UN urged to consider sanctions on Sudan

ABUJA - United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan urged the Security Council on Sunday to consider sanctions against Sudan for "gross violations of human rights'' in Darfur.

Saying a keenly awaited United Nations report on the desert region would be published shortly, Annan said: "Serious violations of international humanitarian law and gross violations of human rights have taken place.

"This cannot be allowed to stand and action will have to be taken,'' he told reporters in Nigeria during an African Union summit to which Darfur rebels also appealed for a peacekeeping force strong enough to disarm Arab militias.

"The Council had considered sanctions and had not been able to move forward because of some divisions in the Council. But I believe that sanctions should still be on the table,'' Annan said at the meeting in the capital Abuja.

Western powers argued for imposing sanctions on Khartoum last year, but opposition by China, which has oil interests in Sudan, and Russia, which supplies arms, blocked the motion.

The Sudanese government, accused of bombing towns in Darfur from the air, again traded allegations with rebel groups.

Annan declined to say whether the UN report detailing abuses in the vast desert region where 1.8 million people have been forced from their homes would, like the United States, describe it as "genocide''. The report would be made public after it is presented to the Security Council shortly, he said.

After years of tribal conflict over scarce resources in arid Darfur, two main rebel groups took up arms in February 2003 accusing Khartoum of neglect and of using Arab militias, known as Janjaweed, to loot and burn non-Arab villages.

Khartoum admits arming some militants but denies any links to the "Janjaweed'', whom it calls outlaws.

Tens of thousands have been killed in two years of fighting, many from disease and malnourishment.

- REUTERS