Powell flies in to Sudan with tough call for “action now” on Darfur
ATTENTION – ADDS Powell, Beshir quotes
By Matthew Lee
KHARTOUM, June 29 (AFP) — US Secretary of State Colin Powell flew in to Sudan with a tough call for the Khartoum government to take “action now” to end the humanitarian crisis in the western region of Darfur.
“I hope to give them a very direct message about how the United States and the international community sees the horrific situation in Darfur,” said Powell, the highest-ranking US official to visit Khartoum since 1978.
“We have got to act now because we are running out of time,” Powell told journalists travelling with him on a flight from the NATO summit in Istanbul.
“We need to see action promptly because people are dying and the death rate is going to go up significantly over the next several months,” Powell said. “Time is of the essence and action is of the essence.”
Asked whether the violence being committed by pro-government Arab militias against indigenous minorities supportive of the Darfur rebels amounted to “genocide,” Powell said a review under way in the State Department had already found “indicators and elements” that point to such a conclusion.
“What we are seeing is a disaster, a catastrophe. We can find the right label for it later, we have got to deal with it now,” he said.
Greeted on arrival by Vice President Ali Osman Mohamed Taha, Powell headed straight into talks with President Omar al-Beshir and Foreign Minister Mustafa Ismail.
His visit coincided with Wednesday’s anniversary of the 1989 coup that brought Beshir’s Islamic regime to power, and his meeting with Ismail took place against the backdrop of fireworks across the city.
Asked about possible US, Powell said: “I prefer to discuss that with them (the government) first.”
But the secretary of state warned that the improvement in relations between Washington and Khartoum following peace agreements between the government and rebels in southern Sudan could be in danger because of the Darfur crisis.
“Unless we resolve the Darfur situation and do it quickly, all that is put at risk,” he told reporters.
Powell spelt out three main demands of the Khartoum government: to rein in the Arab militias, open access to Darfur for humanitarian organisations, and the start of a political process with Darfur’s two rebel movements.
Ahead of their talks, the Sudanese president pledged new measures to smooth the flow of aid, but reiterated his position that it was the rebels, more than the militias, who were to blame for the continued deterioration of the crisis despite an April 8 ceasefire signed in neighbouring Chad.
“It is a matter of record that the insurgent factions have in many occasions violated the ceasefire by attacking convoys of humanitarian relief and workers, destroying development projects under construction and killing the management staff and workers,” Beshir said.
“We shall redouble our administrative, technical and security efforts to secure relief access to the needy before the rainfall season.”
En route to Khartoum, UN chief Kofi Annan, who is to meet Powell here Wednesday, laid down the same demands as Powell.
“The Sudanese government should facilitate the entry of equipment for humanitarian activities and support,” he said. “The Sudanese government should forbid the militia, particularly the Janjawid, from attacking people.”
“If that government is not able or willing to do it, the international community has to do something about it,” he told a press conference in Doha.
Asked about Annan’s idea of a UN peacekeeping force, Powell said he thought the size and remoteness of Darfur and the lack of countries willing to contribute troops would make it “very problematic.”
“The better answer is to have the Sudanese government take control,” he said.
More than 10,000 people have died in Darfur and more than a million been driven from their homes since the revolt against the Arab-dominated government in Khartoum broke out among indigenous ethnic minorities in February 2003.
Washington has threatened Khartoum with sanctions over the 16-month-old conflict, which the United Nations has labelled as the world’s worst current humanitarian crisis.