Accusations fly at UN rights forum over leak of report on Darfur

GENEVA, April 22 (AFP) — The United Nations’ top human rights forum delayed a debate on rights abuses in Sudan amid accusations over how a report on claims of atrocities by government-backed militias in the western Darfur region was leaked to the media.

The debate at the UN’s Commission on Human Rights on what is being called the world’s current worst humanitarian crisis would take place on Friday to give delegations time for further consultations, a UN spokesman said Thursday.

The 53-member Commission had initially been due to vote on a draft resolution condemning widespread violence in Sudan last week, he added.

In another twist, members of the human rights assembly demanded an investigation into the leak of a report on the situation by a team of UN experts who visited neighbouring Chad but initially failed to enter Sudan.

The report, submitted to the acting High Commissioner for Human Rights Bertrand Ramcharan, on Monday had been due for official publication on Tuesday.

But Ramcharan delayed releasing the findings, which are based on interviews with Sudanese refugees who had fled Darfur into Chad, after Khartoum reversed an earlier decision to block his team from entering the country.

A leaked copy of the report that identified “disturbing patterns of massive human rights violations in Darfur,” was leaked to the media, sparking anger at the Commission.

“Is this a report from the Secretariat from which there was a leak from the media?” demanded a diplomat from Bahrain.

Ramcharand took the floor, denying that his team had anything to do with the leak and defending his decision to keep the initial findings under wraps.

“I asked my colleagues to withold the issuance of this document and my colleagues have assured me that none of them gave this document to the media,” he said.

“Many quarters have pressed me to release the document. I have held to the view that I would not release this document since my team was on the ground and I am sensitive to the security implications of this,” he said, adding that he also wanted his team to compile all the information they manage to gather.

Pakistan’s ambassador Shaukat Ymer, however, demanded that the human rights office looked into what happened.

“The acting high commissioner has assured us that this report has not been leaked from his office but the fact remains that this report has been leaked,” Ymer said.

“It has been leaked from somewhere and since member states apparently do not have this report it would be reasonable to assume it has leaked from the office,” said the ambassador.

“What we want is at least an investigation to be carried out into how this happened and to ensure it never happens again.”

Sudan’s human rights delegate Ilham Shanter echoed the call for a probe.

“My government is extremely concerned about this,” she said.