Sudanese president on a day-long visit to war-torn Darfur

KHARTOUM, April 27 (AFP) — Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir left on a one-day visit to North Darfur state in western Sudan, which has been ravaged by civil war, said sources from the presidential palace.

In Al-Fasher, Beshir is scheduled to meet a Sudanese governmental delegation negotiating with the rebels from the region bordering on Chad, the sources added.

The president is also due to discuss development projects with the local authorities.

Khartoum newspapers said Beshir will address a rally, as well as open a health complex, offices for state radio and television and a hall for social development.

A total of 225 development projects are planned for the Darfur region, Izz al-Dinn al-Sayyed, an official preparing for a conference on development and coexistence in Darfur in mid-May, was quoted as saying.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell and the European Union have put pressure on Sudan to open up Darfur to international relief workers and move speedily to finalize a long-expected but much-delayed peace agreement with southern rebels.

The United Nations has called the Darfur conflict the world’s worst current humanitarian crisis and rights groups have said atrocities are still being committed by government-backed militias despite a ceasefire deal reached earlier this month.

The war is estimated by the United Nations to have claimed at least 10,000 lives, uprooted a million people from their homes to other parts of Sudan, and driven more than 100,000 others to seek shelter across the Chadian border.

Peace talks between Khartoum and the southern Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) in Kenya are deadlocked on whether Islamic law would apply in Khartoum during an envisaged six-year transition period, when the city will serve as the joint capital for an interim administration before a referendum on self-determination for the south.