Top UN official to discuss joint EU-UN force for Chad

UNITED NATIONS (AFP) - A top UN official said yesterday he would travel to Brussels next week for talks on deploying a joint European Union-UN force in strife-torn eastern Chad and north Central African Republic (CAR).

After briefing the Security Council on plans to protect civilians in the two countries from the spillover of conflict in neighboring Sudan's Darfur region, Jean-Marie Guehenno, head of UN peacekeeping operations, said he would take up the humanitarian crisis with EU ambassadors in Brussels early next week.

He said the talks would focus on how an EU military force would be articulated with a UN mission.

Guehenno said the plan was for the 15-member Security Council to authorize a EU military force along with "a multi-dimensional UN mission with a strong police component" that would help specialized Chadian forces ensure security in camps for refugees and internally displaced persons in the area.

He stressed that there would have to be close "coordination mechanisms" in the form of liaison offices between such a EU-UN force and the planned African Union-UN force that is to take over peacekeeping from cash-strapped AU troops in Darfur.

Khartoum last month accepted the deployment of the joint UN-AU peacekeeping force that will have some 20,000 soldiers in Darfur.

Sudan and Chad accuse each other of supporting rebel forces in their respective territories.

Last week, the Security Council expressed concern about the deteriorating security in northern CAR and reaffirmed its readiness to deploy a UN force in the area as well as in neighboring eastern Chad.

The northern half of CAR has for the past two years been hit by a flare-up of violence by bandits as well as by armed opponents of President Francois Bozize, triggering a brutal crackdown by government security forces.

Some 230,000 Darfur Sudanese have sought refuge in Chad and in recent months their numbers have been swollen by 160,000 locally displaced people fleeing cross-border violence.

According to UN estimates, at least 200,000 people have died of the combined effect of war and famine in Darfur since the conflict started in February 2003. Other sources give a much higher toll but Khartoum disputes the figures.