Aid work suspended after three are killed in Darfur camp

All international assistance has been suspended in camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the Zalingei area, in the western Sudanese region of Darfur, after three aid workers were killed on Thursday, the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, said. The aid agencies decided to withdraw after three Sudanese government workers from the water and sanitation department were beaten to death by a mob in an IDP camp just outside Zalingei town in West Darfur State. "UNHCR is extremely concerned about the continuing deterioration of the security situation in Darfur," UNHCR spokesperson Ron Redmond told reporters in Geneva on Friday. "This tragic incident is just adding to an already long list of security incidents that have occurred over the past three weeks." In the past two days, armed men in the Jebel Marra area, north of Zalingei, have attacked two NGOS, while a driver hired by a local NGO and partner of the faith-based humanitarian operation of ACT-Caritas in Darfur was killed on Wednesday in South Darfur. Last week, a driver working for an international NGO was killed in El Geneina by bandits. Ten days ago, an aid worker from the NGO Relief International was shot dead by an armed gang in North Darfur. The conflict, which started in 2003, has displaced 1.8 million people in Darfur. Approximately 210,000 Sudanese refugees have fled Darfur into neighbouring Chad, while an estimated 15,000 Chadian refugees have crossed into Darfur over the past eight months. International donors, meeting in Brussels on Tuesday, pledged about US $220 million in additional funding to the African Union (AU) force struggling to keep the peace in Darfur. Limited funding and lack of equipment have impaired the capacity of the 7,000-strong Africa Mission to effectively carry out its peacekeeping mandate in Darfur and representatives of the international donor community insisted the AU peacekeeping mandate must be transferred to the United Nations by 1 January 2007. "I can't foresee any realistic exit to the Darfur conflict without such a transition [from AU to UN peacekeeping], and I can't either imagine that the government of Sudan would continue to oppose it," the EU's foreign policy chief Javier Solana said at the conference. At the same time relief agencies warned of a worsening humanitarian crisis in the region, with more civilians caught in escalating violence between armed groups. There are about 14,000 aid workers operating in Darfur.