Sudanese protest against Darfur troops plan

TENS of thousands of Sudanese yesterday marched on the UN headquarters in Khartoum in protest at the possibility of Western military intervention to deal with a humanitarian crisis in the western region of Darfur.

In Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, a spokesman for the African Union (AU) said the organisation may boost the number of troops to be deployed in Darfur to 2,000 from 300, subject to the move being approved at a meeting of its members.

Protesters, many from organised pro-government groups but including many ordinary citizens, carried anti-American banners and chanted slogans attacking UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan for his close alignment with US policy.

"Annan, Annan, shame, shame," they shouted. "Annan, Annan, you coward. We will not be ruled by the Americans."

At least 35,000 people took part in the protest.

AU spokesman Adam Thiam said the troops proposal needed the approval of the AU's 15-member security body, the Peace and Security Council. The body would also look at broadening the original mandate of the AU force to include a peacekeeping role as well as protecting observers monitoring a ceasefire between the government and two rebel groups, he added.

There are 96 unarmed AU observers in Darfur, and Sudan has reluctantly agreed to an armed force to protect them.

The conflict has displaced more than one million people in Darfur, mainly as a result of the raping, looting and burning by the Janjaweed militias, which the government has used as auxiliaries in an attempt to suppress the rebellion by settled non-Arab peoples.

The UN Security Council has given Sudan 30 days to show it is serious about disarming and prosecuting the Janjaweed.

Yesterday's protest reflected the government's success in convincing ordinary Sudanese that Western military intervention in Darfur is an imminent danger. In fact, no countries other than those in the AU have gone beyond the preliminary planning stage, and the US has shown no inclination to send troops to Darfur.

But influential evangelical Christian groups are pressing President George W Bush to consider sending troops to stop what they and the US Congress call genocide in Darfur.

Hassan Ahmed, a Sudanese protester in his 60s, said: "If they want to send African troops, then those are from among us, but we will not allow a single American foot to rest on Darfur soil." He said he was not a government loyalist.

Khadija Adam, a woman from western Sudan, said: "I am not saying that things are not hard for us, but on the other hand we cannot allow them (the international community) to use this as an excuse to make us kneel to them."

The Sudanese government has said it will strongly oppose any attempt to send Western troops into Darfur, a vast arid region about the size of France.