UN Security Council Calls for Major Conference on Darfur

The United Nations Security Council has sent an invitation to major leaders involved in the Darfur crisis for a meeting to take place next week.

|PIC1|The meeting will look to discuss a new proposed resolution, which will transfer peacekeeping in the region to UN forces. Even though this seems to be the direction the UN is looking to take, the Sudanese government has made it well-known that it strongly opposes this move.

Just last week, Britain and the US introduced a new resolution to authorise the African Union to hand over peacekeeping duties to a much larger and better-equipped UN force.

It was in fact the African Union representatives that requested the transfer to be made on the grounds that it did not have the resources to conduct a full-term operation successfully.

However, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir remains unwaveringly opposed and has issued the stark warning that Sudan's army would fight any UN forces sent to Darfur.

Ghana's U.N. Ambassador Nana Effah-Apenteng, the current council president, told how he sent invitations last week to the African Union, the Arab League, the Organisation of the Islamic Conference and the Sudanese government to meet the council to discuss the proposed resolution, according to AP.

|TOP|It had been hoped that a peace agreement signed in May by the government and the largest rebel group would facilitate a full ceasefire. However, violence has continued in the region, and reports have suggested fighting has become more fierce since that agreement was signed as rival rebel groups clashed further.

UN and AU peacekeepers have reported that rebel factions are attempting to gain an advantage prior to a lasting peace deal being struck.

The violence in the region has been described as one of the worst humanitarian disasters in current history, with more than 200,000 people killed since 2003 when ethnic tribes turned against the Arab Khartoum government.

Britain's UN Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry told this week that London and Washington want the resolution adopted as quickly as possible as the situation in Darfur “is deteriorating”.

|AD|Recent violence has seen two AU soldiers killed and three wounded in an ambush by unidentified fighters Saturday.

Parry said, “We want the United Nations urgently to support African Union forces in Darfur as a step towards their replacement by an effective U.N. force on the ground.”

However, Sudan's Justice Minister Mohamed Ali al Mardhi denounced the US-British draft on Sunday, calling it “wicked” and “misleading.”

He warned the government would in no way offer any protection to international forces against attacks from Sudanese people and those from neighbouring countries.

Sudan has expressed that it wants the AU force to remain in Darfur and be strengthened with potential cash that would be spent on a separate UN force.

As the resolution stands, it would replace the 7,000-strong African Union force with a UN peacekeeping mission of about 22,600, made up from 17,300 troops, 3,300 international police officers and 16 police units trained in riot and crowd control equalling about 2,000 people.

As the AU's mandate in the region runs out on 30th September, the draft resolution calls for the UN force to begin deploying by 1st October at the latest. In the meantime, it asks the UN to strengthen the AU force with additional aircraft and ground transport.