Arab nations look to buy Sudan time after UN sets 30-day Darfur deadline
CAIRO, Aug 7 (AFP) — Arab countries were set to push for the United Nations to extend the 30-day deadline given to Khartoum to resolve the political and humanitarian crisis in Darfur, amid fears a foreign intervention would turn Sudan into “another Iraq”.
Foreign ministers of the Arab League will meet at the organization’s headquarters in Cairo on Sunday to find ways of extending the time-frame allocated to Sudan by the UN Security Council in a deal reached Friday, league sources told AFP.
The UN said Sudan had accepted the agreement, which is due to be signed in Khartoum on Monday, but Arab countries want a more flexible framework to prevent any foreign intervention and avert a repeat of the crisis in Iraq.
The 22-member pan-Arab body, which belatedly reacted to the crisis in Darfur, could decide to dispatch an observer force with African Union (AU) troops, said Samir Hosni, in charge of Sudanese issues at the Arab League.
The pan-African organisation already has observers in the strife-stricken western province of Darfur and is now planning to send 2,000 armed troops to protect the observers and enforce an April ceasefire between government forces and rebel groups which has been repeatedly violated.
Countries such as Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Mauritania, Sudan and Somalia are members of both the Arab League and the AU.
The text of the agreement itself acknowledges that Khartoum may not be able to fulfill all its obligations in 30 days and the Sudanese government is counting on its Arab partners to lobby for an extended deadline.
Ibrahim Dekche, a Sudanese and former senior official at the Organization of African Unity that was replaced by the AU, fears that the crisis in Darfur could entail a “geopolitical reorganization of the Horn of Africa weakening Sudan’s position”.
League sources nevertheless hailed some “positive aspects” in the UN resolution, which called for the respect of Sudan’s territorial integrity and dropped references to ethnic cleansing in the troubled region.
Since February 2003, Darfur — a region in western Sudan larger than France — has been the scene of violent clashes since black African rebel groups, complaining of the marginalization of their region and a lack of protection for local people, rose up against the government.
The conflict has left between 30,000 and 50,000 people dead and up to 1.2 million displaced, according to UN figures.
The Security Council has tasked UN Secretary General Kofi Annan with presenting a report at the end of August on the progress made by the Sudanese government in Darfur, notably on its pledge to disarm its marauding proxy militias — the Janjaweed.
Short of an immediate military intervention, Khartoum risks being slapped with international sanctions should its efforts be deemed insufficient by the UN.
Khartoum announced Thursday it would start disarming the Janjaweed next week, but rebel groups reacted skeptically. The Janjaweed — the name means ‘guns on horseback’ — are made up mainly of Arab nomadic tribes blamed for perpetrating atrocities against black African farmers in Darfur.
While attempting to alleviate the international pressure on the Sudanese government, the Arab League is also seeking to improve humanitarian assistance in Darfur where international organizations and NGO’s have warned of an unprecedented disaster.
Egypt was the first Arab country to deliver aid to Darfur’s civilians by opening an air corridor and setting up emergency medical facilities in the north.
Cairo is particularly concerned by the crisis in Sudan, through which the Nile River, Egypt’s lifeline, runs.
The current chairman of the AU ceasefire commission, Alpha Oumar Konare, Annan’s special representative for Sudan, Jan Pronk, and a representative of AU head Olusegun Obasanjo will be among those attending Sunday’s Arab League meeting.
Konare was scheduled to have talks late Saturday with Arab League Secretary General Amr Mussa.