U.N. chief: Darfur is in ‘free fall‘": Conflict has spread to two neighboring countries

2006/12

By EDITH M. LEDERER, Associated Press Writer 7 minutes ago

UNITED NATIONS - The conflict in Darfur has spread to two neighboring countries and is now in "free fall" with six million people facing the prospect of going without food or protection, the outgoing U.N. humanitarian chief said Tuesday.

"I think some of the Arab countries and Asian countries have not really understood we‘re in a free fall. It‘s not a steady deterioration. It‘s a free fall and it includes Darfur, eastern Chad, northern Central African Republic," he said.

More than 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million displaced in the fighting, and the violence has only increased since the government and one rebel group signed a peace agreement in May.

Egeland, who was the first to call Darfur the world‘s worst humanitarian emergency in November 2003, said that one of his greatest regrets is that key global leaders did not come together and offer the sticks and carrots to settle the conflict in 2004 when it only involved one million people.

Where is the free fall going?

Egeland recalled that the women and children he met during his recent fourth visit to Darfur thanked him for the food but pleaded for security. With the humanitarian operation collapsing in many places, he said, they will have nothing.

In a farewell speech on Monday to the U.N. Security Council U.N. Security Council, Egeland accused world leaders of failing to live up to a pledge made at a U.N. summit in September 2005 to protect civilians caught in armed conflict from genocide, war crimes and ethnic cleansing. A Security Council resolution adopted in April reaffirmed their agreement.

"But what I do expect is that China, the United States, Russia, the European Union — the leaders come together and say we‘re going to push and pull and provide sticks and carrots until it changes," he said.

Nonetheless, he said, things are starting to change.

The Security Council adopted a resolution pushed by Britain and the United States to transfer peacekeeping in Darfur from an ill-equipped 7,000-member African Union force to a larger, better equipped U.N. force. But the Sudanese government rejected a U.N. force, claiming it would violate the country‘s sovereignty and was an attempt at recolonization.

He supported the resolution but said it did not get implemented, partly because it lacked support from African, Arab and Islamic countries for a U.N. force.

In late November, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Sudan had agreed in principle to a compromise "hybrid mission" from the African Union and the U.N. — but Khartoum wanted to discuss the size, the force commander and the head of the overall mission.

"At the moment I think it‘s more than sad to see that grown men with jackets and ties like me sit and quarrel of what is a

hybrid force‘ ... while women and children are dying," Egeland said.

"I‘m happy to note that in nine months we might have this force, but what about the next nine days where it could collapse completely?

© 2006 The Associated Press.