UN rights envoy to keep investigating in Sudan

By Stephanie Nebehay 
December 14, 2007
Reuters
Source: http://africa.reuters.com/top/news/usnBAN440245.html


GENEVA (Reuters) - The U.N. human rights envoy for Sudan looks set to overcome resistance from African and Islamic states and have her mandate extended, but a team of Darfur investigators will be disbanded, diplomats said on Friday.

A compromise resolution, expected to be adopted later in the day at the United Nations Human Rights Council, addresses African and Muslim nations' arguments that there was no need to renew both Sima Samar's investigative mandate and that of a separate U.N. group of seven independent experts that she leads.

The former Afghan deputy prime minister has served as U.N. special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Sudan since 2005. She has reported war crimes by Sudanese forces and their allied militia in the troubled Darfur region.

Unlike the larger group of investigators on Darfur, Samar has the power to carry out fact-finding missions in Sudan, deemed crucial to ensuring full assessments of conditions there.

There has been a compromise. It's a good outcome. The special rapporteur will be extended by another year, a diplomat told Reuters.

The fate of Samar's independent post hung in the balance after African and Islamic countries raised the objections to her role at this week's session of the 47-member state Council.

Egypt, speaking on behalf of African nations, and Pakistan on behalf of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference said on Tuesday that conditions in Darfur had improved and Khartoum had cooperated with recent U.N. inquiries.

Portugal's ambassador Francisco Xavier Esteves, speaking on behalf of the European Union, countered by saying it was important for Samar to carry on given the continued violence and grave human rights violations in Sudan.

Diplomats said a behind-the-scenes compromise was clinched between African countries and the EU under which Samar would keep up her investigative work but the experts' group would not.

Sudan's government has been accused of sanctioning killings, rapes and looting in the vast Darfur region, where conflict has raged since 2003, uprooting an estimated 2.5 million people.

Keeping the spotlight on Khartoum is widely seen as a litmus test for the Human Rights Council, set up in June 2006 to replace the highly politicised U.N. Human Rights Commission.

Zambia's delegation told the Council session on Friday that Samar's investigations played a critical role.

A lot needs to be done for the people of Sudan in general and the people of Darfur in particular. Extending her mandate will ensure that the situation of human rights in that country is not forgotten, it said.