Darfur still living in fear as first AU troops arrive

The situation in the troubled Darfur region of western Sudan remained tense as the first batch of an African Union (AU) force, consisting of 154 Rwandan troops, arrived to protect an AU observer mission, relief workers said. "The overall situation on the ground throughout the Darfur region remains very tense," Jennifer Abrahamson, public information officer for the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Sudan, told IRIN on Monday. Humanitarian assistance, Abrahamson added, was getting in, but "some areas of concern remain". The internally displaced persons (IDPs), for example, still did not feel secure enough to return to their homes, she said. On 12 August, a crowd attacked some IDPs from a nearby camp, suspecting them of being involved in attacks against other displaced persons. One IDP was killed and another hospitalised. The government authorities ordered the suspension of all humanitarian activities at the camp and AU observers were denied entry, according to the UN. The Rwandan contingent arrived in the town of Al-Fashir, North Darfur, on Sunday. The acting head of the AU's Conflict Management Centre, Elghassim Wane, told reporters in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, that another contingent made up of Nigerian soldiers was expected in Darfur on 25 August. From Al-Fashir, the soldiers would be deployed in five centres, namely Al Geneina, Nyala, Kabkabie, and Tine and Abeche in Chad, Wane added. However, the Sudanese army spokesman, Gen Mohamed Bashir Suleiman, said in a statement issued from the capital, Khartoum, that the task of the AU force would be "confined to the protection of the 80-man African cease-fire monitoring team, currently deployed in the states of Darfur and Ndjamena", Sudan News Agency reported. The task of the 300-strong force, he added, would "not include conducting any military action against any of the conflict parties in the case of ceasefire violations, contrary to reports which were published in some media." In Khartoum, an AU delegation led by the Commissioner for Political Affairs, Julia Dolly Joiner, arrived on Sunday "to assess the humanitarian situation on the ground and see how the present efforts by the AU towards alleviation of the sufferings of the affected population could be strengthened," the AU said in a statement issued on Saturday. During her visit, Joiner was expected to meet with Sudanese officials in the capital, Khartoum, before leaving for Darfur, where she was due to meet with local authorities, humanitarian agencies, the AU observers and IDPs. The UN has described the conflict in Darfur as the worst humanitarian crisis in the world at the moment. An estimated 2.2 million people are in urgent need of food, medicine and other basic items of survival. They include 1.2 million IDPs forced from their homes by attacks launched by government-backed Janjawid militias. The Sudanese government has presented to the UN an action plan to meet its commitments under a Security Council timetable to improve the situation. The Council had said in a resolution adopted on 30 July that it would consider measures - including economic sanctions - if the Sudanese government did not make progress on commitments to disarm the Janjawid militias and restore security in Darfur. On Friday, Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Usman Isma'il presented the plan in Khartoum during the third meeting of a Joint Implementation Mechanism (JIM), co-chaired by the UN Secretary-General's Special Representative, Jan Pronk, UN News reported. The meeting was attended, for the first time, by diplomats from Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia. The JIM was set up jointly by the Sudanese government and UN in July to report on the progress government was making towards disarming the Janjawid, who have been blamed for most of the atrocities in Darfur. Sudan had undertaken to improve security for the IDPs and alleviate the humanitarian crisis there. The plan presented by Isma'il included "a list of areas that the government proposed could be made safe and secure within 30 days," UN news reported. Pronk indicated that the 30-day Darfur Plan of Action, which he and Isma'il agreed to, "could be seen as consisting of three phases of 10 days each" said UN news. "In the first, the government would decide on policies to meet the requirements, and then ensure that its policies would be implemented by all regional and local authorities in Darfur," he said. The impact of the process - in terms of a verifiable, substantial and irreversible improvement of the security situation - would be seen in the last 10 days. "The first phase is behind us," Pronk was quoted as saying. "The government has indeed shown political will to fulfil its commitments, but the coming two phases are crucial." [ENDS]