EU rights champion urges Europe to act on Darfur

BRUSSELS - The winner of the European Union's top human rights prize demanded on Tuesday that the bloc take a more active role in resolving the Darfur crisis, saying it could not simply stand by during "genocide".

Speaking before an EU-Africa summit this weekend, Sudanese lawyer Salih Mahmoud Osman called on the EU to commit troops for a Darfur peace force and help bring rights abusers to justice.

"Europe has always been talking tough about the policies of the government of Sudan, but we don't see acts," he told a news briefing in Brussels. "Europe is confused, it is divided on the issue of Darfur. The EU hasn't any unified political will."

International experts estimate 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million uprooted in Darfur since mostly non-Arabs took up arms in early 2003 accusing Khartoum of neglect. Khartoum says 9,000 have died.

Osman said that despite numerous U.N. Security Council resolutions, the number of dead in Darfur had now risen to 500,000 and rape was still being used as a weapon of war -- sometimes against girls as young as eight.

"Europe keeping silent and watching while genocide is happening will never be accepted," he said.

"We are surprised if you are waiting for the number to increase to 800,000, as happened in Rwanda, then you call it genocide -- when it is too late. That is not acceptable.

"We expect more from you, we expect you to take steps to prevent our children from being raped, from being killed."

Osman said the African Union (AU) force in Darfur was too small to be effective, was corrupt and its troops sometimes stood by when incidents happened right before their eyes.

He said the European Union had to contribute to a hybrid United Nations and AU force for Darfur and it was not enough for the EU to send a force to neighbouring Chad.

"Without an international component, African Union forces cannot address the situation in a proper and adequate manner."

In July, the U.N. Security Council authorised a U.N.-AU mission of up to 19,555 military personnel and 6,432 international police.

But U.N. peacekeeping chief Jean-Marie Guehenno has cast doubt on its deployment due to Sudan's restrictions on its movements and refusal to accept non-African troops. Western states have also not provided attack and transport helicopters.

Europe had to review its Darfur policy and be "more serious", Osman said.

"If the government of Sudan commits itself to any commitment, Europe must see that it is fulfilled, otherwise this story will go on like that and this is very dangerous."

Osman, an opposition member of the Sudanese parliament who works for the Sudan Organisation Against Torture, was in October named the winner of the European Parliament's annual Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought.