Sudan wary of Paris conference on Darfur

June 24, 2007 (KHARTOUM) — Sudan will watch from a distance on Monday as world powers, including ally China, gather in Paris to seek ways to end the violence in Darfur, in a conference Khartoum rejects as a distraction from current peace efforts.

“We will not comment until the end of the conference,” foreign ministry spokesman Ali Sadek told AFP.

The ministerial gathering, which brings the United States, China and some 15 other nations together, was announced on June 7 at the G8 summit in Germany by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who has made Darfur a high priority.

The African Union, which operates a peacekeeping operation in the western Sudanese region, has opted to stay out of the conference, angry at being snubbed by organisers, diplomats said.

Days after the conference was announced, Khartoum expressed reservations during a visit to Sudan by the new French foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, and spelled out its complete rejection in a statement two days later.

“The Sudanese party has informed the French minister that it has rejected the conference,” it said.

“While preparing the conference, France did not consult with Sudan … which is the main party concerned,” it said.

The ministry also expressed concern that the gathering risked “scattering the efforts” of finding a solution to the four-year conflict in the western Sudanese region which has left at least 200,000 dead, according to UN figures.

But the French embassy in Khartoum said ahead of the conference that the aim was to “expand the mobilisation of the main decision-makers and contributors around the United Nations and African Union efforts in Darfur and the region.”

Sudanese officials however remain skeptical, dreading yet another initiative which they say will further complicate the peace drive in Darfur.

“It risks creating a parallel channel, let alone a contradictory one, to the United Nations and African Union” who are pushing for a political solution to the crisis, senior interior ministry official Bakri Mulah told AFP.

Khartoum reached a peace agreement with Darfur rebels on May 5, 2006 in Nigeria but only one of three negotiating rebel factions endorsed the deal and violence has since spiralled.

According to Sudan, world powers should channel energy into convincing the non-signatories of the Darfur peace agreement to join the political process, rather than hold a new conference that risks adding more pressure on Khartoum.

The presence of China at the Paris meet does not seem to be a huge comfort to Khartoum, which insists it has fulfilled its commitment vis-a-vis the international community after finally accepting on June 17 the deployment of international peacekeepers in Darfur.

The agreement, first proposed last year by then UN secretary general Kofi Annan, will see 23,000 UN troops take over from the under-funded and ill-equipped African Union force currently operating in Darfur.

“The ball is now in the court of Western countries,” Sudanese Foreign Minister Lam Akol said recently to a visiting delegation from the UN Security Council, adding that Khartoum was willing to negotiate with holdout rebels.

The Darfur conflict broke out in 2003 when an ethnic minority rose up against the Arab-dominated government, which then enlisted the Janjaweed militia group to help crush the rebellion.

The conflict has killed at least 200,000 people and forced more than two million from their homes, according to the United Nations, though Khartoum contests those estimates, saying 9,000 people have died.

(AFP)