The United Nations has warned that a significant number of Arab militia, suspected to be the pro-government Janjaweed, is assembling in Sudan’s Darfur and that its purposes are not known.
The Janjaweed is a militia that has been blamed by UN and African Union officials for numerous cases of rape, arson, looting and killing during the four-year conflict in Darfur. The officials accuse the Khartoum government of arming the Janjaweed and coordinating regular military operations with it — charges the government denies.
In a report released this week, the UN in Khartoum said that the militia, ”suspected to be Janjaweed” were reported gathering about 75km north-east of El-Geneina, the capital of West Darfur.
The reason for the gathering is not known, UN spokesperson Radhia Achouri said. She declined to say how many people were in the assembled militia.
A telephone message left with the Sudanese government in West Darfur on Wednesday was not immediately returned.
More than 200 000 people have been killed and 2,5-million chased from their homes in Darfur since February 2003 when ethnic African tribesmen took up arms, complaining of decades of neglect and discrimination by the central government.
The government is accused of having responded by unleashing the Janjaweed militia. Khartoum denies the charge, but members of the Janjaweed have told the media that they were armed by government forces.
A 7 000-strong African Union peacekeeping force has been trying to stop the ongoing violence, but the force is underfunded and ill-equipped. Several attempts to reach the AU in Sudan to confirm the UN’s report went unanswered Wednesday.
The UN mission in Sudan also said this week that residents of West Darfur have abandoned some villages because of banditry, armed robberies and other harassment.
On Monday, the UN said two armed people dressed in military fatigues, suspected to be Arab militia, entered a refugee camp in El-Geneina, set alight a shelter and shot dead one refugee who came out to protest.
The UN Security Council has been pushing to deploy a 22 000 force of UN and AU peacekeepers in Darfur to halt the violence.
But Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir has rejected any U.N. troops as colonialists and insists that the existing AU force, with U.N. technical support, can maintain order. — Sapa-AP