US calls on Sudan to stop violating UNSC resolutions
October 28, 2008 (UNITED NATIONS) – The US accused Sudan of breaching on its obligations under UN Security Council (UNSC) resolutions.
Khalilzad was speaking following a briefing by the UN peacekeeping officials on the deployment of African Union-United Nations forces in Darfur (UNAMID).
The US official said that Sudan violated the arms embargo imposed by the UNSC in Darfur and conducting military flights in the war ravaged region.
He further alleged that Sudanese air force is using aircraft painted to resemble UN humanitarian aircraft.
But Sudan’s envoy to the UN Abdel-Haleem Abdel-Mahmood rejected the charge of painting the aircraft saying it has been recycled from a year ago and said it is meant to divert attention from the positive developments in his country.
Abdel-Mahmood also said that his US counterpart “spoke unnecessarily” before adding that “this proves that we succeeded our message through very clearly to the UNSC”.
The US diplomat also spoke on the issue of justice in Darfur saying that Sudan “is not accepting that there is no impunity for war crimes and crimes against humanity”.
In July the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) asked pre-trial judges in mid-July to issue arrest warrants for Sudanese president Omar Hassan Al-Bashir.
Ocampo filed 10 charges: three counts of genocide, five of crimes against humanity and two of murder. Judges are still reviewing the evidence before making a final ruling.
Sudan wants the UNSC to invoke invoking Article 16 of the ICC Statute which allows the UNSC to suspend the ICC prosecutions in any case for a period of 12 months that can be renewed indefinitely.
But the US made it clear it will veto any such attempt in the UNSC unless verifiable progress is made on the ground in Darfur.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met briefly with Sudan 2nd VP Ali Osman Taha in New York last month where they discussed the ICC row.
Rice provided Taha with a list of conditions including facilitating the deployment of African Union-United forces in Darfur (UNAMID), lifting restrictions on aid workers and reaching an understanding with all opposition forces.
The US top diplomat said that Washington wants to see progress made on these benchmarks within a specific timeframe that expires mid-December.
Only then will the US be willing to discuss a deferral of Al-Bashir’s indictment with Sudan, Rice told Taha.
Today the UN under-secretary-general for field support, Susana Malcorra, said that UNAMID will get more reinforcements before the end of this year.
Malcorra said she believed UNAMID can reach targets of 60 per cent deployment by the end of this year and 80 per cent by next March.
“These new, revised targets reflect a scaling back of initial extremely ambitious projections,” she said. “The new targets are still ambitious, but in our view can be achieved.”
U.N. officials say that as many as 300,000 people have died and some 2.5 million fled their homes since violence broke out in Darfur in 2003, when mostly African rebels took up arms against the Arab-dominated Khartoum government.
(ST)