Chad president urges rapid deployment of EU troops

CHAD’S president issued a “solemn call” yesterday for a planned European peacekeeping force to quickly deploy to Chad to ease pressure on his forces after days of fighting left hundreds dead in the Central African country.

The EU force’s mission is to protect refugees from Sudan’s conflict-wracked Darfur region that borders Chad and civilians displaced by fighting in Chad. The deployment, delayed earlier by logistical problems, was put off again because of the rebel attack on Chad’s capital.

President Idriss Deby, in a radio interview with Europe-1, said that “to be guarantor of 300,000 Sudanese refugees, 170,000 displaced Chadians, this is a big weight and it takes a lot of our strength.”