Parties in Darfur crisis okay power sharing in govt
From Madu Onuorah and Oghogho Obayuwana, Abuja
AN agenda which sets out the areas the talks on the Darfur crisis would cover was endorsed by the Sudanese government, representatives of the Sudanese Liberation Movement and the Justice and Equality Movement yesterday.
The parties involved in the crisis arrived at the areas, which cover humanitarian, political, security, economic and social issues during the second day of the Abuja talks.
The political and security issues are tied together, while social and economic issues will be treated differently.
President Olusegun Obasanjo who is the chairman of the African Union (AU) told reporters that the parties agreed to power sharing in the government of Sudan.
Obasanjo told a mid-session press conference at the ECOWAS secretariat in Abuja that "from all indications, we have taken the first step in the` right direction in the very important talks."
The President stated that significant progress had been made since the meeting began on Monday, noting that "emotion-laden statements" were received from the parties to the crisis at the beginning of the talks.
According to the President: "Sparing the time on the Darfur crisis, I believe that we have made progress within the last 24 hours. We have had a wonderful opening and statements from parties concerned. Some were emotion laden, which is understandable. Statements have been frank and the Sudanese government has requested the opportunity to go over the draft agenda, which was unanimously adopted this morning (yesterday) with minor adjustments."
He said that extending the meeting to another day was worth the effort to stave off the imminent danger facing the country arising from the threats by the United Nations (UN) Security Council and the African Union (AU).
Said he: "I believe that one thing that would be a real disaster is for the international community to collectively feel absolutely dissatisfied with the events and the handling of events by the government of Sudan to the extent that they have to unleash something more than what we are trying to contain. That would be great disaster to Sudan, the government, the people and indeed, for Africa. I believe that we can manage it and we will manage it."
On Monday, Khartoum rejected a wider role for African peacekeepers despite international pressure to end violence that has led to the world's worst humanitarian crisis in the Darfur region.
The talks are a last-minute attempt at resolving the crisis before the UN Security Council's August 30 deadline.
Sudan's Agriculture Minister Majzoub al-Khalifa Ahmad on Monday dismissed the proposal floated by the AU to send nearly 2,000 peacekeepers to Darfur, where a pro-government mostly Arab militia are accused of killing tens of thousands of black Africans and pushing more than 1.2 million from their homes.
"Nobody agreed about that (a peacekeeping force). There was an agreement about a force to protect observers," Ahmad said. "The security role is the role of the government of Sudan and its security forces."
He said Sudan might consider an expanded AU role later. "If there's a need, it will be discussed."
Rebel delegates at the AU-brokered talks were frustrated at the government's unwillingness to address the causes of the conflict and insisting to focus instead on aid issues.
The 150 AU-Rwandan troops now in Darfur are operating under a vague mandate that does not spell out how far they can go to protect targeted civilians.
Rwandan officials have said the troops would protect civilians, and Obasanjo, the current AU chairman, offered on Sunday to have the soldiers help disarm the rebels while the government reins in the militia.
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw toured a sprawling refugee camp in Darfur yesterday ahead of a meeting with Sudanese President Omar el-Bashir. Straw said the Sudanese government must vastly improve security.
He said he would tell the president that "we recognise that the government of Sudan has made progress in greatly improving humanitarian access and also in terms of the safety and security of people in the camps.
"But talking to people here, it is very clear that people are still very anxious, apprehensive and nervous about whether they will be safe to go back to the villages from which they have come," Straw told journalists at Abu Shouk, a sprawling camp set in desert and scrubland more than a mile from the provincial northern capital of al-Fasher.
It is critical the government establish "safety and security across Darfur and get the political process going," he added.
Straw said on Monday that his government was ready to help finance an enlarged AU force for Darfur.`
