Talks on Sudan’s Darfur still on track after UN deadline expires
ABUJA, Aug 31, 2004 (Xinhua) — The Sudanese government and its rebel foes were still involved in the African Union-brokered peace talks in the Nigerian capital Abuja on Monday, one day after a UN Security Council deadline for Khartoum to address the Darfur crisis expired on Sunday.
“The AU secretariat delivered the (peace agreement) draft to the two sides,” Sudan’s chief negotiator, Agriculture Minister Majzoub al-Khalifa said in Abuja. “The rebels demanded more time to discuss the draft, and so we will reconvene tomorrow at three o ‘clock (1400 GMT).”
Rebel negotiator Ahmed Mohammed Tugod confirmed the receipt of the agreement draft and said talks would resume Tuesday after they examined the draft.
The draft text focuses on free access to Darfur in western Sudan for UN aid agencies and international monitors. It will also recommit Sudan to withdraw its troops from the refugee camps, where the forces and Arab militia have been accused of attacks, threats and other forms of violence.
Both sides are expected to cooperate with the African Union’s cease-fire monitors and follow their recommendations, while ensuring that Khartoum mounts its own probe into allegations of rights abuses.
Meanwhile, a dispute over an alleged attack by Arab militia in a black African minority village in southern Darfur, which rebels said left 64 civilians dead, continued to hang over the talks. Some African officials confirmed the attack.
Nigerian President and African Union Chairman Olusegun Obasanjo said that cease-fire monitors had confirmed the attack despite Khartoum’s denials.
“The reported attacks by the government forces have been confirmed to me by the African Union chairman of the cease-fire monitoring commission,” Obasanjo told a press conference in Abuja.
Obasanjo said he had written to Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir asking him to ensure attacks on civilians by Sudanese forces or Arab militia be stopped to avoid undermining the Abuja talks.
Progress in the peace talks was slow as both sides accused the other of breaching the truce and attacking civilians, but African Union mediators are hopeful that the two sides can agree at least on humanitarian issue.
According to the United Nations, about 1 million people in Darfur have fled their homes and more than 10,000 have been killed during the 18-month-long conflict.
UN SANCTIONS NOT LIKELY YET
The Sudanese government said Monday that it had helped improve
the situation on the ground and peace talks were still in progress. Sudan’s chief negotiator al-Khalifa said in Abuja on Monday that he believed the United Nations would not probably advocate sanctions as the situation improved.
However, the senior UN advisor on refugee issues, Dennis McNamara, said in Nairobi on Monday that Sudan was not doing enough to protect the displaced and that militiamen perpetrated rapes and harassed civilians without being punished.
Reports from the United Nations and others have said that Sudan had cooperated in dealing with the humanitarian crisis, but pointed out that Sudan had not reined in the Arab militia, as the UN Security Council demanded in a resolution last month.
The UN Security Council will soon receive a report on Darfur from UN special envoy Jan Pronk, who is scheduled to address the 15-member body on Thursday.