Khartoum's United Nations envoy, rejecting a bleak U.N. assessment of the situation in Sudan's conflict-torn western Darfur region, said early Tuesday it was time for international peacekeepers to prepare to leave.
Saying it omitted key information, Sudan’s U.N. ambassador, Abdul Mahmoud Abdul Haleem, criticized the latest report about Darfur by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, which says Khartoum has broken a deal on deploying the peacekeepers.
"One big fact should be the focus of the report — that the war is over," he told Reuters. "With peace in sight, the U.N. should, in coordination with the African Union and Sudanese government, plan for an exit strategy."
The Darfur conflict began in 2003 when mostly non-Arab rebels revolted after accusing Khartoum of neglecting Darfur. A counterinsurgency campaign drove more than 2 million people from their homes. The United Nations says as many as 300,000 people died, but Khartoum rejects that figure.
The U.N.-AU mission in Darfur, known as UNAMID, has been fraught with difficulties. For nearly two years, the mission’s commanders have faced bureaucratic delays and other obstacles in deploying the peacekeepers approved by the U.N. Security Council.
Ban’s new report says there are now close to 20,000 troops and police deployed in Darfur, the site of what U.N. officials say is one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world.
The report also accuses Sudan of harassing and limiting movements of UNAMID personnel in breach of an agreement with Khartoum on their deployment.
"The repeated incidents of government officials preventing access to UNAMID patrols are a direct violation of the Status of Forces Agreement with the government of Sudan and a serious impediment to the mission’s capacity to implement its mandate," Ban said in the report.
The harassment included bureaucratic delays, warning shots fired at UNAMID, weapons pointed at convoys and Sudanese army helicopters flying low over UNAMID "in a threatening manner."
Ban’s report said government forces and armed rebel groups continued to clash in Darfur, making it clear that neither side was committed to a peaceful solution to the crisis.
It also said the militaries of Sudan and neighboring Chad had been fighting along their border and that U.N./AU mediator Djibril Bassole’s "efforts to resume peace negotiations between the parties (in Darfur) were not successful."
Abdul Haleem said U.N. efforts should focus on ensuring that peace talks between the government and rebels are a success.
Ban’s assessment contrasts sharply with those of some UNAMID officials who have suggested recently the conflict in Darfur was essentially over. The former head of UNAMID said in August that Darfur was no longer at war.
Two months later, however, UNAMID said that Sudanese government and rebel forces were massing troops in Darfur, raising fears that new violence could break out.