SWITZERLAND/FILE: U.N. human rights mission has accuses Sudanese government of orchestrating and taking part in international crimes in Darfur

A United Nations human rights mission has accused the Sudanese government of orchestrating and taking part in international crimes in Darfur, where observers say more than 200,000 people have been killed in four years of conflict. A U.N. human rights mission on Monday (March 12) accused Sudan's government of orchestrating and taking part in war crimes in Darfur and called for urgent international action to protect civilians there. The U.N. mission, led by Nobel peace prize laureate Jody Williams, was sent by the U.N. Human Rights Council to investigate charges of widespread abuse in Sudan's vast western region, where observers say about 200,000 people have been killed since a revolt broke out in 2003. At a Human Rights Council session which opened in Geneva on Monday (March 12) Louise Arbour, the high commissioner for human rights, said the aim of the council was to show fairness and impartiality to any government under review and also to "the thousands of individuals who receive neither fairness nor impartiality when they seek to address their own individual grievances to their governments". The report on Sudan, which the mission submitted to the council, said: "The situation is characterised by gross and systematic violations of human rights and grave breaches of international humanitarian law." The 35-page report added: "The mission further concludes that the government of Sudan has manifestly failed to protect the population of Darfur from large-scale international crimes and has itself orchestrated and participated in these crimes." It urged the U.N. Security Council to take "urgent further action" to protect the civilians in Darfur, including through the deployment of peacekeepers. The Sudanese government denies responsibility for abuses and blames them on rebel groups that rejected a 2006 peace deal. The Darfur violence, described as genocide by Washington, has killed tens of thousands of people and driven 2.5 million from their homes as rebels, accusing the Khartoum government of neglect, battle pro-government Arab militias. Humanitarian agencies say they face growing difficulties in getting aid to the desperately needy, and increasingly aid workers themselves are targets of the violence. Khartoum denies genocide and says the figures are exaggerated. It says Western media have blown the conflict out of proportion. Nevertheless, the Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) has summoned Ahmed Mohammed Haroun, Sudan's minister of state for humanitarian affairs, and militia commander Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-al-Rahman, also known as Ali Kushayb to answer war crimes charges in a first step towards bringing to trial those deemed responsible for atrocities, including mass rape and murder of civilians. Khartoum, which says it will hold trials of its own, is adamant that it will not hand over anybody to face the court. The decision to send the six-person team to Sudan was taken by the U.N.'s human rights watchdog only after a bitter debate. Some Arab and African countries on the 47-state body were unhappy at singling out Sudan for special attention. The Sudanese government, which is resisting calls for U.N. peacekeepers to be deployed in Darfur, at first agreed to cooperate but then refused to issue visas to the mission. It travelled instead to Chad's border with Sudan, where the conflict in Darfur has spilled over, and to Addis Ababa, headquarters of the African Union, which has been trying to contain the violence in Darfur with 7,000 peacekeepers. The mission's report marks the latest international investigation to accuse Sudan of complicity in crimes in Darfur. It said that, while rebel groups were also guilty of serious abuses, the "principal pattern is one of a violent counterinsurgency campaign" being waged by government forces and their militia allies, the so-called Janjaweed.

ITN Source | March 12, 2007

Tags:. .urged. .broke. .ali. .population. .desperately