Blair Pushes For No-fly Darfur

Blair tried to sell his no-fly zone proposal during a recent meeting with EU leaders. (Reuters)

"There could be an agreement in the Security Council that there could be a no-fly zone," a well-informed Downing Street source told The Guardian on Wednesday, March 28.

Blair wants the no-fly zone included in a package of sanctions already under discussion among the Security Council members, including an arms embargo and freezing assets of Sudanese leaders implicated in the Darfur conflict.

According to Downing Street, Blair is pushing a Security Council resolution under "chapter 7" which allows the use of force to implement the measure.

"If the Sudanese government broke that agreement there would have to be consequences," said the source.

Given impracticality of enforcing a no-fly zone over a region the size of France, US and British officials are considering punitive air strikes against Sudanese military airfields in the case of any violation, according to The Guardian.

In 2004, France knocked out most of Ivorian military planes and helicopters on the ground in reprisal for the deaths of nine French peacekeepers in an Ivorian raid on rebel-held areas.

The Guardian said the no-fly-zone proposal was the brainchild of Blair amid skepticism in the Foreign Office and Ministry of Defense.

The idea will be a hard sell in the Security Council as China, a principal backer of Khartoum, is likely to oppose it.

Apathy  

"Thousands are dying in Darfur and we have a moral obligation not to send back anyone whose life is in danger," Sir Campbell said.

While Blair was pushing for much tougher international action against Sudan, his government was being scolded for its apathetic treatment of helpless Darfur asylum seekers.

"The Government's handling of this is a disgrace," James Smith, chief executive of The Aegis Trust group, told The Independent.

The pressure group blasted London's double standards as manifested in sending asylum seekers back to face death in war-ravaged Darfur.

"The government is talking tough about the Darfur crisis but on the other hand they are trying to send asylum-seekers back to face the regime that has burned their villages and murdered their families," Smith said.

The trust affirmed that the Home Office was trying to round up Darfuris before the judgment in a test case that could halt attempts to deport them.

"Thousands are dying in Darfur and we have a moral obligation not to send back anyone whose life is in danger," Sir Menzies Campbell, a Liberal Democrat leader, told the House of Commons Tuesday.

"Returning frightened and vulnerable Darfuri victims of ethnic cleansing to Khartoum is morally wrong and totally unacceptable," agreed Glenys Kinnock, a Labour MEP.

Mohammed Abdulhadi Ali, 39, fled Darfur after his village was burned to the ground by militias and came to seek sanctuary in Britain.

After two failed asylum claims, immigration authorities are now determined to send him back to Sudan next week.

"When I came to Britain I hoped I would be safe. Now they would like to send me back," Ali told The Independent from a detention centre at Heathrow airport.

"They don't care for human rights."