UN
Sudan
Sanctions
Draft Slams
Visa Denial,
Darfur
Killings,
Bashir to
Libya?
By
Matthew
Russell Lee,
Exclusive
UNITED
NATIONS,
February 13 –
When Sudan
denied entry
to UN
sanctions
expert Schbley,
saying he was
on a blacklist
due to work on
the UN's
Somalia /
Eritrea
sanctions
panel,
Colombia's
Ambassador
Nestor
Osorio who
then chaired
the UN
Security
Council's
Sudan
Sanctions
Committee told
Inner City
Press it was
an “outrage”
that would be
reversed.
Now
with Colombia
off the
Security
Council and
Argentina
having come on
and taken over
the chair for
the Sudan
Sanctions
Committee,
Schbley
is still
blocked.
This
week began
closed door
consultations
on a draft
resolution to
extend
the experts'
mandate. Inner
City Press has
exclusively obtained
the
draft and is
putting it
online here.
At Operative
Paragraph 11,
the
draft
“Calls
on the
Government of
Sudan to
remove all
restrictions,
limitations
and
bureaucratic
impediments
imposed on the
work of the
Panel of
Experts,
including by
issuing timely
multiple-entry
visas to all
members of the
Panel of
Experts for
the duration
of its
mandate, and
by waiving the
requirement of
Darfur travel
permits for
said Panel
members.”
Some
on the Council
see this as
going too far,
into the
sovereignty of
Sudan. “Visas
are a
sovereign
decision,” a
non-Western
Council
member told
Inner City
Press on
February 12.
Another said,
“The US
throws drafts
like this down
and expects us
to just accept
them.”
A
third Council
member noted
that the US
has extended
the time to
negotiate the
draft. But
where will it
come out? The
draft also has
the Security
Council
“Further
deploring
the forcible
detention and
intimidation
by the
National
Intelligence
and Security
Services of
members of the
Panel of
Experts,
condemning the
simulated
attack by
Sudanese army
helicopters
on a UNAMID
patrol to
which the
Panel of
Experts arms
expert was
attached; and
deploring the
Government of
Sudan’s
refusal to
grant
admittance to
a member of
the Panel of
Experts, as
set out in
paragraphs 20
to 24 of the
Final Report
of the Panel
of Experts.”
Getting
more
specific, the
draft cites
Protection of
Civilians, the
topic of
the Security
Council's
all-day,
late-night
debate on
February 12:
“Urges
the Government
of Sudan to
respond to the
Committee
requests on
measures put
in place to
protect
civilians in
various parts
of
Darfur,
including
those affected
by new
displacements;
investigations
conducted and
accountability
measures
undertaken for
killings of
civilians and
perpetrators
of human
rights abuses
and violations
of
international
humanitarian
law (including
notably the
killings of
civilians in
Abu Zereiga in
June 2011,
Hashaba in
August 2012
and
Sigili in
November
2012)”
Meanwhile
some
report that
already
indicted
President Omar
al Bashir
plans to
travel not
only to Chad
but also
Libya. Watch
this site.
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