Sudan has warned the United Nations of "serious consequences" for its staff and facilities if the International Criminal Court issues an arrest warrant for President Omar Hassan al-Bashir over Darfur, a U.N. envoy said on Monday.Addressing the U.N. Security Council, Ashraf Qazi, head of the U.N. mission charged with monitoring a 2005 peace accord between Sudan's north and south, said the mission was preparing for any such actions.
"The government has conveyed to me that the issuance of an arrest warrant against President Bashir could have serious consequences for U.N. staff and infrastructure in Sudan," Qazi said, without specifying where the threat might come from.
"We are taking all necessary precautionary measures including strengthening our cooperation with Sudanese security institutions," Qazi said.
On July 14, ICC Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo charged Bashir with masterminding a campaign of genocide in Darfur, western Sudan, and asked the court for the warrant. The Hague-based court has yet to issue a decision.
Khartoum has acknowledged the distinction between the ICC and the mandate of the two peacekeeping missions in Sudan, Qazi said. However he noted the Bashir government had called the ICC prosecutor's action a political and not a legal move.
The missions in Sudan are UNMIS, a 10,000-strong U.N. force that aims to ensure the north and south comply with the 2005 peace deal that ended two decades of civil war, and UNAMID, a joint operation with the African Union in Darfur.
International experts and U.N. officials estimate at least 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million have been driven from their homes in Darfur since mostly non-Arab rebels took up arms in 2003 accusing the central government of neglect.
Daniel Bases,
Sudan.
7 comments:
Huyu anatakiwa afungwe maisha maana matatizo aliyosababisha nchini kwake ni makubwa sana, sasa sijui hawa wanaomlinda wanamaana gani.
Regardless of what one makes of the idea of international justice, an arrest warrant would be a historic move that many human-rights experts believe will further erode that sense of impunity shared by dictators the world over.
And the atrocities in Darfur began long after al-Bashir took power and supposedly turned "moderate and civilized." This guy need to be answerable for what he did to uor fellow africans
As far as I know Al-Bashir's government played a key planning role in the Darfur conflict, which has killed some 300,000 people and displaced 2.5 million in five years
This is a danger guy
Despite Sudan's having garnered the support of China and Russia, it is now all but certain that the nation will not manage to persuade the U.N. Security Council to suspend the investigation or force the ICC to postpone its decision for a year.
Chinnaelion
India
According to the ICC prosecution documents, Bashir's strategy caused 35,000 violent deaths
But genocide is extremely difficult to prove, and even among human rights experts there is no consensus that it occurred in Darfur. Some analysts believe the ICC will push forward only with the charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
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