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ABILITY OF UN-AU
MISSION IN DARFUR TO CARRY OUT ITS MANDATE IS THREATENED BY CONTINUED
VIOLENCE AND INSTABILITY, BY CAROLINE PATTON:
21/10/2008
(MaximsNews Network)
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UNITED
NATIONS - / MaximsNews Network / 21
October 2008 -- In
a report released today, the Secretary-General warned that the current situation
in
Darfur
is severely impairing the operations of the joint UN-AU (UNAMID) in the
troubled region.
Throughout
its tenure, the mission has had to contend
with constant shortages in personnel and
materiel, with few countries willing to make
and keep commitments to UNAMID. There has also
been violence against its members, and other
UN and humanitarian staff, which has only
risen over the last nine months.
The
challenges of safely reaching different areas
of the region have impeded operation of UNAMID,
as well as the transport of aid by other
organizations.
It has also served as a barrier to
acquiring the necessary equipment, tools and
provisions for the mission. Presently, this
requires UNAMID soldiers to “often undertake
patrols and provide force protection escorts
without adequate communication and
transportation assets. UNAMID civilian
personnel also work and live in an extremely
unsafe environment.”
There
has been some tenuous progress in bringing the
mission to full strength but Ban Ki-Moon
warned that, “Reinforcements are slowly
arriving, but the security situation and
difficult environment in
Darfur
have delayed the arrival of equipment for
incoming contingents.”
Right
now, UNAMID is at 10,500 military and police
members but it was originally planned to
number 26,000 and this level is the ultimate
goal of the slow build up. There are also over
2,5000 civilians who are part of the mission,
about half as many as planned. The UN has
asked its members to provide the troops and
supplies it needs.
The
most recent additions are 147 police officers
from
Nepal
who landed in
Darfur
yesterday and today and will serve for the
next year. These new arrivals bring
specialized expertise and training and will
constitute a single “formed police unit” (FPU).
They will participate in protecting refugee
camps, travel routes, and towns or villages
targeted by the government or rebels.
Two
other units from
Bangladesh
and
Indonesia
already exist, 19 were intended to be created.
The Bangladeshi unit has begun night patrols
at the Kalma IDP camp where 31 people were
killed two months ago by Sudanese soldiers
claiming they were seizing contraband.
Despite
constant appeals from the UN and other
international actors, the parties to the
clashes in
Darfur
have rejected peaceful, negotiated roads to
ending the fighting and “continue to pursue
a military solution to the conflict.” In
2006, an agreement was signed that was
intended to mitigate the insecurity and
potentially bring a conclusion to the
violence. But this has proved dramatically
over-optimistic; the accord has barely even
been put into place.
UN
officials who traveled to
Darfur
in early October are working to find solutions
to the problems facing UNAMID. The
Secretary-General has insisted that the
Sudanese Government to cease its violence
against the population and emphasized that the
UN-AU personnel cannot fulfill their mandate
without the help of the government.
He
told the international community, “I call on
the Government to comply with its obligations
under international human rights and
humanitarian law, in particular with regard to
the protection of civilians.”
Ban
Ki-Moon made a similar request to the rebel
organizations operating in Darfur and
explained that, “UNAMID, despite its broad
mandate for the protection of civilians and
assistance to peace implementation, is not
designed to create a sustainable solution to
the
Darfur
crisis. That is the responsibility of the
parties to the conflict.”
--- Caroline
Patton
Labels:
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