A divided UN Security Council approved a resolution threatening oil sanctions against Sudan unless the government reins in Arab militias blamed for a killing spree in Darfur and ordered an investigation of whether the attacks constitute genocide.
The vote Saturday was 11-0 with four abstentions -- China, Russia, Pakistan and Algeria.
China, a permanent council member with veto power, said immediately after the vote that it would veto any future resolution that sought to impose sanctions on Sudan.
"I told the American government that the position of my government on sanctions is a firm one," said China's UN Ambassador Wang Guangya. "We always believe that sanctions is not a helpful means to achieve political objectives. It will only make matters worse."
The resolution adopted Saturday says the council would have to meet again to consider sanctions against Sudan's petroleum sector or other punitive measures if the government doesn't act quickly to stop the violence and bring the perpetrators to justice -- or if it doesn't cooperate with an African Union monitoring force.
The resolution strongly endorses the deployment of a beefed-up African Union force with an expanded monitoring mission that would actively try to prevent attacks and mediate to stop the conflict from escalating. More than 50,000 people have already died and over 1.2 million have fled their homes to escape the violence.
It also authorizes Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who was in the council chamber for the vote, to rapidly appoint an international commission to investigate reports of human rights violations in Darfur and determine "whether or not acts of genocide have occurred."
Last week, US President George W. Bush's administration for the first time called the attacks "genocide," a crime punishable under a 1948 UN convention.
Sudan's UN Ambassador Elfatih Erwa said the government would implement the "unfair" resolution despite "the injustices it contains." He accused the US of introducing it solely to achieve "the political objectives" of Bush's administration and Congress -- a charge immediately rejected by US Ambassador John Danforth.
While the US Congress "believes it is the only conscience of the world, and indeed that they have the divine right to decide on the destinies of peoples," Erwa said, millions of people see "the shortcomings and the faults" of the US including the killing of civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq and inflicting "torture on prisoners and innocent people in prisons in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo."
Danforth denounced the "unseemly and uncalled-for attack on the United States."
"President Bush's interest in Sudan has been intense, maybe ever since he took office," said Danforth noting that the president appointed him as his envoy to Sudan five days before the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.
"This is not something that comes in an election year. This is something that he has ... been personally involved in for a long, long time."
But China's Wang appeared to agree with Erwa, saying some council members questioned the timing of the resolution in relation "to domestic politics."
Bush is up for re-election on Nov. 2 in a close race with Democrat John Kerry.
The US revised the resolution three times, each time softening language to try to get broader support and avert a Chinese veto. It was only after a last-minute meeting between Danforth and Wang, who unsuccessfully sought additional changes, that Beijing said it would abstain rather than exercise its veto power.
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