UN encourage Japan to take part in Darfur mission

TOKYO, March 8 (AFP) — The United Nations peacekeeping chief on Tuesday encouraged Japan to take part in a mission in war-torn Darfur, saying Tokyo could play a variety of roles despite its pacifist constitution.

Japan is considering a deployment to Sudan in what could be a breakthrough if Japanese troops actively disarm combatants in addition to providing logisticial support as in past missions.

UN Undersecretary General Jean-Marie Guehenno, who is in charge of peacekeeping, said he told Japan could send engineers, doctors or civilian experts to the western Sudan region.

“I offered a whole menu,” said Guehenno, who is on a six-day visit to Japan. “I was encouraged to see that the government of Japan sees the importance of this contribution.”

Guehenno said he understood Japan’s unique circumstances due to its official pacifism and told defense chief Yoshinori Ono that “support units would be very useful” for a Darfur mission.

UN Security Council members have called for a peacekeeping force to be sent to Darfur once a peace deal is sealed between ethnic rebels and Arab pro-government militias in the conflict that has killed at least 70,000 people in two years.

Japan, which renounced the use of force under the US-imposed constitution after World War II, has been trying to be more than a financial power as it seeks a greater world role including a permanent seat on the Security Council.

Japan has some 550 troops in the southern Iraqi city of Samawa on a non-combat, humanitarian mission in Japan’s first military deployment since 1945 to a country where there is active fighting.

Japan deployed some 1,000 troops to Indonesia to help relief after the tsunami disaster, its biggest overseas military deployment since World War II.

Japanese troops have also taken part in UN peacekeeping operations in Cambodia, Mozambique, the Golan Heights and East Timor, but their activities were mostly confined to logistics such as transport.