UN ON KALMA VIOLENCE: "WE COULD HAVE DONE BETTER"

UNCLAS USUN NEW YORK 000781 SENSITIVE SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PREL PGOV PHUM UNSC SU SUBJECT: UN ON KALMA VIOLENCE: "WE COULD HAVE DONE BETTER" REF: (A) KHARTOUM 1289 (B) KHARTOUM 1300 (C) KHARTOUM 1303 ¶1. (SBU) SUMMARY. UN Assistant Secretary-General Mulet told the Security Council on August 26 that early reports from Kalma IDP camp in Darfur confirm that dozens of civilians were killed or wounded in a cross-fire on August 25 between Sudanese security forces and some well-armed camp elements. Beyond saying that IDP camp residents should not have arms, that Sudanese authorities should not use deadly force in the camps, and that UNAMID might have reacted more quickly, Mulet was not assigning blame for the episode. UN staff was more critical privately of UNAMID's reaction to the crisis but said the greater problem was lack of coherent jurisdiction and capacity for camp security. END SUMMARY. ¶2. (SBU) UN Department of Peacekeeping operations Assistant Secretary-General Edmond Mulet briefed the Security Council on August 25 events at the Kalma Internally Displaced Persons camp in Darfur during closed consultations on August 26. Mulet said UNAMID Nyala sector south HQ received a letter from local Sudanese authorities at 8:00 am on August 25 inviting UNAMID to participate in the execution of a search warrant at the camp. He said UNAMID command assembled a response team (including medical personnel from an NGO), notified Khartoum-level Sudanese authorities, departed Nyala HQ in six APC's at 12:30 pm, and arrived at Kalma some 20 kilometers away (after a long delay at Sudanese checkpoint) at 5:30 pm. ¶3. (SBU) Mulet said Sudanese security forces in 60 vehicles had massed outside the two main extrances to the Kalma camp by 7:30 am on August 25 with gunfire beginning at about 8:00 am and lasting until about 1:30 pm. He said it was impossible to say who fired first. He put casualties at 64 dead and 117 wounded inside the camp, many of them children, with no casualties reported from the government positions outside the camp. ¶4. (SBU) Mulet said UNAMID is continuing to investigate the episode. He noted that the IDP camp is a "safe haven" under international law with both the presence of weapons and the use of lethal force theoretically prohibited. He said the situation remains tense with government forces maintaining a heightened security presence around the camp and said the UN would remind the Government of Sudan of its obligation to respect humanitarian law. ¶5. (SBU) UN's Integrated Operational Team leader Michael Gaouette (protect) was more straightforward with Poloffs on the margins of the Council. He said, even while the UN investigates, "we know we could have done better." He scoffed at Nyala UNAMID HQ failing to understand the urgency of the situation in the face of what must have been cell phone reports from the scene, waiting hours to hear back from Khartoum and to assemble a response team, and taking hours to reach the camp even after they finally got underway. ¶6. (SBU) Gaouette said candidly DPKO has much to learn from this episode, admitting that he does not know what authority issued the search warrants involved here, whether UNAMID and local Sudanese authorities have procedures in place for cooperating on the execution of search warrants, or who has jurisdiction for disarming camp residents. He sees potential for UNAMID to cooperate with both Sudanese authorities and rebel groups in the disarming of IDP camps, but quickly adds that UNAMID has little potential for realizing that potential at its present level of deployment. Wolff