U.N. official says response to Sudan crisis “far too slow”

OSLO, Aug 23, 2004 (dpa) — The United Nations and the international community were “far too slow” in responding to the crisis in Darfur Province in western Sudan, a U.N. official said Monday.

U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland predicted victims in the region would die because of a lack of resources.

The U.N. and other relief agencies still needed “between 100 and 200 million dollars to get all our aid operations going”, said Egeland, who is visiting his native Norway for a new fund-raising campaign organized by Norwegian Church Aid and the Red Cross.

“If we do not get the money, people will die. Not because of government or rebel attacks, but because we do not have sufficient resources,” he said, according to the Norwegian news agency NTB.

He was speaking as a peace talks got under away in Nigeria under the auspices of the African Union.

Commenting on the slow response to the conflict, Egeland said the parties blocked a ceasefire for too long, the Khartoum government hampered relief efforts, donors sat on the fence and relief agencies did not mobilize during the early phase.

Darfur was an example of a forgotten or rather ignored crisis, Egeland said, pointing to other regions where funding was also lagging behind, such as the Central African Republic, Haiti, Ivory Coast and northern Uganda.

Egeland said restoring security was key to ensuring the return of the Darfur refugees. He said organizing the food transports to refugees was a “logistical nightmare”.

Around 50,000 people are believed to have died as a result of the conflict, either violently or from starvation and disease. More than a million people have fled their homes, and two million are in urgent need of food and medical attention.