Peacekeepers face logistics nightmare

Khartoum: It will take weeks to deploy more peacekeepers to Darfur even once reinforcements arrive because of the difficulties of operating in the remote region of western Sudan, the force commander said on Friday.

Only 9,900 of the 26,000 soldiers and police in the UN-African Union force have been deployed and the target of getting 80 per cent on the ground by the end of the year looks increasingly unlikely to be met.

The slow arrival of peacekeepers has been blamed on both Sudanese delays and UN bureaucracy.

Force commander Martin Luther Agwai said that even once troops arrive, there was a problem moving vast quantities of weapons, ammunition, vehicles and generators across thousands of kilometres of hostile terrain from Sudan's only port.

Equipment

"It cannot be anything less than eight weeks to move one container to Darfur," he said, adding that the equipment had to move from Darfur's main towns to the force's remote bases.

"We are looking at the issue of using railways, we are looking to get more aircraft from friends to move the equipment, we are looking at other options all over," he added.

International experts estimate 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million been driven from their homes since mostly non-Arab rebels took up arms in Darfur in 2003, accusing central government of neglect. The UN-African Union mission is supposed to protect civilians but the absence of a peace deal in Darfur makes its task even more difficult.

At full strength it should be the world's largest UN-funded peacekeeping mission.

Agwai, a Nigerian, said 335 Egyptian engineers just deployed had brought 1,000 containers of equipment with them.

Those engineers will help build barracks for the soldiers in the northern Darfur sector. Chinese engineers will build barracks for the south and UNAMID is awaiting a Pakistani engineering company for West Darfur.