UN threatens Sudan with sanctions on Darfur abuses

By Evelyn Leopold

UNITED NATIONS, Sept 18 (Reuters) – The U.N. Security Council adopted a resolution on Saturday threatening Sudan with sanctions if it did not stop atrocities in the western Darfur region where Arab militias are terrorizing African villagers.

The vote was 11-0, with four abstentions, on the U.S.-drafted resolution that also calls for an expanded African Union monitoring force and a probe into human rights abuses, including genocide.

U.N. officials hope at least 3,000 African Union monitors and troops go to Darfur to investigate and serve as a bulwark against abuses.

China, Russia, Algeria and Pakistan abstained. China earlier threatened to veto the measure. Diplomats said Beijing apparently relented after a strong plea from U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who is to report on progress in Darfur within a month.

All four countries abstaining thought the resolution was too harsh on Sudan. “We should increase humanitarian assistance to Darfur rather than create a situation that could lead to a closing of the door to relief and assistance,” said China’s U.N. Ambassador Wang Guangya.

But U.S. Ambassador John Danforth, in a chilling recital of abuses in Darfur, said some 50,000 people had been killed, 1.3 million civilians had been uprooted from their homes and 2 million people were in need of relief.

“We act today because the Government of Sudan has failed to fully comply with out previous resolution, adopted on July 30,” Danforth said. “The crisis in Darfur is uniquely grave. It is the largest humanitarian disaster in the world.”

Danforth accused the Sudanese government of bombing villages and sending in its soldiers to help militia, called Janjaweed, even when there was no activity from African rebels fighting the government.

“Nine in 10 of the refugees said that they had witnessed no rebel activity in the areas so mercilessly attacked by the government and the Janjaweed,” Danforth said.

INVESTIGATION OF ABUSES

Co-sponsoring the resolution with the United States were Britain, Germany, Spain, and Romania. Also voting in favor but not listed as sponsors were France, Brazil, Chile, Angola, Benin and the Philippines

The resolution also calls for Annan to set up a commission that would investigate human rights abuses and determine if genocide had occurred in Darfur, as the United States last week said was the case.

The resolution urges African rebels and all other parties to the faltering African Union negotiations to sign an agreement on security quickly.

Rebels began an uprising in Darfur in February 2003 after years of skirmishes between mainly African farmers and Arab nomads over land and water in the area as large as France.

The government turned to the militia, drawn chiefly from the nomadic Arab population, to help suppress the rebels but the Janjaweed, often backed by government forces, escalated the conflict, raping villagers and pillaging.

Over the past week, the United States softened language on sanctions and eliminated a call for Sudan to stop all military flights over Darfur.

Specifically, the resolution says that if Sudan does not comply with its demands or cooperate “with the expansion and extension” of the African Union mission, the council “shall consider taking additional measures … such as actions to affect Sudan’s petroleum sector and the Government of Sudan or individual members of the Government of Sudan.”

Sudan’s budding oil industry pumps about 320,000 barrels a day. (Additional reporting by Irwin Arieff)