2006年VOA标准英语-Sudan Rejects UN Resolution on Darfur Peacekeep

（单词翻译）

By Cathy Majtenyi
Nairobi
01 September 2006

The Sudanese government has expressed its strong opposition¹ to Thursday's United Nations' Security Council resolution that calls for a U.N. peacekeeping force in the volatile² Darfur region. Cathy Majtenyi reports for VOA from Nairobi.

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Sudanese Vice³ President Ali Osman Taha was among top government officials reported by the state news agency SUNA Friday as opposing the U.N. force. He was quoted as saying Sudan has "options and plans" to confront what he calls the international intervention⁴.

In reports Thursday and Friday, other members of the ruling National Congress party blasted the resolution, saying that Security Council members were split over what the Sudanese government terms a hasty vote.

On Thursday, the U.N. Security Council approved the deployment⁶ of 20,000 U.N. military and police personnel to take over from an African Union force in Darfur, which has seen an escalation⁷ of violence and chaos⁸ in recent months. But the troops would not deploy⁵ without Sudan's consent.

Welcoming the resolution are members of the Sudan Liberation Movement, one of several rebel groups operating in Darfur.  

		The Darfur region of Sudan

Stephen Missa Dhunya is a former member of Parliament, who is now supervisor⁹ of a disarmament project in Sudan. He says he supports the presence of a U.N. peacekeeping force, if it will help end the suffering of people in Darfur, but says he is doubtful that this will happen.

"We've seen U.N. forces everywhere, for example in Congo, or in Rwanda,” said Dhunya. “They don't seem to really take an active role in stopping whatever they were sent to stop. The U.N. forces are there, and still there is much killing¹⁰ going on, so I don't know what they are coming to do in Darfur."

An estimated 200,000 people have been killed and two million displaced by the three-year-old conflict involving government forces, rebel groups, and a militia¹¹ called the Janjaweed that many say is backed by the Sudanese government.

The African Union force sent in to provide security has come under heavy criticism for being under funded, ill-equipped and having few powers.

Earlier this year, the Sudanese government signed a peace agreement with one of the rebel groups involved in the fighting.

The government argues that it has the capability¹² to deal with the Darfur crisis, and that the presence of foreign troops is tantamount to an imperial invasion.

But aid groups, human rights officials and others argue that the U.N. needs to step in and avert¹³ the looming¹⁴ humanitarian¹⁵ crisis.