Sir Emyr Jones Parry, UK Ambassador to the UN, urges Sudan, AU to back UN force for Darfur

AFP report March 1, 2006 says Britain's UN envoy Emyr Jones Parry urged Khartoum and the African Union (AU) not to reject a plan to replace the AU force in Darfur with a robust, Western-backed UN force. Excerpt:

"We would like to see the AU take a decision imminently to actually say we carried the burden, we carried it with dignity and that at this stage the best plan would be for the United Nations to take over that operation," Jones Parry said.

"The AU is certainly sending mixed signals at the moment but the previous report (in January) was unequovical that this should be handed over (to the UN)," Jones Parry told reporters here.

"The best thing the African Union and the government of Sudan can do in the next week or so is to agree the handover so that the whole resources of the UN can be mobilized to actually improve the situation in Darfur which has deteriorated recently" both in security and humanitarian terms, he added.