Sudan defiant against sanctions threat

Sudan is not afraid of a UN resolution threatening sanctions over the violence in Darfur, President Omar el-Bashir has been quoted as saying.

“We are afraid neither of the UN nor of its resolution,” state-run television quoted el-Bashir as telling a meeting of local political leaders yesterday in Khartoum. The report did not elaborate.

El-Bashir’s remarks came as Louise Arbour, the UN high commissioner for human rights, arrived in Khartoum in preparation for a trip to the western Darfur region to look into the humanitarian situation.

Western governments and international aid agencies maintain that government-backed militias burned and looted villages and raped or killed many inhabitants. The US has said genocide was being carried out.

Arbour met with Justice Minister Ali Osman Mohamed Yassin, who said his government was ready to assist her but that ”there is no genocide or cases of rape” in Darfur. The government has denied supporting the militiamen and rejected characterisation of genocide.

Sudan’s parliament speaker, Ahmed Ibrahim Tahir, was quoted by the official Sudan Media Centre as making similarly defiant remarks during a meeting of tribal leaders in Darfur.

“If Iraq has opened one gate to hell for the West, we are going to open seven gates,” Tahir was quoted as saying.

Such a UN resolution, according to a Sudanese Foreign Ministry official, will only make it harder for the government to calm an insurrection in the region.

But despite his criticism, Mutrif Sideeq indicated that his government would try to comply with the resolution meant to push it to rein in ethnic Arab militias accused of killing ethnic African villagers and creating an even deadlier humanitarian crisis.

The government is accused of backing the Arab militia as a strategy against rebels based among Darfur’s African tribespeople.