AU 'can't protect civilians'
2006-01-12 09:15
Washington - UN peacekeepers should be deployed immediately to the western Sudanese province of Darfur because the African Union force currently there lacks the resources to be effective, a Boston-based rights group said on Wednesday.
Physicians for Human Rights, which has sent teams of experts to visit the region three times, said in a report that the 7 000-member African Union force lacks a mandate and financial and logistical support to protect civilians.
"Without a meaningful intervention that includes additional international troops, thousands more could die and those displaced will not be able to return to their homes," the study said.
The report also urged that the UN Security Council mandate that profits from the sale of Sudanese oil or other commodities should be used for "compensation, restitution and rehabilitation" of the victims of the three-year old conflict.
Roughly 18 000 Darfur residents are believed to have died in the conflict, and another two million have been displaced.
The report's author, John Heffernan, said Sudanese government forces and their militia allies have attacked "the very survival of a people by destroying property, livestock, communities and families, driving victims into a terrain unable to sustain life, and then repeatedly obstructing humanitarian assistance, their only lifeline."
- AP