KHARTOUM, 18 September 2006 — A group of Sudanese voluntary organizations marked the “Global Day for Darfur” yesterday by staging a protest denouncing the worldwide solidarity event as a Jewish conspiracy. “Zionists, go to hell,” “Resistance will continue till the end,” shouted some 150 representatives of Sudanese civil society organizations opposed to the deployment of UN peacekeepers in war-torn Darfur.

Sudanese civil society groups called on the United Nations yesterday to re-allocate any money earmarked for peacekeepers in Darfur toward humanitarian aid and development instead. In a written statement to the United Nations, they rejected rising pressure on Sudan to accept the deployment of more than 20,000 UN peacekeepers to Darfur, where political and ethnic violence has killed tens of thousands of people since 2003 and has worsened in recent months.

“It is more productive for international organizations propagating the continuation of war and conflict to adopt peace building and support humanitarian activity in Darfur,” the statement by the Sudan Council of Voluntary Agencies said. The statement said deploying an international force would “only add to the complexity of an already volatile situation,” and said funds would be better spent on development, confidence-building measures, and peace-building.

The protesters, many of them women, chanted “Down, down, USA” and waved banners vowing to resist the deployment of a UN force. One protester vowed to turn himself into a suicide bomber to fight any troops. “We will explode ourselves. We will be explosive forces, suicide forces,” said protester Youssef Aboul Qassem. Another protester carried an effigy dressed in a white burial shroud representing the United Nations in Darfur.

Some 30 human rights groups worldwide have made yesterday a day of international solidarity with Darfur, a western Sudanese region where three and half years of war and famine has left up to 300,000 dead. The international community, led by the United Nations and the United States, has called for an embattled contingent of African Union monitors to be replaced by a more robust force of UN peacekeepers.

But the Sudanese government has consistently rejected the option, accusing Washington and the West of seeking to invade the country and plunder its resources. In Khartoum, the protesters dispersed peacefully after marching to the UN compound, waving banners and chanting slogans against the world body.

Fathi Khalil, the chairman of the pro-government Sudanese Bar Association, accused Jewish organizations of having “pressured America and Britain to sponsor resolution 1706,” which calls for a UN deployment in Darfur. “They are Jewish organizations which are known for their hostility to the Sudan and which have used the international media to present the Darfur crisis as a global one that is identical to the Holocaust,” the lawyer told AFP.

“Most of the people outside know nothing about the Darfur conflict,” said El-Gemiabby Mohamed, a civil society activist. “We have to press for a cease-fire and let the Darfur people solve their problems.” “But the solution is not to add another military force in Darfur. The solution is to force all the groups to come and sit down and talk.”

The mandate for a 7,000-strong poorly equipped African Union peace-monitoring force expires on Sept. 30, and Sudan has said it would be allowed to extend its mandate only if it remains under AU control. “We don’t want them (UN troops) to come to our country. We don’t want to be another Iraq,” said Abla Mahdi Abdel Moneim, one of the protesters. “If they come here, they will fail.”

In London, Christian, Muslim and Jewish leaders delivered a plea and said prayers outside the Downing Street residence of Prime Minister Tony Blair. In Rwanda — scene of a 1994 genocide which some have evoked in comparison with the Darfur crisis — survivors of the 100-day slaughter that killed 800,000 people called for action. “When I think of the people in Darfur today, it makes me sick to the stomach because I know what it’s like to watch your protectors walk away and I know the fear of waiting for help that never comes,” said survivor Didier Sagashya.