Sudan Rejects Security Council Plan To End the Genocide in Darfur

UNITED NATIONS — Sudan yesterday rejected a U.N. Security Council plan to end the genocide in Darfur, informing several countries that sending troops to protect refugees there would be seen as a “hostile act.”The American ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, called for a strong Security Council response to the defiant letter from Khartoum. But other council members dismissed the African nation’s statement and urged more diplomacy. They also stressed the “positive” elements of a separate letter President Bashir of Sudan sent yesterday to Secretary-General Annan in which he agreed to beef up the ill-equipped African Union force now in Darfur.President Bush recently named Ambassador Andrew Natsios as his personal envoy to Sudan, but Mr. Natsios, who met with Mr. Annan here yesterday, has yet to receive a Sudanese visa.Also yesterday, the Sudanese ambassador to the United Nations, Abdalmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohamad, abruptly left the Al-Jazeera studio at Turtle Bay as he was about to be interviewed in a live broadcast. He gave no reason for his departure.While Mr. Bolton has pushed the council in recent months for tougher resolutions on rogue states — including North Korea, Iran, and Sudan — those countries increasingly have tested the council’s resolve and its willingness to follow through on its statements.After North Korea launched long-range missiles in July, the council invoked some provisions of Chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter, which allows for universal sanctions or even military action. The council also demanded that Iran suspend its uranium enrichment program and threatened sanctions if it failed to do so.Pyongyang’s answer this week was an announcement of its intention to test nuclear weapons. The European Union nuclear negotiator Javier Solana also said diplomatic negotiations with his Iranian counterpart, Ali Larijani, had reached a dead end.The council was unable to agree on a tough response to Pyongyang’s challenge. And the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said yesterday that Moscow would oppose to any sanctions against Iran.In its letter, Sudan issued a direct challenge to U.N. resolution 1701, which the council approved in August. The resolution calls for troops from a U.N. force active in southern Sudan to be diverted to build up a new, 22,500-strong U.N. force in Darfur and replace the weak observer A.U. force of 7,000 troops now in the region.Khartoum stresses its position of “total rejection” of resolution 1701 in the letter, sent yesterday from the Sudanese mission to the United Nations to A.U. troop contributors, as well as to other nations that have sent soldiers to join the U.N. force in the south.“In the absence of Sudan’s consent to the deployment of U.N. troops, any volunteering to provide peacekeeping troops to Darfur will be considered as a hostile act, a prelude to an invasion of a member country of the U.N.,” the letter says.“They’re trying to intimidate troop-contributing countries,” Mr. Bolton said. “This is a direct challenge to the authority of the Security Council in its efforts to alleviate the tragedy in Darfur, and clearly requires a strong response by the Security Council.”But several council members said Mr. Bolton was overreacting; they pointed to Mr. Bashir’s more conciliatory letter. Asked by a reporter about the separate Sudanese letter to the troop contributors, the Russian ambassador to the United Nations, Vitaly Churkin, said, “There are much more authoritative communications from the Sudanese government, which are in a completely different mode.”A European diplomat who asked for anonymity said yesterday that Sudan’s rejection of the Security Council plan was conveyed on the highest levels, including by Mr. Bashir himself in a meeting this week with the secretary-general of the Arab League, Amr Moussa.

Sudan Rejects Security Council Plan To End the Genocide in Darfur

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