Seven Peacekeepers killed in Sudan's Darfur

I think this is the report from the other thread.

SEVEN PEACEKEEPERS KILLED IN SUDAN'S DARFUR
إقرأ هذا الخبر بالعربية
by Naharnet Newsdesk july 13, 2013 hours ago

Seven peacekeepers were killed on Saturday during an ambush in Sudan's Darfur region, the African Union-U.N. Mission said, marking the worst-ever losses in the five-year history of the operation.

The attack adds to worsening violence in Sudan's far-west region and happened near the peacekeepers' base at Manawashi, north of the South Darfur state capital Nyala.

"Seven peacekeepers were killed and 17 were injured," UNAMID's acting spokesman Christopher Cycmanick told Agence France Presse.

The incident occurred about 25 kilometers (16 miles) west of another UNAMID base at Khar Abeche, Cycmanick told AFP.

"The UNAMID team came under heavy fire from a large unidentified group. Following an extended firefight, the patrol was extracted by UNAMID reinforcements", a statement said.

UNAMID did not immediately give the nationalities of the victims, but Tanzanian troops are in charge of that area.

Earlier this month three Nigerian peacekeepers were wounded and an ambulance with their patrol was shot up in Labado, east of Nyala, Herve Ladsous, the U.N.'s Undersecretary General for Peacekeeping, said during a visit to Sudan.

The peacekeepers killed at least one attacker, he said.

More than 40 UNAMID members have died in hostile action since the mission's establishment in 2007.

But U.N. sources have said they were unaware of anybody previously being held accountable in Sudan for killing a peacekeeper, despite repeated U.N. calls for the perpetrators to be brought to justice.

In April, a Nigerian peacekeeper was killed and two others were wounded in an assault against their base east of Nyala.

At the time, local sources said that attack appeared to have been planned and carried out by government-linked forces, but authorities denied such a connection.

A U.N. panel of experts earlier this year reported that former members of government militias "have forcibly expressed their discontent with the current government," including through occasional cases of "direct attacks on UNAMID staff and premises".

Prior to Saturday, six other peacekeepers had been killed in attacks in Darfur since October.

Rebels have been fighting for 10 years in Sudan's far-western and have contributed to some of the unrest this year.

But UNAMID chief Mohamed Ibn Chambas has blamed inter-ethnic fighting for most of the violence, which displaced an estimated 300,000 people.

U.N. experts, human rights activists and tribal leaders have accused government security forces of involvement in this year's tribal fighting.

But Chambas said the nature of the disputes -- mainly competition for land, water and mineral rights -- made it hard to tell who was on which side as police and militia also had ethnic affiliations

A diverse group of critics from rebels to Darfur's top official, Eltigani Seisi, have expressed concerns about UNAMID's ability to safeguard the population, including 1.4 million displaced by Darfur's decade-long conflict.

On Saturday a humanitarian source told AFP the latest incident will make UNAMID more cautious.

"The only thing they will do in future is to make sure they stay safe, rather than investigating anything," said the source, asking for anonymity.

During his visit to Sudan this month Ladsous responded to the critics by saying that UNAMID, with about 20,000 military and police officers, "has the inherent robustness to deal with the situation."

But he admitted there have been a few cases where the peacekeepers' actions did not meet expectations.

On October 2 four Nigerian Blue Helmets were killed in an ambush near El-Geneina in West Darfur. At that time it was the deadliest attack in UNAMID history, U.N. sources said.

Rebels began their uprising against the Arab-dominated Khartoum regime in 2003.

Security problems have more recently been compounded by the inter-tribal fighting, kidnappings, carjackings and other crimes, many suspected to be the work of government-linked militia and paramilitary groups.

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Such a shame---I have my doubts that there will ever be peace in the region. Thanks for posting...

We just said
Those even more
Heroes

On Saturday a humanitarian source told AFP the latest incident will make UNAMID more cautious.

"The only thing they will do in future is to make sure they stay safe, rather than investigating anything," said the source, asking for anonymity.

As I read the story, I was wondering if this would mean they would pull back....and by this statement, it appears that they will. Depressing.

I'll say a prayer tonight to ask they be given courage and strength and wisdom and compassion to deal with the dark side.

Man's inhumanity to man due to greed, greed, greed.

DAR ES SALAAM (Reuters) - Tanzania said on Sunday it would seek a stronger mandate for peacekeepers in Sudan's strife-torn Darfur region after seven of its troops were killed in an ambush on Saturday.

The head of U.N. peacekeeping operations, Herve Ladsous, told Reuters in Paris that the situation in the area was "totally unacceptable".

Tanzania said 36 members of its contingent of soldiers and police had been ambushed by rebels some 20 km (12 miles) from Khor Abeche in South Darfur. Seventeen others were wounded, including two women.

"We are communicating with the U.N. on the possibility of strengthening the mandate of peacekeepers in Darfur to enable our troops to protect themselves against attacks," Tanzania's army spokesman, Kapambala Mgawe, told reporters in the east African country's commercial capital, Dar es Salaam.

"We want our troops in Darfur to be able to use force to enforce peace and defend themselves against future ambushes from rebels."

Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete expressed his grief over the casualties.

Law and order has collapsed in much of Darfur, where mainly African tribes took up arms in 2003 against the Arab-led government in Khartoum, which they accuse of discriminating against them.

More at link:



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SHAME ON THE UN
Rebecca Tinsley

Posted: 07/15/2013 7:10 pm

This week, seven UN/African Union peacekeepers were killed in Sudan's war-torn Darfur region. This brings the total number of peacekeepers killed there to 157 (1). At the end of this month the UN will vote whether to continue the world's most expensive mission, known as UNAMID. But until the UN gives the mission the political backing necessary to fulfill its UN Security Council mandate, more money and lives will be wasted, and the people of Darfur will continue to be terrorized, raped and killed.

CONTACT YOUR REPS TO DO SOMETHING
In theory the peacekeepers are in Darfur to protect civilians, but in practice they cannot even protect themselves. The latest ambush happened in an area controlled by one of the Sudanese regime's proxy militias. Khartoum has promised to investigate, as it always does. But to date no one has been brought to account for the deaths of other slain peacekeepers, or humanitarian aid workers, such as the two World Vision staff also killed recently in similar circumstances in Darfur.

Until recently the UN insisted Darfur had become less violent, and that people who had been ethnically cleansed by their own government were finally returning home (2). No mention was made of the continuing systematic rape of girls and women, or the destruction and looting of villages. The UN's claims were shown to be politically-motivated nonsense: since January this year another 300,000 unarmed civilians have fled to camps, such is the increasing level of terror (3). Ten years since the Khartoum regime began its policy of aerial bombardment of non-Arab villages, 1.4 million Darfuris (out of a population of six million) are in refugee camps over the border in Chad or struggling to survive without any protection in squalid internally displaced persons' camps (4).

The UN stopped counting the numbers of dead in Darfur at 300,000 in 2007 (5). For the same reasons in January 2009 the UN ceased publishing the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs' "Darfur Humanitarian Profile" on the dire conditions in Darfur, hoping that by appeasing the regime, the architects of the ethnic cleansing might have a change of heart (6). UN staffers admitted the chief UN aid official, Georg Charpentier, submitted his press releases to the regime for approval (7). No wonder the wretched people of Darfur are convinced the UN sides with their oppressors in Khartoum.

It is this track record of pandering that endangers the peacekeepers' lives. UNAMID officers know they have little support from UN officials further up the chain of command. If they challenge local Sudanese security services and authorities they are unlikely to receive the backing of their superiors whose priority, it seems, is to appease those responsible for the violence rather than challenge them. If the peacekeepers interpret their mandate broadly, trying to protect civilians from attack, or pointing the finger of blame in the aftermath of attacks, they risk their personnel with no guarantee the UN in New York will stand by them.

On a daily basis the Sudanese authorities invent new rules to prevent UNAMID performing its duties; bureaucrats stop their supplies reaching them; security officers require them to obey a curfew, rather than going out on patrol; Sudanese soldiers and police prevent peacekeepers reaching villages where there are reports of violence. But instead of demanding that Sudan fulfils its own promises, abiding by the international treaties and conventions it has signed, the UN fails to back its own staff.

At its most absurd, in 2007 the UN apologized to Khartoum after a local UN agency had revealed that the Sudanese were disguising their military planes as UN planes in order to ship weapons into Darfur, contrary to UN sanctions (. Meanwhile UNAMID is short of essential equipment, such as helicopters, necessary to protect unarmed civilians in imminent danger or monitor events in Darfur, both core elements of the UN mandate.

The indicted war criminals in Khartoum draw the correct conclusion from the UN's acquiescence: the UN secretary-general's occasional expression of disapproval counts for nothing while the UN fails to hold Khartoum to its international commitments. The UN could apply and enforce sanctions already passed by the Security Council -- personally targeted smart sanctions which would make the lives of the Sudanese leaders inconvenient. The UN could also terminate discussions on rewarding Sudan with much-needed debt relief. Yet it persists in believing Khartoum will respond favorably to further displays of spinelessness, rather than interpreting it as weakness to be further exploited.

For years Khartoum's proxy militia have harassed and killed UN staff, including peacekeepers. Their actions are met by nothing stronger than words of condemnation from UN headquarters in New York, signaling clearly that the Sudanese regime is at liberty to do as it wishes. And Khartoum breaches international sovereignty by bombing refugee camps in neighboring South Sudan, with no penalty (9). No wonder the soldiers of UNAMID are reluctant to risk their lives protecting civilians. We owe it to the memory of their dead colleagues, and to the Darfuris facing violence every day, to insist that, for once, Khartoum investigates and punishes those found responsible for the continuing loss of life in Sudan.

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The UN stopped counting the numbers of dead in Darfur at 300,000 in 2007 (5). For the same reasons in January 2009 the UN ceased publishing the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs' "Darfur Humanitarian Profile" on the dire conditions in Darfur, hoping that by appeasing the regime, the architects of the ethnic cleansing might have a change of heart (6). UN staffers admitted the chief UN aid official, Georg Charpentier, submitted his press releases to the regime for approval (7).

Wow. See no Evil. Hear no Evil.

Submitting the press releases to the regime for approval? Are you kidding me?

An update on the 14 injured in the above attack.
4 DARFUR ATTACK VICTIMS NOW IN CRITICAL CONDITION

The acting Force Commander, Lieutenant General Paul Ignace Mella from Tanzania, addresses troops based in Khor Abeche, South Darfur, after Saturday’s ambush that killed seven African Union-United Nations Mission peacekeepers and wounded 17 others. PHOTO | UNAMID

IN SUMMARY

• One of them has been airlifted to Khartoum for specialised treatment and is in intensive care, according to UN-Africa Mission in Darfur

Dar es Salaam. Four of the 14 Tanzanian soldiers who were wounded in Saturday’s deadly ambush in Darfur, Sudan, are in critical condition.

One of them has been airlifted to Khartoum for specialised treatment and is in intensive care, according to UN-Africa Mission in Darfur (Unamid) spokesperson Chris Cycmanick.

Mr Cycmanick told The Citizen on the phone from Sudan yesterday that the names of the critically ill soldiers would remain undisclosed. “At this time, Unamid cannot release these names, but you can contact your foreign minister to have them if they are that much in need,” he said.

In Dar es Salaam, Tanzania People’s Defence Forces (TPDF) spokesperson Colonel Kapambala Mgawe said the wounded soldiers were recovering in hospital, and confirmed that one had been taken to Khartoum.

“We are concerned about the condition of one of our soldiers, who is in a serious condition in a Khartoum hospital,” Col Mgawe said.

TPDF had by last evening not yet disclosed the names of the seven Tanzanian troops who were killed when gunmen ambushed them near their Unamid base. The names of the 17 wounded soldiers have also not been released.

Col Mgawe said on Sunday that a team of experts would travel to Khartoum and Darfur for talks with Sudan authorities over the attack.

Yesterday, Col Mgawe said preparations to receive the bodies of the slain soldiers from the United Nations were underway, adding that they would be taken to the Lugalo Military Hospital mortuary in Dar es Salaam, ahead of an official sendoff at the Ministry of Defence and National Service headquarters.

The bodies have been ferried to Khartoum from where they would be flown to Dar es Salaam.
The remains will then be transported to their respective home regions for burial after last respects are paid in Dar es Salaam.
Meanwhile, Norway has condemned the attack on United N ations peacekeeping forces in Sudan.

“The attack must be investigated and those responsible brought to justice,” said Norway’s Foreign Affairs minister Espen Barth Eide.

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Mazy thanks for keeping us up to date on the situation there! Very much appreciated.  

No problem ;~)

Mazy you are amazing...so good to keep us keyed into the reality of this world....Makes my post on other thread appear so ridiculous and banal.....x

Always read, always felt....x

what would he say wrote:Mazy you are amazing...so good to keep us keyed into the reality of this world....Makes my post on other thread appear so ridiculous and banal.....x

Always read, always felt....x

That is so not true if all we read was these kinds of threads it would cause a lot of depression. Life is made up of good and evil and we need that balance. I only got into checking on Darfur because of George. Trust me I cherish all the wonderful posts about him. I could not do what I do with out that source of information on him to even things out. I thank everyone for all the great info posted on here, I am just where I get this information.
Have a Good One.

X X X:thumbsup: 

depression
Great depression
Indeed

yep so true we need to balance it. The forum is perfect for it. Thanks Mazy for posting it.