SERIOUSLY UNDERMANNED
The United Nations has warned that the peacekeeping force remains seriously undermanned -- with only 9,000 out of a promised 26,000-strong force on the ground -- and poorly equipped. The force was sent to keep the peace in a remote region about the size of France.
Law and order has collapsed in Darfur where U.N. officials say five years of conflict have killed up to 300,000 and driven 2.5 million from their homes. Khartoum puts the death count at 10,000 and accuses Western media of exaggerating the conflict.
Nigeria, the country that has contributed the most soldiers to the current force, has borne the brunt of some of the worst violence against peacekeepers in the region.
At least 12 soldiers were killed after armed raiders, thought to belong to a splinter rebel faction, attacked a Nigerian-manned base in the eastern Darfur town of Haskanita in September.
UNAMID is in the process of erecting a memorial stone to around 60 international peacekeepers killed since they first arrived in Darfur on 2004. Ban was "deeply saddened" by the accident, the U.N. statement said.
UNAMID troops held a minute's silence this week in memory of 45 Nigerians killed in a road crash in Nigeria on Wednesday after returning from duties in Darfur.
Troubled peace negotiations between Sudan's government and Darfur rebels were left in ruins this month, when the powerful insurgent Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) launched a shock attack on Khartoum.
Government officials vowed they would never negotiate with JEM after the attack. State media late on Thursday reported the lawyers were finalising cases against a number of people arrested on suspicion of taking part in the May 10 raid on Omdurman, a suburb of Khartoum.
Aid workers running the world's largest humanitarian operation in Darfur have warned that deteriorating security is having a serious impact on their work.
The U.N.'s World Food Programme said it was cutting humanitarian deliveries by half and forced a sharp cut in rations for aid-dependent Darfuris from May after a surge of bandit attacks on its convoys.
