U.N. Official Warns of Darfur Failure 

By Warren Hoge
January 9, 2008
The New York Times
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/09/world/09cnd-nations.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

UNITED NATIONS — The United Nations’ top peacekeeping official told the Security Council Wednesday that obstructionism by the Sudanese government, unwillingness of other countries to supply needed transportation equipment and continuing outbreaks of violence threatened to doom the freshly deployed peacekeeping force in Darfur.

“Without positive developments on each of these three issues, we will face a ‘perfect storm’ of circumstances that will lead to the failure of UNAMID, with dire consequences for international efforts to help the Sudanese bring peace and stability to Darfur,” said Jean Marie Guéhenno, the undersecretary for peacekeeping.

UNAMID is the official acronym for the joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force that officially took over responsibility for the crisis in Darfur on Dec. 31.

Only 9,000 members of the planned 26,000-member force are in Darfur now, the start-up of a mission charged with ending the convulsive four-year-old clash between government forces and government-equipped militias on one side and rebels on the other. The conflict has left at least 200,000 civilians dead and chased 2.5 million villagers from their homes.

Most of Mr. Guéhenno’s statement of the stark realities facing peacekeepers in Darfur dealt with foot-dragging tactics by the Sudanese government in Khartoum.

In an illustration of how far-reaching those blocking moves have been, he said that in the hours leading up to the change-of-command ceremony in Darfur, the Sudanese even raised objections to the planned “rehatting” exchange of African Union green berets and helmets for the blue ones of the United Nations.

More importantly, he said, Sudan was still, after more than three months of negotiations, stalling agreement on providing the land necessary for bases, on the approval to conduct flights and other operations at night, on the legal status of the force and on the inclusion of non-African specialized units that are considered essential to the force’s success.

Abdalmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohamad, the Sudanese ambassador to the United Nations, denied the charges, saying outside the council chamber, “It is very regrettable that they always develop this habit of continuing their accusations that Sudan is not helping them whereas the actual facts on the ground prove in no uncertain terms that Sudan is cooperating on all issues.”

Mr. Mohamad also refuted the claim by Mr. Guéhenno that the local commander of Sudanese government forces had confirmed in a phone call to a commander of the joint force that his soldiers were responsible for a small arms and rocket grenade attack Monday on a convoy of 20 white vehicles carrying rations for the United Nations troops.

“I can assure you that the Sudan government forces did not at all do that, we have no relationship whatsoever with that attack,” Mr. Mohamad said.

Zalmay Khalilzad, the United States ambassador to the United Nations, said that “the cumulative effect of what the government of Sudan is doing is to have an ineffective force, not to be able to carry out its mission, and that is unacceptable to us.”

He asserted that this in turn was making it difficult to persuade major powers to “embrace the mission” and contribute the heavy and medium transportation units and the 24 helicopters that Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and other officials have been pleading with world capitals to supply.

The United Nations says such air capability is crucial because of the extent of the affected area, which is roughly the size of France. Despite the repeated appeals, however, no offers have been forthcoming, Mr. Guéhenno said.

Sudan did not keep a Dec. 13 date to conduct talks on the legal basis of the peacekeeping force, he said, but the country appeared willing to do so this Saturday. In two further small acts of cooperation, he said, Sudan had released communications equipment it had impounded and would now permit the joint force to use a government logistics hub as a staging area.

But in a persisting disagreement, he said, Sudan was barring acceptance of military units from Thailand or Nepal, two countries with years of experience in United Nations peacekeeping missions, and had rejected a sophisticated engineering unit from Scandinavian countries. This rejection, based on Khartoum’s desire to have an all-African force, would have “serious consequences” for the eventual deployment of the force, he said.

Mr. Guéhenno told the council that hostilities between the Sudanese forces and the Justice and Equality Movement rebels in West Darfur had led to a number of civilian casualties and the relocation of 283 aid workers. He also cited the menace to the region from the government of Chad, which has pursued Chadian rebels into Darfur with air attacks.

“This is an extremely worrying development in light of the potential for these engagements to escalate and assume international, cross-border dimensions,” Mr. Guéhenno said.

In conclusion, he said, the United Nations would not have the personnel or military assets in place “for many months, even in the best case scenario.”