Annan urges Security Council to take action against killings, displacement in Darfur, Sudan

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan, saying the evidence pointed to crimes committed by the Sudanese Government, militia and rebel forces, today urged the Security Council to act urgently to stop further death and suffering in the strife-torn Darfur region and "to do justice for those whom we are already too late to save."

He addressed the Council as it received a report from UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour on the findings of the five-member International Commission of Inquiry on the conflict in Sudan's vast region in the west.

"The Commission has established that many people in Darfur have been the victims of atrocities perpetrated on a very large scale, for which the Government of Sudan and the Janjaweed are responsible - including war crimes and very likely crimes against humanity," he said.

"The Commission has also found credible evidence that rebel forces are responsible for serious violations, which may amount to war crimes."

The panel recommended referring those responsible for the Darfur situation to the International Criminal Court (ICC) so that their crimes would not be left unpunished, he said.

In her briefing, Ms. Arbour underscored that point by saying that referring the matter to the ICC is “the only credible way” to bring the perpetrators of the crimes to justice since the measures taken so far by the Khartoum Government to deal with the crimes have been “grossly inadequate and ineffective.”

Most estimates put at 70,000 the number of people killed since the conflict began two years ago, with another 1.65 million internally displaced and 200,000 more who fled over the border into Chad.

While concluding that the Government had not committed genocide, the Commission said it found that Government forces and militias had committed crimes against humanity that "may be no less serious and heinous than genocide."

It listed the indiscriminate killing of civilians, torture, enforced disappearances, destruction of villages, rape and other forms of sexual violence, pillaging and forced displacement.

Rebel forces were also responsible for possible war crimes, including the murder of civilians and pillage, it said.

"As others have said before me, while the United Nations may not be able to take humanity to heaven, it must act to save humanity from hell," Mr. Annan said.

"This report demonstrates beyond all doubt that the last two years have been little short of hell on earth for our fellow human beings in Darfur. And, despite the attention the Council has paid to this crisis, that hell continues today."