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The Sudan oil deals are part of the bigger picture/context. However, I don't think it should distract us from the need for a stronger UN mission to the Darfur area and again the last thing the area needs is US military intervention. I would imagine the troop composition would be similar to that of the UN troops in southern Sudan to oversee a separate peace deal there (see details below). Having a mobile and empowered UN force on the ground in Darfur (western Sudan) can expand on the work of the African Union (AU) troops and be instrumental in reducing the number of people killed by, among other things: (1) proving security for the civilian population caught in the conflict, sometimes with things as simple as having escorts, as the AU troops have done in a few places, for refugees who need to leave the refugee camps to gather wood (2) disarming the local militias. I wrote about this here earlier.

As an example of troop composition the current UN mission to southern Sudan, which overseas a separate peace deal there, is headed by an Indian Lieutenant general and has:

Contributors of military personnel:
Australia, Austria, Bangladesh, Belgium, Benin, Bolivia, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Canada, China, Croatia, Denmark, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Fiji, Finland, Gabon, Germany, Greece, Guatemala, Guinea, India, Indonesia, Italy, Jordan, Kenya, Kyrgystan, Malawi, Malaysia, Mali, Moldova, Mongolia, Mozambique, Namibia, Nepal, New Zeland, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Republic of Korea, Romania, Russia, Rwanda, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Tanzania, Thailand, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe

Contributors of police personnel:
Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, China, El Salvador, Fiji, Finland, Ghana, India, Jamaica, Jordan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Namibia, Nepal, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Philippines, Russia, Samoa, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Tanzania, Turkey, Uganda, Ukrain, United States, Zambia and Zimbabwe
(source UN site)

For more from the official UN site on Sudan go here you can also find a Sudan pdf map.

by Alexandra in WMass (alexandra_wmass[a|t]yahoo[d|o|t]fr) on Mon Mar 6th, 2006 at 10:16:28 AM EST
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