Washington – U.S. officials took a forceful role Wednesday in peace negotiations between Darfur rebels and the government of Sudan, pushing through revisions of a proposed agreement in an effort to restart the stalled talks, senior State Department officials said.
Sudanese government officials seemed to welcome the U.S. effort, intended to end the carnage in Darfur, which has taken more than 180,000 lives.
But spokesmen for the rebels, who had objected to the accord as initially framed, said the changes did not go far enough.
The peace negotiations are underway in Abuja, Nigeria.
The revisions put forth Wednesday, the officials said, would direct Sudan to disarm the government-backed militias in Darfur more quickly and to induct more members of the rebel forces into the Sudanese army.
But the officials added that more revisions were possible.
Abduljabbar Dosa, chief negotiator for the largest and most important rebel faction of the Sudanese Liberation Movement, said “certain demands are not negotiable,” including the creation of a single state out of the three states of Darfur.
That would give Darfur more political clout in Khartoum, the Sudanese capital.
African Union mediators have extended to midnight tonight the deadline for concluding the negotiations, which have been underway fitfully for almost two years.