms embargo on rebels and militia but not on the government, although it forbids military combat flights by Khartoum over Darfur.

(Reuters)