From the Stockhouse board:
BAMAKO, May 23 (Reuters) - The United States will soon
appoint a coordinator for diplomatic efforts to end civil war in
southern Sudan, Secretary of State Colin Powell said on
Wednesday.
Powell told reporters on his plane to the Malian capital
Bamako, the first stop on a four-country tour of Africa, that
the planned appointment represented the Bush administration's
increased interest in Sudan.
"In the very near future the president will be appointing,
or I'll be appointing, an overall coordinator for our political
and other efforts to try to bring some peace to that very
troubled country, to see if we can help them along," Powell
said.
"I expect that our interest in Sudan and our efforts to
solve the problems in Sudan -- humanitarian, political and
economic and otherwise -- will also increase," he added.
Andrew Natsios, administrator for the U.S. Agency for
International Development (AID), has served as the U.S.
coordinator for humanitarian relief work in Sudan, but without a
political mandate.
When he took office in January, Powell made a point of
eliminating many of the special envoy posts that proliferated
under former U.S. President Bill Clinton, including the position
of special envoy on Sudan.
But members of the U.S. Congress and U.S. Christian groups,
alarmed by reports of human rights abuses in southern Sudan,
have been pressing the Bush administration to pay Sudan more
attention and appoint a replacement envoy.
In recent testimony to Congress, Powell said he envisaged
cooperation with the Sudanese government for the sake of peace,
but only if Khartoum met certain conditions, such as an end to
Sudanese airforce attacks on southern towns and villages.
The civil war began in Sudan in 1983 when black Africans
from the mainly Christian and animist south took up arms against
the Arab-dominated Muslim government in Khartoum to demand
greater autonomy.
Millions of people have died as a direct or indirect
consequence of the fighting.
Powell will discuss the Sudanese conflict with Kenyan and
Ugandan leaders later this week, but he does not plan to meet
Sudanese officials or rebels of the Sudan People's Liberation
Army. |
