Sudan rejected genocide charges on Monday against its president for crimes in Darfur and one top lawmaker said his government could no longer guarantee the safety of UN staff in the troubled region.
Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir appeared late on Monday at an elaborate law signing ceremony in Khartoum, where dozens of lawmakers, diplomats and military leaders paraded past him cheering. The president waved a wooden cane and smiled as advisers danced and a brass band played nationalist songs.
Human rights groups, meanwhile, said they feared a government backlash that could further hurt aid operations in Darfur, as many as to 300,000 have already died.
Deputy parliament speaker Mohammed al-Hassan al-Ameen told state TV that Sudan was unable to guarantee “the safety of any individual.”
“The UN asks us to keep its people safe, but how can we guarantee their safety when they want to seize our head of state?” al-Ameen said.
The International Criminal Court (ICC), where genocide charges were filed on Monday against al-Bashir, is not related to the UN, though the UN Security Council referred the Darfur case to the court.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s spokesman issued a statement stressing the court’s independence and saying UN aid workers should be allowed to continue their work in Sudan. Sudan’s government is obligated to ensure the safety of UN staff and property, the statement said.
Nevertheless, rights groups said they were girding for possible retaliation against any aid workers, UN personnel or foreigners in Sudan.
“There are risks involved and many people and commentators have warned that there could be a backlash from the Sudanese government, that they’ll stop cooperating with the United Nations, that they may attack humanitarian workers,” Human Rights Watch’s London director Tom Porteous told Associated Press Television News.
The joint UN-African Union peacekeeping force in Darfur was evacuating nonessential staff and cutting back on “a limited number of operations that carry security risk to civilian staff,” spokeswoman Shereen Zorba said on Monday. But all peacekeeping duties were still being carried out by soldiers, she said.
The force had already increased its security posture after seven peacekeepers were killed in an ambush in Darfur last week.
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