Nigerian senate to rule on Darfur troop deployment

ABUJA, Aug 18 (AFP) — The Nigerian senate said on Wednesday it would ask its defence committee to consider a request by President Olusegun Obasanjo for permission to deploy some 1,500 peacekeepers to Sudan’s war-torn Darfur region.

The committee was due to report back to the senate on Thursday, when a vote was expected on the request.

Obasanjo wrote to the senate on Tuesday asked lawmakers to approve the immediate deployment of a company of 150 troops to protect African Union observers overseeing the implementation in Darfur of a shaky ceasefire, signed on April 8, between local rebels and the Sudanese army.

Obasanjo also asked the senate to approve a plan to expand the mission to include either one or two more 770-strong battalions, if the Khartoum government gives the AU the go-ahead to deploy a full-scale peacekeeping mission in Darfur.

Rwanda has already sent an initial company of 150 soldiers to protect the AU observers and Nigeria is expected to match this commitment by the weekend.

Obasanjo sent the request after receiving Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman Ismail, who asked Nigeria for logistical support, humanitarian aid and the immediate deployment of troops to Darfur.

The AU, of which Obasanjo is the current chairman, has invited the parties in the Sudanese conflict to a peace conference in Abuja on August 23.

The United Nations says the ethnic conflict in Darfur has created the world’s worst current humanitarian disaster.