Rights Group: Sudan Violating Arms Embargo

A human rights group said that Sudan's government continues to violate a U.N. arms embargo in Darfur and urged the United Nations to give its planned peacekeeping force for the region the authority to confiscate weapons from combatants.

In its latest report on Darfur, London-based Amnesty International published photographs it said were obtained from credible witnesses supporting the claim of arms embargo violations.

The photographs were taken in July and purportedly show military shipments arriving at the Sudanese army airport in the West Darfur state capital of El Geneina, the group said Thursday.

The report came the same day that the Sudanese government expelled two Western diplomats for what was described as "meddling in its affairs," state media reported.

It was not immediately clear why the top Canadian and European Union diplomats were expelled, but many Western countries have been critical of the Sudanese government's role in atrocities committed in its Darfur region.

The two were summoned separately to the Foreign Ministry and were handed their expulsion notes, the official SUNA news agency reported, citing Foreign Ministry spokesman Ali Al Sadeq.

They were "involved in activities that constitute an intervention into the internal affairs of the Sudan, a matter that contradict their diplomatic duties and mission," the spokesman said.

Also Thursday, the U.N. chief called on the Sudanese military to remove troops remaining in southern Sudan, expressing disappointment that a July 9 deadline was not met as called for in the 2005 peace deal.

In a report to the Security Council circulated Thursday, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon also said the formation of joint military units comprising government soldiers from the north and former rebels from the south is significantly behind schedule.

He lamented that supposedly integrated units are operating separately, under different chains of command. One result, Ban said, has been continuing instability in some areas.

"In southern Sudan, the activities of some regular armed forces and local militias, the exploitation of oil resources and tribal insecurity continue to pose challenges for the protection of civilians," he said, singling out a May 5 attack by one tribe that left 54 members of another tribe dead, mainly women.

One photograph offered by Amnesty International as evidence of arms shipments into Darfur shows Sudanese soldiers moving containers from an Antonov cargo plane onto military trucks. Two others show Russian-supplied Mi-7 and Mi-24 attack helicopters at the airport, Amnesty said.

"Sudan flaunts its impudence of the U.N. arms embargo and peace agreements by persisting to send arms into Darfur," said Larry Cox, the group's director in the United States.

In 2005, the U.N. Security Council imposed a wide arms embargo on all parties in the conflict in Darfur, including the Sudanese government. It was a follow-up on a previous 2004 embargo that also included the government-armed janjaweed militia.

Brian Wood, a military expert at Amnesty's London offices, said that while there is no way of knowing what was in the photographed containers, the military aircraft at the El Geneina airport had arrived from Sudan's capital on flights that were not reported to or permitted by the U.N.

"And that means that those are violations of the Security Council arms embargo to Darfur," Wood told The Associated Press by telephone. "We have indicated that we know of similar flights with small arms and weapons to militia and armed groups that have attacked civilians in the past."

Amnesty's report also said air raids by Sudanese forces continued in Darfur, with strikes reported by the U.N. in North Darfur in late June. Sudanese forces also used Antonov aircraft for several bombing raids on South Darfur in August, near the town of Adila, the group said.

On July 31, the U.N. Security Council authorized the deployment of 20,000 peacekeepers and 6,000 civilian police in a joint U.N.-African Union operation for Darfur, which the Sudanese government had long resisted.

The peacekeeping mission is authorized to use force to protect and ensure freedom of movement for its own personnel and aid workers and to prevent armed attacks and protect civilians in Darfur.

But the U.N. resolution does not authorize the force to seize or collect arms.

"The U.N. Security Council must give U.N. peacekeepers the ability to remove weapons from all parties involved in the conflict," Cox said.

"Otherwise, the ability to effectively protect civilians and usher in a lasting peace will remain elusive."

More than 200,000 people have died in Darfur since ethnic African rebels took up arms against the Arab-dominated central government in 2003, accusing it of discrimination.