Darfur: New hats--and not much more

The Ottawa Citizen writes this in an editorial:

[...]

It should begin with Canada using all its resources and its will to ensure that the long-delayed United Nations/African Union force for Darfur is fully deployed and properly equipped...

Here's the reality:

A joint United Nations-African Union (AU) force took charge of peacekeeping in Darfur on Monday, seeking to end almost five years of fighting in the western Sudanese region.

The force replaces a struggling AU mission. The plan is for it ultimately to comprise 20,000 soldiers and 6,000 police, but numbers are currently only about a third of those levels.

AU troops swapped their green headgear for U.N. blue berets to mark the handover at a ceremony held in front of a big crowd and amid tight security at a base in El-Fasher in the north of the region.

[...]

There are currently around 7,000 troops and 1,200 police in the AU force.

Ethiopia and Egypt will each send 850 troops early in the new year to serve with a joint United Nations-African Union force in Sudan's Darfur region, an AU official told Reuters in Addis Ababa on Monday.

"Ethiopia and Egypt will send a battalion, numbering 850 troops each , as the first batch of their contribution to the UN-AU Joint African Peacekeeping force in Darfur," Assane Ba, spokesman for the AU Peace and Security Commission told Reuters.

"Troops from Asian countries are also expected to be deployed in Darfur early in the new year," he added.

Ethiopia has pledged to deploy up to 5,000 troops to the joint mission...

How does the Ottawa Citizen propose, in practical terms, that Canadian "will" can "ensure" anything there? Pure tripe. But there is some realism here.

Mark C.

Posted by markc at January 3, 2008 10:30 AM