U.N. to Send 10,700 Peacekeepers to Sudan

The Security Council on Thursday authorized 10,700 troops and police for southern Sudan to monitor a fragile peace that has followed the end of the country’s 21-year civil war, but will not send soldiers to the violence-torn western region of Darfur.

To resolve a deadlock over possible sanctions and a war crimes tribunal for Darfur, the United States separated the section on peacekeeping from a broader resolution to get the U.N.’s blue-helmeted soldiers on the ground as quickly as possible, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said.

In an interview Thursday with the Los Angeles Times, Rice said that negotiations “had gone on too long, circling around about our disagreements rather than on the things that we agree, which is there ought to be a peacekeeping arrangement.”

The U.S. plans to propose a resolution next week on sanctions against militia and government leaders who undermine the peace agreement or perpetrate violence in Darfur. Washington appears to have broken through resistance from China, Russia and Algeria by making sanctions apply to future violations only, overlooking transgressions committed in the past.

“We have been, frankly, disappointed that there are those who don’t seem to ... see the need for this kind of sanctions resolution,” Rice said. “We’re working with the Chinese and the Russians and others who have been reluctant to have one.”

A stalemate over how to prosecute those charged with war crimes has been even tougher to break. France has introduced a resolution, expected to be voted on next week, that would refer cases to the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

Although the State Department has designated the systematic attacks by pro-government militias in Darfur as genocide, U.S. opposition to the ICC has delayed action on accountability for war crimes. To allay Washington’s concern that the world court could be used for politicized prosecutions, the French proposal includes immunity from the court’s jurisdiction for Americans.

The U.S. has offered the idea of a tribunal in Tanzania backed by the African Union, and Nigeria put forward a sketchy plan for an African panel on justice and reconciliation. Neither has gained support in the Security Council, where nine of the 15 members are party to the ICC.

Even Britain, the United States’ frequent ally, dismissed the two proposed alternatives to The Hague. “The only option is to send it to the ICC,” said British U.N. Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry. “That’s what it was created for.”

Thursday’s resolution directs the new mission to work with an African Union contingent in Sudan “with a view toward expeditiously reinforcing the effort to foster peace in Darfur.”

The African Union has about 2,000 soldiers and monitors in the country but says it has little power to intervene in sporadic attacks against civilians and aid workers by militias and rebels. This week, a U.S. Agency for International Development worker was shot in the face in Darfur during an ambush of a humanitarian convoy.

Diplomats say they have not lost sight of the ravaged region. More stability in the north and south may help bring peace to the west, said Stuart Holliday, U.S. assistant ambassador to the U.N.

“We remain very concerned and disturbed by the situation in Darfur,” he said. “We will continue working with our council colleagues to address that important question in the days ahead.”

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Times staff writer Sonni Efron in Washington contributed to this report.