African Union says no end to violence in Darfur.

By Camillus Eboh

ABUJA, Dec 19 (Reuters) – Fighting between Sudanese government forces and rebels continues in Darfur despite cease-fire promises, the African Union said on Sunday, saying one of its monitoring helicopters had come under fire.

AU official talks to his base by satellite phone.

“One of our helicopters has been shot. They are firing on our helicopters. This shows that the cease-fire is not being observed. They did not comply. They have not stopped fighting,” AU spokesman Assane Ba told reporters on Sunday evening.

He gave no further details and it was not clear who had shot at the helicopter, or when.

The AU has cease-fire monitors in Sudan’s troubled Darfur region and the pan-African body has also been mediating in faltering peace talks in Nigeria between the Sudanese government and the rebels.

Sudan said on Sunday it would immediately and unconditionally cease hostilities in Darfur and asked the United Nations and AU to request that rebel forces do the same.

“Yes, we will inform our forces in Darfur immediately to stop any fighting, so we will not fire unless we will be attacked by the other side,” Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman Ismail said in Khartoum.

Ba had accused the Sudanese government of failing to comply with a deadline to stop fighting in Darfur, describing fresh helicopter strikes on a village in South Darfur state.

The AU force commander in Darfur, Nigerian General Festus Okonkwo, told mediators government forces attacked the village of Labado on Saturday, Ba reported.

“Things have changed, the latest report from General Okonkwo is that the Sudan government has not complied. He said government helicopters attacked Labado and burned the place yesterday,” Ba said.

But Ismail insisted the government had met Saturday’s deadline, and retaliated later after coming under rebel attack.

Okonkwo earlier said the Sudanese government had complied with the ultimatum to stop hostilities on Saturday or face the matter going to the U.N. Security Council.

Ba said an African country — which some mediators privately identified as Libya — was trying to broker a fresh initiative to persuade the fighters to withdraw and to rejuvenate the talks.

The rebels left the negotiations a week ago to protest against a renewed government offensive on their positions.

Mediators had a meeting on Sunday with Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, who is also chairman of the African Union.

Obasanjo asked the mediators to give the would-be peace broking country more time to ask the two sides to stop fighting, Ba said.

Labado, which had been in rebel control, is about 65 km (40 miles) east of Nyala, the capital of South Darfur state.

Thousands of Darfuris are fleeing the fighting, streaming toward Nyala town from the east, bringing reports of government bombardment with helicopters and Antonov planes. They say government forces and Arab militias, known as Janjaweed, attacked their villages and in some cases set up bases there.

Aid community sources in Darfur say rebels have been attacking aid and goods convoys along the Nyala to El-Fasher road, where two Save the Children workers were killed recently.

Many of the villages along the road to the east were rebel strongholds before intense fighting in the past week. The offensive began after the government said rebels attacked a convoy of 500 government troops on a routine patrol in the area.

ROAD IS VITAL LINK

“This road is vital to the Sudanese government as it links their troops to supply routes from Khartoum,” one source said, asking not to be identified.

The United Nations has closed many of the roads out of Nyala to aid traffic. The World Food Program says at least 160,000 people are cut off, which could increase if fighting spreads.

“We are waiting for the AU, we will give them a reasonable time to persuade the government. But if the attacks continue, we will be forced at some point to answer the Sudan government,” said Tajeddin Bashir Niam, from the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) rebel group.

Niam told Reuters there were indications the government troops were advancing from Labado to other towns.

POISED FOR ATTACK

The 53-member AU on Friday reported arms had poured into Darfur and the government was poised for a major offensive.

The United States, Britain and the United Nations weighed in with warnings to Khartoum and the rebels. The guerrilla fighters took up arms in early 2003 after years of tribal skirmishes over scarce resources in Darfur, accusing Khartoum of marginalizing the region. The conflict has displaced 1.6 million people and killed tens of thousands since it first broke out.

The United Nations has said Darfur, an area the size of France, is suffering from one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises with 2.3 million people in need of aid. (Additional reporting Opheera McDoom in Khartoum)