UN envoy is told to leave Sudan

BBC NEWS
UN envoy is told to leave Sudan
The Sudanese government has given the UN envoy in Khartoum, Jan Pronk, three days to leave the country, according to media reports from Sudan.

It follows a statement from the head of the Sudanese army accusing Mr Pronk of spreading false information in an article on his personal website.

The official news agency Suna reported the deadline.

The Sudanese army had called for Mr Pronk to be thrown out, saying he was "waging war against the armed forces".

Resisting pressure

The Sudanese foreign ministry has given Mr Pronk 72 hours to leave the country," Suna said the AFP news agency reported.

"He has until mid-noon on Wednesday to leave," Foreign Ministry spokesman Ali al-Sadig was quoted by the Reuters news agency.

It said comments posted on his personal blog on a UN website that the army was suffering heavy losses in the Darfur region "negatively affects the work of the armed forces".

Sudan is resisting strong international pressure to allow UN peacekeepers to try and end the conflict in Darfur.

Former armed forces spokesman General Mohammed Beshir Suleiman told Suna that Mr Pronk's comments were part of the West's continuing efforts to get Sudan to accept UN troops into Darfur.

More than 200,000 people are thought to have died and two million displaced as a result of the three-year conflict in the Darfur region.

The UN Security Council has passed a resolution calling for 20,000 troops to be sent to Darfur to replace the 7,000 poorly-equipped African Union troops who have failed to end the conflict.

He wrote that there had been hundreds of casualties and prisoners taken, leading to a fall in morale and the sacking of generals.

He also said that pro-government Arab militias were again being mobilised in contravention of UN resolutions.

The Janjaweed militias are accused of widespread atrocities, even genocide.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/6074808.stm

Published: 2006/10/22 11:55:12 GMT

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