Sudan strife has escalated, UN aide says
UNITED NATIONS -- The UN official in charge of an office to prevent genocide said yesterday that Arab militias have escalated a campaign of violence against civilians in Darfur, Sudan, by mounting attacks against camps for displaced families.
The official, Juan Mendez, special adviser to the United Nations secretary general, Kofi Annan, said Khartoum has not abided by a Security Council order to establish a ''plan to disarm" the Sudanese-backed Arab militiamen.
Those militia are accused of driving more than 2 million Africans from their homes since 2003.
''I found the situation much more dangerous and worrisome than I expected," Mendez said.
The UN official completed a second visit to the region within the past year. ''Until last week, there have never been concerted, massive attacks of an indiscriminate nature against civilians" in camps in Darfur, he said.
Mendez also told reporters that governments have an obligation to cooperate with the International Criminal Court, which has begun an investigation into alleged war crimes in Darfur. The United States opposes the Hague-based court, which it believes may conduct politically motivated investigations into US military actions. Congress has also passed legislation that limits US cooperation with the court.
Mendez gave his news conference shortly after he presented a report on his findings to the UN Security Council.
Mendez had hoped to provide the council with a personal briefing but was prevented from addressing the council by the United States and Sudan's three closest allies on the council, Russia, China and Algeria.
The US ambassador, John R. Bolton, said the Security Council, which received a briefing yesterday on Darfur from a senior UN peacekeeping official, has sufficient evidence of abuses to take action.
He said another briefing on the matter would simply distract the 15-nation council from making the hard decisions needed to halt the violence.
It is ''not like we need additional information," Bolton said. ''We should talk about next steps, not about how to arrange the furniture in the Security Council."
