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A U.N. fact-finding mission’s new report on gross human rights abuses in Darfur must be made public before the U.N. Commission on Human Rights votes Thursday on a key resolution on Sudan, Human Rights Watch said today.

Earlier yesterday, a fact-finding mission from the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) was due to present its findings on Darfur to the U.N. Commission on Human Rights. The mission recently spent 10 days in Chad interviewing Sudanese refugees who had recently fled the conflict in Darfur.

Unexpectedly, OHCHR decided yesterday not to release its report on Darfur to the Commission, which on Friday will conclude its annual six-week session. The decision came at the same time as a move by the Sudanese government, which had denied OHCHR access to the country for the past two weeks, to finally grant it travel authorization. The Sudanese government had allegedly called for a delay in the release, arguing that the report would be “incomplete” without a visit to Sudan.

“Denying the United Nations access is one of the delaying tactics the Sudanese government is using to pull the wool over the eyes of the international community,” said Joanna Weschler, Human Rights Watch’s U.N. Representative. “The High Commissioner’s office has an obligation to present the best available information on Darfur to the Commission while it is still in session.”

The OHCHR mission is not the only high-profile mission to have had access delayed in the past few weeks. A second mission that was supposed to be led by Jan Egeland, U.N. Under-Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs, was postponed twice in the past week due to lack of travel authorization by the Sudanese government. These delays followed Sudanese government assurances of access.

Each week of delay is critical in Darfur, where the imminent rainy season threatens to further limit access to displaced civilians. Hundreds of thousands of people have been victims of crimes against humanity committed by government forces and allied militias, and many are currently concentrated in camps and settlements around the major towns, where they continue to be attacked and looted by government-backed militias. More than 750,000 people are estimated to have been forced from their homes in Darfur, and more than 120,000 people have crossed the border into Chad.

Humanitarian assistance and protection in Darfur remain minimal. If concrete improvements in the security situation are not made, there is a serious risk of man-made famine and epidemics.

“Commission members must insist on real access for humanitarian and human rights monitors, and reinstate the post of a special rapporteur for Sudan,” Weschler added. “If they don’t, they will be allowing the Sudanese government to get away with murder.”

The Commission, which is scheduled on April 22 to vote on a resolution on Sudan, should unequivocally condemn crimes against humanity and other abuses committed by Sudanese government forces and allied militias in Darfur, call for a human rights monitoring presence in Darfur and reinstate the mandate for the special rapporteur for human rights in Sudan under item 9 of the agenda, Human Rights Watch said.

Background

Since February 2003, the Sudanese government and its allied Arab militias have waged a brutal war against a rebel insurgency and its perceived civilian base in Darfur. Government military operations have mainly targeted civilians who share the same ethnicity as members of the rebel groups. Government forces and allied militias have killed thousands and have forced more than 750,000 people to flee their homes within Sudan and another 120,000 to seek refuge across the border in Chad.

In interviews with Sudanese refugees in Chad, Human Rights Watch researchers documented widespread and systematic abuses committed in Darfur by government forces acting in complicity with the Arab militias known as “janjaweed.” Refugees consistently described indiscriminate aerial bombardment of civilian villages, the looting and burning of their homes by government forces and militia members, and incidents of murder, rape and abductions of women, children and the elderly.

On April 7, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan urged in a speech to the Commission on Human Rights that “international humanitarian workers and human rights experts be given full access to the region, and to the victims, without further delay.” He stressed that if such access was denied, the international community must “take swift and appropriate action.”

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