Washington, DC — The United States is waiting for Sudan to act responsibly in the Darfur crisis and is not planning a military intervention, said Charles Snyder, principal deputy assistant secretary of State for African Affairs.
Speaking at a Foreign Press Center news conference Tuesday, Snyder and Kim Holmes, the Assistant Secretary of the Bureau of International Organization Affairs stressed their support of the United Nations draft resolution on Sudan as a means of addressing the Darfur crisis. "If Khartoum does not comply with the resolution's demands, the Council will consider more stringent action, such as imposing sanctions on the Government of Sudan," Holmes said.
The U.S. removed the word "sanctions" from the UN resolution Thursday, replacing it with "intention to consider further actions," which U.S. officials say maintains the implicit threat of sanctions, the BBC reported.
John Danforth, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, hopes to have a Security Council vote on the resolution by the end of the week.
The resolution gives the Sudanese government 30 days to disarm the Janjaweed militias who have committed many of the atrocities in Darfur. The resolution will consider further actions against the government of Sudan if it does not comply with disarmament. These considerations include sanctions, an arms embargo, and a travel ban against the country.
Seven members of the Security Council, Russia, China, Pakistan, Algeria, Angola, the Philippines and Brazil oppose the sanctions clause.
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"I think everyone on the Council agrees about the urgency of the matter," Holmes said. "We have not seen anyone on the Council raise a fundamental objection to the need to do something about this problem."
Nine votes are needed to pass the resolution.
"The main thrust of this resolution is to try to get the focus on the obligations and responsibilities of the government of Khartoum to solve the problem as quickly as possible," Homes said.
Snyder and Holmes were pressed by reporters to state whether the humanitarian crisis in the Darfur, Sudan meets the legal requirements of genocide. If the Darfur conflict meets those requirements, than signers to the 1948 Genocide Convention are compelled to act to stop the genocide. Holmes responded by saying that the UN resolution will encourage the Sudanese government to help its own people.
"Whether or not it is called genocide, atrocities - whatever label that you put on it - it's clear to everybody who knows the facts on what's happening in this region that there's a terrible human tragedy going on," Holmes said. "What we really must do is try to move very quickly in the Security Council: on the humanitarian aid front, in the diplomatic front, to try to get access to this region, to try to get aid in there as quickly as we can."
