About one-third of the planned 26,000 personnel deployed Monday on the mission, the Financial Times said. Sudan's government refused non-African forces from Thailand, Nepal and Scandinavia and U.N. member states haven't provided all necessary hardware for the mission, The Times said.

The 9,000-member force, called Unamid, took over command Monday from Amis, an all-African force.

Since the conflict began in 2003 about 200,000 people have been killed, many by pro-government militias, and 2.5 million people have been driven from Darfur, the paper said.