Sudan refused to grant visas for a U.N. military assessment mission planning a U.N. peacekeeping operation in Darfur, a U.N. spokesman said on Wednesday. The Khartoum government has not consented to U.N. troops to augment the African Union soldiers currently trying to stop the killing and rape in Sudan's Darfur region. But officials said they would discuss it after a peace pact, under negotiation in Abuja, Nigeria. Salim Ahmed Salim, the African Union's chief mediator at the Abuja talks between the government and two rebels groups, told the Security Council on Tuesday he expected a ceasefire deal by April 30 but acknowledged frustrations lay ahead.Hedi Annabi, a U.N. assistant secretary-general for peacekeeping, went to Khartoum this week and spoke to President Omar Hassan al-Bashir and other officials about sending the U.N. team to Darfur. "They felt this was not the time for a U.N. assessment mission to go into Darfur until the Abuja process was completed," U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. "We have a clear political line from the Sudanese at this point." But Dujarric said planning continued and options for an eventual force in Darfur would be presented to the Security Council. "It's much more a bump in the road than the end of the road for us in terms of contingency planning," he said.
U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said, "That's clearly a mistake that undercuts our ability to do contingency planning."
Still, there has been hesitation among African Union officials about placing their 7,000 troops in Darfur under U.N. command. North African Arab nations support Sudan.
More diplo-speak at the link...