Despite two years of war, the UN does not have a coherent position on Darfur, writes Justin Kilcullen
The UN's emergency relief co-ordinator for Sudan, Jan Egeland, said this week that 180,000 people were now thought to have died in Darfur in the past 18 months as a result of disease and malnutrition.
However, the debate in the UN Security Council has, as usual, been conducted behind closed doors. The council has not been formally convened to discuss the draft resolution on the issue. Everything is supposed to be agreed in a gentlemanly fashion beforehand in case the public gets to see any unseemly argument over the killing fields of western Sudan.
With one-third of the population of Darfur now having been forced out of their homes, the members of the council have a point. Who would want to defend their squalid positions in public when oil, arms sales and ideology are given greater importance than people?
Kofi Annan has repeatedly called on the Security Council to take firm action and many officials have clearly exposed the worsening situation. UN agencies such as the World Food Programme have joined with non-governmental relief organisations to help save many thousands of lives in Darfur.
However, among the 15 members of the Security Council, some powerful governments have put their own perceived interests ahead of the suffering in Darfur. China's veto looms large at the UN, and it has said that it would kill any resolution threatening sanctions on Khartoum. It is the largest customer for Sudan's rapidly-growing oil exports as well as being a major investor in the petroleum industry there.
Russia is also a significant exporter of arms to Sudan - a lucrative market which has thrived under the arms embargoes imposed by the US and the EU. Additional MiG-29 fighter jets were delivered by Russia last year while the aerial bombing of civilians in Darfur continued.
For Algeria's government, Arab solidarity has meant supporting the regime in Khartoum rather than the almost entirely Muslim population of Darfur.
In the US, meanwhile, the specially-appointed commission of inquiry reported to the UN in January that, while genocide had not taken place, the crimes perpetrated in Darfur were no less heinous. A bulky sealed dossier with evidence against more than 50 named individuals was presented, with a recommendation that the matter be referred to the International Criminal Court. But the US is among the few countries in the world to oppose the court. It thus found itself aligned with Algeria and China on this question.
The resolutions on Darfur passed by the Security Council in July and September last year were weak and were watered down further during negotiations. Seven months later, tens of thousands of people have died; the numbers displaced have continued to grow to record levels; and the attacks on civilians continue. The process of disarming the Janjaweed militias has not even begun, despite specific commitments given by Khartoum.
Rebel groups such as the SLA and JEM are also far from blameless, having been responsible for looting relief convoys and killing or kidnapping aid workers.
NGOs in Darfur face growing obstruction, attacks and harassment. The Save the Children Fund has been forced to pull out of south Darfur. Staff members from SUDO, one of Trócaire's partner organisations, have been arrested. The chairman, Dr Mudawi Adam, was detained in January and was only allowed to see his family as a result of pressure from the UN after he had gone on a hunger-strike. He has now been charged with "attempting suicide" because of his protest. His colleague, Abeed Abd Al-Rahman, has not been heard from since being arrested last September, and his family does not know if he is still alive.
A year ago, we said that if people were not allowed to return to their lands in time for the rainy season in May, an entire harvest could be lost. Now the same warning must be given again: only two to three months remain before the start of the rainy season, and missing that will mean another 15 months without the means to survive.
Last November, the Abu Shouk camp for displaced people on the outskirts of El Fasher was being referred to with some irony by relief workers as the "Hilton": it was a model camp for almost 50,000 people, with better services and food supplies than many others. Now its numbers have swollen to some 90,000, as people have fled renewed attacks.
Displaced people gathered in Abu Shouk can read the messages filtering down from the Security Council: they are starting to make bricks for semi-permanent housing as they realise that their chances of going home in the medium term are not good.
The African Union forces deployed in Darfur have made a real difference to people's safety, but only about half of the 3,320 troops promised have arrived. Meanwhile, although a peace deal is in place to end the separate war in southern Sudan, a new conflict is emerging (as predicted) with the Beja people in the east.
Sustained attention from the international community is now needed. All parties must be told that they have to implement the agreements already in place. If the governments of China, Russia and Algeria have a morally-defensible argument for blocking action at the UN Security Council, it would be interesting to hear it.