U.N. Security Council Trip to Put Pressure on Sudan

John C. Danforth, Washington’s ambassador to the U.N., had a grand vision for this week’s rare Security Council trip to Africa.

The council’s 15 members would fly to Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, and pound the table for action on two issues: the conclusion of a peace treaty to end the country’s 21-year civil war between the northern-based government and southern rebels, and an end to recent violence in the western region of Darfur that has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced 2 million.

But because of stiff political resistance from Sudan’s government -- and a few council members -- the panel will get only as far as Nairobi, Kenya, where the north-south peace talks are being held. Though it is far from Khartoum, Danforth, who has spent years trying to end Africa’s longest-running war, hopes it will be close enough to get something done.

“This has dragged on for an unbearably long period of time. It’s time to reach a conclusion,” he told reporters last week, without any attempt to mask his frustration.

The special session in Nairobi on Thursday and Friday will mark only the fourth time in more than 50 years that the council has met outside its New York headquarters.

The meeting represents a high-profile test of whether the council can help Sudan’s government and the southern rebels walk the last difficult steps toward peace -- without losing sight of the problems in Darfur. It is a tricky balance that has, so far, eluded the council.

“The trip has been characterized as a high-stakes roll of the dice,” a senior U.S. official at the center of the peace talks said. “I don’t think it’s that. It is a weapon in the U.N. arsenal that is very rarely used, but it shows how serious the Darfur-Sudan situation is that we would use it.”

The council will come bearing some sticks, but mostly carrots, Danforth said, to persuade Sudan’s government and the southern rebels to work together. The peace has been three years in the making, and because he helped launch the process as the Bush administration’s special envoy to Sudan in 2001, Danforth hoped the council would be able to celebrate a freshly minted peace deal in Nairobi.

But now he is merely hoping that the two sides sign an agreement Thursday that will commit them to finalizing a peace pact by year’s end. Senior officials from the U.S. and Sudan say privately, though, that talks probably will not finish until early next year.

Under outlines of the pact that have already been negotiated, Khartoum would share power with its erstwhile enemies and allow the south to vote on self-determination in 6 1/2 years.

When the two sides conclude the long-sought deal, the Security Council will probably reward Sudan with a major package of international debt relief and reconstruction funds. The package, to be designed by the World Bank and other international agencies, could be worth more than $100 million.

“If we get some sort of commitment to finish the peace talks, then all of us will do what it takes to get them there in terms of expertise, diplomatic pressure, financial side deals -- whatever it takes,” the U.S. official said.

Danforth is hoping that ending Sudan’s long-running civil war will help resolve its more recent conflict in Darfur. There, the government’s attempt to put down a rebellion with proxy militias has escalated into what the U.N. has deemed “the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.” The world body is investigating the situation as a possible genocide. It has already been deemed one by the U.S. government.

Tens of thousands of villagers have been killed and about 2 million driven from their land. Now huddled in temporary camps, the displaced people still face attacks from militias and uncertainty about their future.

Although the council has twice warned that it might impose sanctions on Khartoum because of the situation in Darfur, Sudanese officials have divined a reluctance on the council to make good on the threat.

Khartoum has sought to use its participation in the peace talks with the southern rebels to avoid reproach over Darfur. The government’s main negotiator, Ali Osman Mohammed Taha, even threatened not to come to Nairobi if the Security Council put too much emphasis on the violence and humanitarian crisis in Darfur.

As council members prepared to board their plane to Nairobi on Tuesday, they were still arguing over how far to push Khartoum on its lack of action to prosecute pro-government militias in Darfur and protect civilians.

Danforth said that the council stood ready to penalize Sudan if it reneged on promises to do those things. But he also argued that the 3,300 African Union peacekeepers now being deployed to Darfur represented the best chance to halt the violence and ensure refugees’ safe return home.

At the core of his strategy, though, is the idea that ending Sudan’s north-south civil war will help spread stability, and bring international attention to Darfur. Even John Garang, leader of the southern rebels, has said that the accord could be a model for Darfur.

But none of it is working yet. Last week, just after Khartoum signed a security agreement with two rebel groups in Darfur, police stormed a refugee camp with bulldozers and tear gas, trying to force the inhabitants to go back to their razed villages. And rebels have renewed attacks and kidnappings, hoping to provoke a retaliation by the government that would attract the world’s attention.

Human rights groups and senior U.N. officials have urged the Security Council not to let the Darfur issue hinge on the civil war peace talks in Nairobi.

“We want to tell them, don’t leave Darfur in the dust,” said Jemera Rone, a longtime Sudan specialist at Human Rights Watch.