§ Lord Aveburyasked Her Majesty's Government:
What assurances the Prime Minister received during his visit to Khartoum that the Sudanese Government would facilitate the deployment of African Union peacekeeping troops in Darfur; and whether agreement has been reached on where these troops should be stationed, on the numbers and on the timescale for their deployment. [HL4331]
§ The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean)During his visit to Sudan, my right honourable friend the Prime Minister secured agreement from the Government of Sudan to a five-point action plan. The first point in this plan was agreement to co-operate fully with an expanded African Union (AU) ceasefire monitoring mission.
On 20 October the AU Peace and Security Council endorsed a plan to expand the current mission from fewer than 500 staff to more than 3,000. This expanded mission will operate out of eight sectors and will be deployed over three months. As the Prime Minister announced in Addis Ababa on 7 October, the UK will provide £12 million to support the expanded mission.