UN chief Ban Ki-moon heads to Sudan

TURIN – UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon heads to Sudan today to press for speedy deployment of a 26 000-strong peacekeeping force in Darfur and a quick start to new peace talks to end the four-year conflict.

“I want to create the foundations of a lasting peace and security,” Ban told reporters last week. “My goal is to lock in the progress we have made so far, to build on it so that this terrible trauma may one day cease.”Reaching that goal will be difficult because Darfur is a vast and complex region where peace agreements and ceasefires have been ignored, lawlessness has increased, and more than a dozen rebel groups and government forces are still fighting.Ban has expressed deep concern at the recent escalation in violence that has led to hundreds of deaths in the last few weeks.Nonetheless, the secretary-general said he chose this time to make the weeklong trip – which will also include stops in Chad and Libya – because of the “historic opportunity” provided by the UN Security Council’s adoption of a resolution on July 31 authorising the 26 000-strong African Union-United Nations force.It will replace the beleaguered 7 000-strong AU force now in Darfur by December 31.The resolution was adopted after months of delay in getting agreement from the Sudanese government, and Ban said he wants to test the government’s commitment to speedy deployment of the AU-UN ‘hybrid’ force.Ban said deploying the force quickly will be ‘one of the largest and most complex field operations the United Nations has ever undertaken’ because of the harsh environment and lack of water and communications – and ‘it cannot succeed without the cooperation of the government of Sudan’.The secretary-general has been in Turin for a meeting with senior UN staff and was scheduled to fly to Khartoum on Monday.Sudan’s UN Ambassador Abdelmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohamed said before flying from New York to Khartoum for the visit that the secretary-general ‘will find a committed Sudan to implementing the letter and the spirit of that resolution’.Nampa-AP”My goal is to lock in the progress we have made so far, to build on it so that this terrible trauma may one day cease.”Reaching that goal will be difficult because Darfur is a vast and complex region where peace agreements and ceasefires have been ignored, lawlessness has increased, and more than a dozen rebel groups and government forces are still fighting.Ban has expressed deep concern at the recent escalation in violence that has led to hundreds of deaths in the last few weeks.Nonetheless, the secretary-general said he chose this time to make the weeklong trip – which will also include stops in Chad and Libya – because of the “historic opportunity” provided by the UN Security Council’s adoption of a resolution on July 31 authorising the 26 000-strong African Union-United Nations force.It will replace the beleaguered 7 000-strong AU force now in Darfur by December 31.The resolution was adopted after months of delay in getting agreement from the Sudanese government, and Ban said he wants to test the government’s commitment to speedy deployment of the AU-UN ‘hybrid’ force.Ban said deploying the force quickly will be ‘one of the largest and most complex field operations the United Nations has ever undertaken’ because of the harsh environment and lack of water and communications – and ‘it cannot succeed without the cooperation of the government of Sudan’.The secretary-general has been in Turin for a meeting with senior UN staff and was scheduled to fly to Khartoum on Monday.Sudan’s UN Ambassador Abdelmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohamed said before flying from New York to Khartoum for the visit that the secretary-general ‘will find a committed Sudan to implementing the letter and the spirit of that resolution’.Nampa-AP