Sudanese Justice Minister Abdel-Basit Sabdarat said the prosecutor will investigate long-standing accusations by the international community that hundreds of thousands of black Africans in Darfur have been slain and raped in a genocidal mission carried out by government-backed Muslim militiamen, the Sudan Tribune reported Wednesday.

The move may have come too late, however, to save Sudan President Omar Hassan Bashir from an arrest warrant being issued for him by the International Criminal Court in The Hague, observers say. The court's chief prosecutor has requested such a warrant be issued for Bashir.

Hadi Shalluf, who was appointed Bashir's defense counsel for the Darfur case at The Hague, told the Tribune that any step by Khartoum to investigate Darfur war crimes is "too late. Sudan could have moved to prosecute war criminals a long time ago," he said.