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Sudan: UN to contribute additional support to AU troops in Darfur

Sudan: UN to contribute additional support to AU troops in Darfur

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The United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) today told officials from the country’s Government and the African Union (AU) that the world body will be sending additional support for African troops in the war-torn Darfur region.

The United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) today told officials from the country’s Government and the African Union (AU) that the world body will be sending additional support for African troops in the war-torn Darfur region.

UNMIS made its announcement in Khartoum at the sixth meeting of the Tripartite Mechanism, which brings together the AU, UN and Sudanese Government, saying that 21 military staff officers and 10 civilian staff members have been recruited to be included in the Light Support Package staff to be deployed to assist peacekeepers who are part of the AU Mission in Sudan (AMIS).

The Light Support Package is the first phase of a three-stage approach aimed at ultimately deploying an almost 20,000-strong UN-AU hybrid peacekeeping force.

The Mechanism was created last year to oversee the provision of UN support to AMIS in Darfur, where at least 200,000 have been killed and 2 million others forced to flee their homes since rebel groups took up arms against Government forces and allied Janjaweed militias in 2003.

Last November, representatives from the three sides came to the agreement that the UN would offer AMIS extra support as part of a three-phase process which will ultimately lead to the creation of a hybrid UN-AU mission.

The next Tripartite Mechanism meeting is scheduled to be held at AMIS headquarters on 18 April.

Meanwhile in Darfur, UNMIS reported that over 1,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs), mostly women and children, arrived at Hamediya camp in West Darfur last week. These IDPs claimed to have fled violence at the hands of the Abala tribe, and said that many of their men were killed.

UNMIS also said that it had been informed by a village chief in Southern Sudan, close to the country’s border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Uganda, that his village had been attacked by armed men last week who looted food stocks and kidnapped six girls between the ages of 12 and 17.