UNITED NATIONS, Dec. 28 (UPI) -- U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan says Sudan has accepted a plan leading to the deployment of a hybrid United Nations-African Union force in war-torn Darfur.
Sudan's President Omar el-Bashir sent a letter to the outgoing secretary-general following intensive diplomatic activity involving Annan and his envoy, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, who recently went to Khartoum for talks with Bashir and other senior Sudanese government ministers on how to end the widespread suffering in Darfur.
"The President has accepted the three-phased approach as a package, and we will have to move ahead and implement it, push it and ... test it," Annan Wednesday told reporters following a closed-door meeting of the Security Council.
Council members are "encouraged by the positive tone" of Sudan's response, he said, noting the United Nations already is in the process of carrying out the first phase. It involves deploying U.N. police advisers and military officers to Darfur.
"We are going to move very quickly on that," he said, calling this "a way of testing the government's willingness to cooperate."
By a "light support package," 24 police advisers and 43 staff officers will start to be deployed in the next few days.
Under an initial $21 million support package to the AU, agreed upon last month, the U.N. Mission Sudan, a previously installed peacekeeping operation in southern Sudan, will provide 105 military advisers, 33 police officers and 48 civilian staff, as well as equipment.
The secretary-general said the United Nations would work with the Chairman of the AU to name a joint special representative and the commander "who hopefully will bring some fresh ideas" to the operation.
Asked about his level of confidence in Bashir, Annan said, "For now, the letter is positive."
