KHARTOUM, 3 August 2004 — Sudan’s army has vowed to fight any foreign military intervention in Darfur, even after the government reluctantly accepted a UN demand to end the killing and atrocities in the troubled region within 30 days.

The World Food Program meanwhile announced it had started to airdrop supplies to some of the hundreds of thousands of people displaced by the conflict, as Arab foreign ministers said they would meet in emergency session on Sunday to discuss the crisis.

As international concern gathered further momentum, a European Union mission was to head to Darfur today to evaluate how the EU could help implement a cease-fire there.

“The Security Council resolution about the Darfur issue is a declaration of war on the Sudan and its people,” armed forces spokesman Gen. Mohamed Beshir Suleiman told the official Al-Anbaa daily.

“The Sudanese Army is now prepared to confront the enemies of the Sudan on land, sea and air,” he said.

The general’s warning came after the Security Council’s decision to pass a watered-down resolution Friday threatening “international measures” against Sudan if it did not rein in its troops and Janjaweed militia allies blamed for much of the slaughter in the western area of Africa’s largest country.

On Saturday, the Sudanese government — which has repeatedly promised to act on the crisis — reluctantly accepted the UN resolution, reversing an earlier stand, a minister said.

“Although we don’t like the resolution, we are already committed to the implementation of its measures on the basis of the agreement that was concluded with (UN) Secretary-General Kofi Annan,” the minister of state for foreign affairs, Neguib Al-Kheir Abdul Wahab, told AFP.

Abdul Wahab was referring to an agreement between the government and the United Nations earlier in July under which Sudan agreed to disarm the Arab militias and take a range of other measures.

Friday’s Security Council resolution, which avoided the term “sanctions”, made no mention of possible use of force, although foreign officials have spoken of sending troops to Darfur to try to force an end to the crisis.

The African Union has said it may transform a planned protection force into a “full-fledged peacekeeping mission” to force the Janjaweed to lay down arms.

The pan-African body already has plans to send some 300 troops to Darfur to protect its team of observers and monitors overseeing the implementation of a shaky cease-fire deal between the militia and ethnic minority rebels.

Arab diplomats said proposals to deploy an Arab unit as part of the African force would top the agenda at Sunday’s emergency foreign ministers’ meeting.

“The participation of an Arab force in the African Union protection force in Darfur will be one of the main items on the meeting’s agenda,” a senior Arab diplomat said in Cairo.