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Darfur death toll may be 300,000, say UK lawmakers
30 Mar 2005 19:59:34 GMT
Source: Reuters
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(Adds comment from Sudanese ambassador to Britain paragraph 8) By Madeline Chambers LONDON, March 30 (Reuters) - As many as 300,000 people may have died in Sudan's western Darfur region in a conflict the international community is doing too little to stop, a British parliamentary report said on Wednesday. It also urged the United Nations Security Council to impose sanctions on Darfur and refer war criminals to the International Criminal Court (ICC). "The world's failure to protect the people of Darfur from the atrocities committed against them by their own government is a scandal," said Tony Baldry, chairman of the cross-party International Development Committee. The committee said it believed around 300,000 people may have died, far higher than previous death tolls which it said had underestimated the scale of the disaster. It said it based its figure on estimates from U.N. Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland. The World Health Organisation previously estimated that 70,000 people had died from hunger and disease in Darfur between March and October 2004, but with hard figures difficult to get, the toll has been fiercely contested. Sudan's ambassador to Britain, Hassan Abdin, rejected the new figures as pure fantasy. "This figure is just really another guesswork. They simply jumped to the conclusion that it must be more than double that without showing how they have come to arrive at this figure. It is statistical anarchy," he told Channel Four News. Rebels took up arms more than two years ago, accusing Khartoum of neglect. Sudan's government admits arming some militias to quell the rebellion but denies links to Arab militias known as Janjaweed who are accused of raping, killing and looting. Two million people have fled their homes. The report was written before a Security Council vote on Tuesday which imposed a travel ban and an asset freeze on those responsible for atrocities against civilians in Darfur or those who violate the ceasefire. The new resolution also strengthens an arms embargo. But Council members remain deadlocked over where to try perpetrators of atrocities. The Security Council is expected to discuss on Wednesday a French-drafted resolution which would refer those accused of war crimes in Darfur to the ICC, but the United States may veto that. The report urged the British government to press the United States to give up its opposition to using the ICC. The committee also urged governments to put more pressure on Sudan to improve policing. And it said the African Union's 2,000-strong ceasefire monitoring force needed a stronger mandate and more troops. "As a first next-step, the AU should do more pro-actively to police the no-fly zone ... and be provided with the logistical and technical support to enable it to fulfil its mandate," the report said. Parliamentary committees have no legislative power, but their recommendations can put pressure on governments.
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