Nigerian peacekeepers to deploy in Darfur’s Haskanita Monday

October 5, 2007 (ABUJA) –Nigerian troops serving in an African Union (AU) force in Darfur will move back next week into the position where seven of their soldiers were killed in a rebel attack, a top general said Friday.

“To show our resolve, by Monday Nigeria will go back to occupy the position at Haskanita with strength, daring whomsoever to attack us again,” Defence chief General Andrew Owoye Azazi said.

The seven Nigerians were among 10 AU soldiers killed last Saturday by rebel forces in the troubled region of western Sudan.

“We promise that the circumstances of the death of our colleagues will always give us more resolve. Wherever Nigeria sends us we will go,” the general said, speaking at the state burial of the seven soldiers killed.

The September 29 attack on the AU military base at Haskanita in south Darfur was carried out by a group of heavily armed men in 30 vehicles.

It was the the most deadly assault on the peacekeeping force since its deployment in 2004 and the AU, which is now looking to the United Nations to beef up its strength with a planned joint mission, has launched an enquiry into the incident.

The seven soldiers were buried with full honours at the military cemetery in the federal capital.

President Umaru Yar’Adua did not attend the ceremony as he is away in Mecca on pilgrimage.

But in a prepared message, read out by the minister in charge of Abuja, Aliyu Modibbo, Yar’Adua reaffirmed his “commitment to peace and stability in our sub-region and in the world at large” and called the death of the peacekeepers “the sacrifice that Nigeria is making to the world”.

“Nigeria will continue to play its role in the world and to Africa in particular. Whenever we are called and whereever we feel it is necessary to be there, Nigeria will be there,” the message said.

Pall bearers marched slowly past carrying on their shoulders seven coffins, each draped in an AU flag and with a pair of boots and a cap on top.

At the sight of the boots belonging to her late husband Toyin Alao, Rashidat, a young, heavily pregnant woman, collapsed in grief.

“I cant believe that my husband is dead. I still take it as a dream,” she had said before the ceremony began as she clung to her five-year-old son.

Alao had been due to finish his stint in Darfur in December.

Duniyan Audu, 33, was buried without ever learning of either the death of his father or the birth of his child, his family explained, saying it had been too difficult getting in touch with him while he was in Sudan.

Despite assurances from the junior defence minister, Fidelia Njeze, that the government would take care of the soldiers’ families, another widow, Rebecca questioned how she would cope with her six children, ranging from four to 20.

“I am worried as to how these ones will be able to cope and survive without their father,” she said, bursting into tears.

(AFP)