Darfur sanctions on Sudanese and Chadian leaders still deadlocked as ICC considers prosecutions?

On Feb 28, 2006, Fred Bridgland noted at Institute For War & Peace Reporting that the UN Security Council met on Feb 27 to consider sanctions against officials deemed to be a threat to the peace effort or human rights in the area. Excerpt:

"The UN Security Council decided last March to impose an asset freeze and travel ban on anyone who hinders the peace process or violates human rights.

It asked a special panel headed by Antonio Cassese to come up with sanction recommendations, and last December the Italian judge gave the council a secret list of names of people he said should be punished.

The list, which was subsequently leaked to the press, includes Sudan's interior minister Elzubier Bashir Taha, intelligence chief Salah Abdalla Gosh and three rebel commanders of the Sudan Liberation Army, which has targeted civilians and aid workers during its insurgency against the Khartoum government. It also names five others against whom the panel is considering recommending sanctions, including Sudan's president Omar Hassan al-Bashir and President Idriss Deby of Chad."

Unless I've missed something, there has been no further news on this following the UN Security Council meeting on Darfur held March 21, 2006.



Photo: Britain's UN Ambassador Sir Emyr Jones Parry (left) Jackie Sanders, Deputy US Ambassador to the UN (center) and John Bolton, US Ambassador confer after a Security Council meeting on Darfur at UN HQ in New York March 21, 2006 (AP Photo/David Karp)
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AU chief and UN chief pow-wow

On Monday, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan called for his fellow Africans to work together to end violence that is holding back the world's poorest continent.

Mr Annan also met with the new African Union chief Denis Sassou-Nguesso, saying afterward the two leaders discussed lynchpin elections in Ivory Coast and Congo and ongoing violence in Darfur.



Photo: Current head of the 53-nation African Union and President of the Congo, Denis Sassou-Nguesso (right) and UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan (left) seen during a meeting at the city of Brazzaville, Congo, March 20, 2006. (AP Photo/Anjan Sundaram)



Photo: NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer looks on as US President George W. Bush (R) makes remarks from the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC. See AFP/ST report Bush hopes to see NATO "take the lead" in Darfur (Photo AFP/JIm Watson/ST)

Note on Feb 22, 2005 The White House's website posted a transcript of a meeting that day between President Bush and NATO Secretary-General de Hoop Scheffer held at NATO HQ in Brussels, Belgium.