From SA, with thanks to Ali Dashti:
Khartoum – Crimes against civilians in Sudan’s troubled region of Darfur are continuing while aid workers are “terrorised” and subject to arbitrary arrest, the United Nations envoy for Sudan said on Wednesday.
Jan Pronk made the bleak assessment two days after a UN panel accused the Khartoum government of gross and systematic human rights violations in Darfur, but stopped short of labelling the violence in the region as genocide.
“Crimes against civilians are still going on in Darfur region of west Sudan,” he told reporters in Khartoum after a tour of Darfur, where tens of thousands of people have died in nearly two years of conflict between government forces and ethnic minority rebels.
I “saw myself burnt and destroyed houses in more than 12 villages which were attacked by militias”, said the UN envoy, adding that he had raised the issue with government officials as well as rebel leaders.
Pronk said he urged them to “stop the acts of violence which are making the innocent victims”.