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Child abuse allegations probed
04/01/2007 10:10 - (SA)
New York - The United Nations is verifying reported allegations that UN staff have sexually abused children in southern Sudan, officials said on Wednesday.
UN officials said the world body is checking whether the allegations reported in the Daily Telegraph are new or already under investigation.
The daily reported on Wednesday that UN staff and peacekeepers in southern Sudan have been accused of sexually abusing children as young as 12.
"We are deeply concerned by press reports of allegations of sexual exploitation and abuse by UN personnel in Juba (in southern Sudan)," said Michele Montas, the spokesperson of new UN chief Ban Ki-moon.
"The UN standard on this issue is clear - zero tolerance, meaning zero complacency and zero impunity," she said.
"In cooperation with the UN Mission in the Sudan (UNMIS), we are looking into the substance of the press reports to determine if the allegations are new or are existing cases already under investigation."
The abuse allegedly started when the UN, which has around 10 000 personnel in the area, moved in two years ago to help reconstruction after the end of a 23-year civil war, the Daily Telegraph reported.
Initial claims of abuse emerged within months of the UN's arrival and an internal report was reportedly compiled on the issue in 2005.
Timing considered 'odd'
Jane Holl Lute, the UN assistant secretary general for peacekeeping operations, said it was "not at all clear" if the allegations in the Daily Telegraph are new.
Several UN diplomats and officials found the timing of the allegations "odd," she told AFP.
"But we want to get to the bottom of it," Lute said. "We want to find out if these are new allegations or if this is a restatement of cases that are already under investigation."
The United Nations has urged the Sudanese government for several months to allow the deployment of a UN force in its strife-torn western region of Darfur.
Sudan, which has opposed the UN troop deployment, called the allegations "very disturbing."
The report had a "negative effect on the Sudanese who had the idea that the United Nations is present in their country to help bring peace here," Sudanese foreign ministry spokesman Ali Sadek said in Khartoum.
"We reject such behaviour, which seems to accompany UN forces on some of their missions," he added, an apparent reference to similar accusations against peacekeepers in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Sapa-AFP
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