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/ 22 September 2007
A small amount of extra peacekeeping troops for Sudan’s troubled Darfur region could be in place by October, officials said on Friday after a high-level meeting on Darfur at the United Nations. Nigeria and Rwanda are considering sending ”a few battalions” to the region next month, according to Britain’s secretary of state for Africa.
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/ 21 September 2007
The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court on Thursday challenged the United Nations and its members to break their silence on two men he charged with war crimes in Darfur. Luis Moreno-Ocampo said too little attention had been paid to his arrest warrants, an issue not on the agenda of the talks.
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/ 20 September 2007
Al-Qaeda’s second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahri urged Sudanese Muslims in a video posted on Thursday to fight a force of African Union and United Nations peacekeepers. Al-Zawahri accused Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir of abandoning his Muslim brothers to appease the United States.
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/ 20 September 2007
A rebel leader from Sudan’s war-torn Darfur region said his fighters defeated a government battalion on Wednesday in a three-hour battle that killed 45 people. Sudan Liberation Army faction chairperson Ahmed Abdel Shafie said one of his units attacked government soldiers stationed in the village of Dobow in the central Jabel Marra region.
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/ 19 September 2007
One of Darfur’s most powerful rebel leaders will not take part in peace talks until a lasting ceasefire is put in place and security is restored, he said in an interview published on Wednesday. Abdel Wahed Mohamed el-Nur has refused to join Darfur rebel commanders and groups who agreed a joint position last month.
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/ 14 September 2007
Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir said on Friday that his government would observe a ceasefire in Darfur after peace talks start next month, on a visit to Rome that has drawn criticism in Italy and abroad. He urged Europe to pressure rebel leaders to attend talks with Khartoum due to start on October 27 in Libya.
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/ 12 September 2007
Iran will not stop uranium enrichment, chief nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani said on Wednesday, despite a call by the European Union and United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to halt sensitive nuclear work. ”We heard about this EU demand and we said our view,” Larijani told a news conference.
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/ 11 September 2007
Ongoing violence in Sudan’s Darfur region threatens to undermine planned peace talks between Khartoum and rebel groups, a British minister said as he flew into the war-torn area on Tuesday. British Foreign Office Minister for Africa Mark Malloch Brown made the remarks a day after rebels said government aircraft had bombed a rebel-held Darfur town.
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/ 10 September 2007
Sudanese government aircraft bombed a rebel-held town in Darfur on Monday, insurgent groups said, hours after the government said it was investigating a rebel raid on one of its bases last month. Reports of the attack came seven weeks before rebel groups and the Khartoum government are set to meet for peace talks.
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/ 7 September 2007
Chad will back United Nations moves to end the conflict in Sudan’s Darfur region by allowing international peacekeepers on its own soil and supporting peace talks, President Idriss Itno Déby said on Friday. Déby made the commitment to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who was in Chad on a regional tour to canvass support for the UN’s peacekeeping initiative for Darfur.
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/ 6 September 2007
Sudan and Darfur rebels will hold talks on October 27 in Libya to push for peace ahead of the expected deployment of a 26 000-strong peace force in Darfur, a United Nations-Sudanese government statement said on Thursday. The statement said the UN ”expresses the hope that parties will cooperate fully” with UN and African Union mediators.
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/ 4 September 2007
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon flew in to south Sudan’s capital, Juba, on Tuesday to try to speed implementation of the 2005 peace deal that ended Africa’s longest civil war. Aides said Ban would try to resolve sticking points in the roll-out of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement.
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/ 4 September 2007
Peace talks between the Sudanese government and Darfur’s rebel groups could begin next month, according to senior United Nations officials. The UN Security Council agreed in July almost to triple the number of foreign troops and police in Darfur with the aim of protecting the millions of displaced people.
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/ 3 September 2007
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon headed for Sudan on Monday to lay the groundwork for a solution to the festering Darfur conflict through talks and deployment of thousands of peacekeepers. Ban will seek commitment to his plan from Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir and visit a refugee camp in the western Sudanese Darfur region.
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/ 1 September 2007
Malnutrition is on the rise in Darfur as a surge in violence prevents aid workers from reaching more people in need, a senior United Nations official said. Eighteen spot surveys in three Darfur provinces indicated the emergency threshold of 15% of the population suffering from malnutrition had increased to more than 17% in some areas.
The leaders of France and Britain on Friday revived the spectre of sanctions against Khartoum if progress is not made on a Darfur ceasefire and upcoming political talks. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy said in a joint editorial in the Times in London that sanctions could be used to bring peace to Darfur.
Nineteen newly freed South Korean hostages were set to fly out of the Afghan capital on Friday after a six-week kidnap drama, sources close to the arrangements said, after a deal critics fear could spur more abductions. Taliban insurgents freed the remaining seven South Korean Christian volunteers late on Thursday.
Mustapha Sesay and Femi Rashid, former foes in Sierra Leone’s civil war, spar with good humoured jibes as they work together in a motorcycle taxi association that brings together ex-combatants. ”I shoot you like a chicken,” laughs ex-rebel child soldier Sesay. ”You don’t know how to fight,” retorts Rashid, once a traditional Kamajor hunter who battled the rebels.
Darfur rebels accused the government of bombing South Darfur on Thursday, the latest attack in an aerial campaign that has driven thousands of people from their homes over the past month. ”There is aerial bombardment on a daily basis — bombing by MiG 29 and by Antonov,” Justice and Equality Movement commander Abel Aziz el-Nur Ashr Ashr said.
Camps teeming with frustrated refugees in Sudan’s Darfur region have become militarised and present a danger that cannot be ignored, a United Nations official was quoted as saying on Thursday. The UN’s emergency relief coordinator said the presence of weapons in the camps made for a potentially explosive situation.