WASHINGTON, May 29: US President George W. Bush on Tuesday tightened US sanctions on Sudan over “genocide” in Darfur and pushed for a tough new UN Security Council resolution to punish the government in Khartoum.
“The people of Darfur are crying out for help, and they deserve it,” he said. “I promise this to the people of Darfur: The United States will not avert our eyes from a crisis that challenges the conscience of the world.” China, a veto-wielding permanent Council member and one of Sudan's main allies, criticised the sanctions even before Bush unveiled them. But Britain welcomed the plan, while France proposed a humanitarian corridor through neighbouring Chad to get aid to Darfur.
The violence in that province has left at least 200,000 people dead and forced more than two million people from their homes, according to the United Nations. Sudan disputes those estimates, saying 9,000 people have died.
“For too long the people of Darfur have suffered at the hands of a government that is complicit in the bombing, murder and rape of innocent civilians,” Bush said.
“My administration has called these actions by their rightful name, genocide. The world has a responsibility to help put an end to it,” he said.
Bush, speaking at the White House, accused Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir of using military forces and government-aligned militias to attack rebels and civilians in the violence-wracked region and blocking peace-making efforts.
The goal of the sanctions is to force Sudan to allow the full deployment of a UN peacekeeping force; disarm the Janjaweed militias; and let humanitarian aid reach the region, which is roughly the size of France, US officials say.
“President Beshir's actions over the past few weeks follow a long pattern of promising cooperation while finding new methods for obstruction,” said Bush, who warned Sudan's president in April that he had a “last chance” to cooperate.
Bush said he had directed US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to seek a new UN resolution broadening economic sanctions on Sudan's leaders, expand an arms embargo on Sudan, and bar Sudanese military flights over Darfur.
The stricter sanctions will bar another 31 companies, including oil exporters, from US trade and financial dealings, and take aim at two top Sudanese government officials, the Treasury Department said in a statement.
The two officials were identified as Ahmed Haroun, state minister for humanitarian affairs -- who has been accused of war crimes by the International Criminal Court in The Hague -- and Awad Ibn Auf, head of Sudan's military intelligence and security.
The assets of Khalil Irbahim, the leader of a rebel group that has refused to back the Darfur peace deal, would also be blocked, it said.
China, which supplies arms to Sudan and buys more than half of the African state's oil output, said new sanctions would only complicate the crisis in Darfur.
“These willful sanctions and simply applying pressure is not conducive to solving the problem,” said Liu Guijin, China's special representative on Darfur. “It will only make achieving a solution more complicated.” But Liu stopped short of saying China would use its Security Council veto power to block the new UN resolution, saying: “I don't think we have come to that stage.” China also faced pressure from European nations over Darfur.
French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said he had discussed the humanitarian corridor proposal with China's Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi at a meeting of Asian and European foreign ministers in Hamburg, Germany.
Kouchner said he had also discussed the French proposal with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Monday, even as the French foreign ministry said it was open to ramping up UN sanctions.
“We will examine whatever proposals are made about a possible toughening,” of international sanctions, said ministry spokesman Denis Simonneau. Britain came out in support of the new US sanctions.—AFP
